[CQ-Contest] QZB (Suggestion)

[Mike Fatchett W0MU]

Rick and all,

The pileups on Sunday became insane.  Any DX that would LOUD had huge 
pileups and for the most part I would agree were pretty much zero beat.  
I know some of the DX had to be going crazy!  One station finally broke 
down and was calling for 7's and 0's  and that pileup was pretty tough.

I tried calling a number of stations a bit off frequency with little 
luck so it was back to zero beat.  Maybe most ops had their filter 
dialed down low?  With skimmer and RBN you can't really hide anymore.  I 
noticed a few ops changed frequencies in an attempt to flee a packet 
spot bomb.

I found that I had better luck working weaker stations from Colorado 
with 100 watts than the very loud stations who had huge pileups.

I look forward to you remote station write up as we have hopes to buy a 
place in the Carib where we can put up a "small" station.

Mike W0MU



On 2/21/2011 6:07 AM, K6VVA - Rick wrote:
> During my part-time long haul high-latency Internet remote operation as
> KP2CW in the ARRL CW DX Contest this past weekend, compared to observations
> as VP2VVA in 2009, I'll ballpark about a TEN FOLD INCREASE in the frequency
> (pun) of a unique type of packet cluster related pileup problem.  I predict
> this will get worse year after year.
>
>
>
> Not just your basic run-of-the-mill contest mini-pileups, but of the type
> where everyone was exactly ZERO BEAT (or within a few Hz) apparently as a
> result of point-and-click with no single station loud enough to rise above
> the pack.  I'm usually pretty good at grabbing partial calls (or fractions
> thereof) to respond to, but at times with a deluge of S9+20dB signals
> (possibly just the top 'layer') all starting and ending as a unison ZERO
> BEAT 'pumping mass', it was impossible.  The swarm would start and stop,
> start and stop in unison, until someone finally someone woke up and moved
> off dead center a bit or slipped in a QRQ call during the momentary lull.
> What a time waster for everyone.  During several of these episodic events, I
> actually sent 'you guys are all zero beat' in hopes the sharper ops would
> grasp what was happening on my end and take evasive action.  Without some
> kind of head's up, who can really tell what's going on unless they are on
> the 'other end' ?
>
>
>
> So.......
>
>
>
> Having a simple Q-Signal to alert everyone as to this type of 'Ground Hog
> Day' scenario on the other end of the pileup could be productive for all.
> I'd suggest 'QSO' (for 'Spread Out'), but that one is already taken in the
> list of Q-Signals.  Therefore, my suggestion is to use 'QZB' (a/k/a You guys
> are ALL ZERO BEAT) as a head's up to move UP or DOWN a tad from dead center
> for these types of point-and-click packet spot pileup nightmares.  Checking
> my log, I did not find one single entry for a station with the suffix 'QZB'
> which is good :^)
>
>
>
> For those interested in Remote Contesting, I'll include some details on the
> KP2CW 'tragedies and triumphs' experienced over the weekend in my upcoming
> 3830 post.
>
>
>
> FWIW&  73...
>
>
>
> Rick, K6VVA * The Locust
>
> Remote Contesting Advocate
>
>
>
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