[CQ-Contest] Busted Skimmer Spots

[Dave Zeph]

Skimmers will decode any RF they finds - and there is PLENTY of RF in M/M's
such as K3LR.   All of this causes the generation of "Skimmer-busted calls"
such as LW3LPL (mentioned on the CQ Contest Reflector). LW3LR and many, many
variations such as K3LA, K3LE, K3RR, LT3LR, M3LR ....

The new Arc V6 was used at K3LR to Filter Spots sent to the RBN.  Two
instances of Arc V6 were run - one to feed the RBN Network - and the second
to feed the Win-Test Network.  The RBN software connected to an Arc V6
Server rather than directly to each of K3LR's 6 Skimmers (each Skimmer has a
Perseus radio).

Arc V6 has a DxSpotBlock Filter.  This uses calls from two files.  One file
contains the usual "Halloween calls" like G0RE.  The second file is named
MyDxSpotBlock.  The filtering worked fine once I solved a self-imposed
problem.

At the beginning of the Contest, some calls in the K3LR MyDxSpotBlock file
were being blocked, but others were not.  A lot of sleepless hours were
spent trying to figure out the reason.  About 4:00 AM Sunday morning a
logged error message led me to check the MyDxSpotBlock file and found that I
had entered the K3LR call twice.  K3LR was on this list to prevent
inadvertent "Skimmer Self-Spotting."

By the time the Contest ended, the K3LR MyDxSpotBlock.dat file had grown to
146 calls and most of the K3LR Skimmer-Busted Calls were blocked.


73 --- Dave, W9ZRX