[CQ-Contest] Busted Exchanges - how to log them?

[Sandy Taylor]

If the local got all the information he needed from the VE8, the contact
counts, even if it took a few tries.

I've overheard many contest Qs that go like this:

...contest
Whiskey Five Big Zipper
W5BZ, 59 4
OK, not sure what that means, you're 59 here in Bigwhoop, Oklahoma. Name
here is Fred. Runnin' a TS830S into a 3-element beam at 50 feet.
OK, thanks Fred, Sure appreciate you dropping by to help me in the contest.
If you want to work others, you can give them a signal report and Zone 4 for
the exchange, roger?
Um, no, name here's Fred, not Roger. What's this zone stuff, anyway?

(after a few words of explanation, and after Fred actually said 'four' (he
already gave the 59), Fred's on his way, the contact is logged and running
resumes)

There are very few contests, I can think of perhaps only one, where you are
only credited with contacts with stations who submit logs and I can see
nothing in any rules that prohibits stations from ekeing out QSOs by talking
casual ops through the required information.

As for the geographically challenged Norwegian operator, I would suggest
stating flat out that Zone 24 puts him in remote Siberia and asking for
confirmation. If he persists with Zone 24, log it and move on with a clear
conscience that you at least tried to do the right thing.

73, Kelly
Ve4xt


-----Original Message-----
From: cq-contest-bounces at contesting.com
[mailto:cq-contest-bounces at contesting.com] On Behalf Of R.S.Hradilek
Sent: July-28-08 5:20 PM
To: cq-contest at contesting.com
Subject: [CQ-Contest] Busted Exchanges - how to log them?

We've all been there. After hours of contesting, we come across a 
station that either isn't in the contest, or doesn't know his correct 
exchange. Sometimes it is a needed mult. Here are 4 scenarios:

.	He sends his CQ zone instead of his IARU zone.
.	He sends a serial number instead of a zone.
.	He sends a signal report, with no zone at all.
.	He sends a signal report, name and QTH, etc.

I worked a Norwegian station in the IARU who insisted that he was in 
zone 24. I made him repeat it, repeated it back to him, and logged it 
as 24 - a remote Siberian mult, but he couldn't have been there. His 
CQ zone is 14, so I guess he was sending a serial number and there 
were 23 guys who worked him before I did. He was not signing his 
callsign/mm.

I would think we are supposed to log it they way it's copied (but not 
count the mult). Many would simply log the correct zone (18). Maybe I 
should too. 

It comes down to the logic in the software used by the score 
checkers. They MUST have logic that detects the stations that bust 
their own exchange, so that serial numbers and other bad zone numbers 
are not counted as mults. I would hope they make the correction on 
their end, assuming there are others that log the actual sent 
information. If, however, I am the ony op that doesn't log him as 
zone 18, the log checking software would penalize ME for getting it 
right. Thus, I seek clarification.

I long ago decided that it is OK to log these stations. Back in the 
70's I tuned across a local who was trying to extract an approximate 
equivalent of SS exchange information from a clueless VE8. The 
following weekend at the local ham store I met one of his buddies in 
the DX club, who stated that this guy was the only one in the club 
that got a sweep. "No he didn't", I responded, and I explained. 
Subsequently, word got around that I had "accused" one of their 
members of "cheating", and I was blackballed from that well known DX 
club for 20+ years. I still havn't joined.

Since then, I have noticed that nobody seems to have a problem piling 
up on stations who simply send "5nn" as their exchange. Obviously, 
they are logging the contact, filling in the zone, and counting the 
mult. 

Roy -- AD5Q
Houston

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