[Fourlanders] W4NH January Contest Summary

[Bob Lear]

January VHF Sweepstakes, Fourlanders W4NH operating at W4ZST QTH EM84ao

Another contest under the belt (and plenty of food and beverages went 
there too) for the W4NH group.  I think things went pretty well, with 
only a couple of technical problems with amplifiers to gum up the works. 
  Those problems were solved and we went to the end of the contest with 
the poor propagation conditions and lack of activity on the bands.  We 
did score about the same as we have the past two years operating VHF 
sweepstakes from here, but that is the nature of VHF in January 
unfortunately.

The unofficial results are as follows.  We may enter as limited or multi 
but it probably won't matter.

6m  107Q 28 grids
2m   70Q 20 grids
222  17Q  8 grids
432  32Q 12 grids
903   1Q  1 grid
1296  5Q  3 grids

for a total of 232 Q's, 299 points and 72 grids making the final score 
21,528 before Brian looks at the logs and submits them.

We had a small army of visitors this time.  More than for any other 
contest.  I had a total of 33 counted including the kids who visited.  I 
didn't get an exact count for the Saturday evening meal, but it was at 
least 22 I think.  Someone commented that outside there were so many 
cars scattered about that it looked like they had been shook out like a 
large cup of dice!  Maybe I need to 'lime' out some parking places!  A 
lot of the visitors were first timers and maybe some of them will even 
come back after experiencing the mayhem!

As usual Jeff came through with some great meals.  We did get caught 
off-guard for Saturday evening as we ended up with more folks than we 
had actually planned for, but thanks to our good friends Chris and Mary 
Porter who brought some fine BBQ Pork and Brisket from "Cue" in Milton 
and some Brats that Chris smoked on the grill at home, they supplemented 
Jeff's great Brunswick stew and southwest cornbread. Everyone had plenty 
to eat (and some a little too much!).  Kos cooked breakfast/brunch on 
Sunday morning for the ten or twelve who were here then.  There were 9 
who stayed overnight at the house on Saturday night.  We had pancakes, 
syrup, bacon, sausage, coffee and OJ for breakfast and enough left over 
for the five who stayed overnight Sunday night to have pancakes and 
sausage for breakfast on Monday morning.  Jeff cooked spaghetti, salad 
and garlic bread for Sunday evening dinner for the 10 operators still 
here then.  It was great as usual and as always "Never Hungry" continues 
to be the club motto.  Thanks again to Jeff for the meals and cooking 
and for Chris and Mary bringing the great BBQ that everyone enjoyed 
also.  Jeff also brought his youngest son Gabe to visit with us Sunday 
evening.  He was still extending his Christmas visit from El Paso and 
stayed around with for the evening meal and then spent some time in the 
shack with us.  Thanks also to Kos for cooking the great breakfast.  We 
also seemed to have endless chips, dips and snacks in the shack during 
the contest.  I think Scott and Tom were the main perpetrators of those 
waistline bulges for us all.

The technical problems we had involved the 2m and 222 amps or so we 
thought.  The 222 problem turned out to be a coax switch and the amp is 
fine, even after being partially dis-assembled, tubes pulled and other 
testing that went on.  It was back to normal after discovering the 
problem with the switch.  The 2m problem has not been fully discovered, 
but preliminary troubleshooting pointed the finger at the TR relay.  We 
will report the final outcome.  We did put a 2m brick in-line for a 
while Saturday evening on 2m, but it wasn't enough for the WSJT skeds 
later.  Scott brought a back-up amp (Ron's 2x 4CX250's) on Sunday 
morning and it was put into service and was fine until the end.  One 
other technical problem I remember was the high SWR on 2304 that kept me 
from making a Q on that band.  I did get an opportunity to try for one Q 
there.  I will investigate that hard line and jumpers when I take the 
antennas down.   We also had some line noise on 6m that a couple of the 
guys investigated down the road and identified some power poles, but 
they are not still doing it now.  I will follow up.  We also seemed to 
keep having audio problems on the 6m stations that may or may not have 
just been 'hot' audio.  We will also investigate the sound card used there.

Now on to the participants.  The Fourlanders core members, band captains 
and main operators were Bob W4ZST, Jim W4KXY, Ron WW8RR, Scott NN4W, 
Brian NX9O, Tom K4TJD, Kos N4NIA, Kim WG8S, Jim WE8W, Ivan K4VJM, Jeff 
W0ONR and Bill KI4US.  We had an interested new visitor Chris Caldwell 
from Kennesaw, W4CCH, who came, observed, operated on 2m some  and 
apparently didn't find out enough about us to be scared off.  We always 
welcome new folks who get the VHF contesting/operating bug like us. 
Another first time visitor was Bill Morgan KG4AOX from Cumming, who 
visited on Sunday morning and had breakfast with us.  Another first time 
visitor from Cumming was Vince Pardinas W4VRP and his wife Athy.  They 
stayed for Saturday evening dinner too.  Ivans friend Steve Dearman 
KI4IXR came by for a while on Saturday.  Charles Lemmons, a wanna-be ham 
visitor and friend of Tom McElroy came on Saturday.  We haven't heard 
from Tom whether we scared him off or got him enthused.  We sure hope 
the latter and that he will get his license and visit with us again 
sometime.  Tom McElroy W4SDR also brought his daughter Audrey to visit 
with us.  Audrey will also probably get her license soon.  Tom and 
Audrey have also been on the mountain on Fourlanders trips.  So have 
other Saturday visitors Randal DePriest N4AC, his wife Loreen and the 
two harmonics Alan and Owen, who all stayed for dinner.  Two local hams 
from Dahlonega, Mike Saunders KG4ZFP who is interested in coming to the 
mountain with us sometime and Buck Cheves KC4GCK who has to take total 
responsibility for getting W4ZST into this VHF contesting mess in the 
first place ('Hey, let's do a VHF contest!) back around '94 or so, both 
came Saturday afternoon to hang out for a while.  I did mention Jeff's 
son Gabe who came on Sunday, and of course I can't leave out Brian's XYL 
(actually still YL!) Anna N9KHC who visited with the kids Duncan and 
Eilis.  Number 1 daughter Claire was also here and spent the night 
Saturday with Dad in the house.  And last but not least, Chris Porter 
W5ONT who had been here the weekend before and helped us set up antennas 
and his wife Mary W5MWP from Cumming were here Saturday and brought us 
the great BBQ and Brats.  Thanks again so much to them for coming and 
helping with dinner too.  Somehow I just can't be out in the shack and 
in the house at the same time.  Can't figure out why!  If someone was 
here and I haven't acknowledged them in this report, then they must have 
been hiding or the 'Old-timers' is creeping up on me.

Thanks to all who participated in any capacity.  That's what makes each 
of our contests happen, all the volunteers and visitors.   Note 
especially that Kim WG8S drives from Huntsville to be with us and Jim 
WE8W comes down from Greensboro, so a trip from the metro area is really 
not too bad for most of us.  A few others who threatened to visit did 
not make it, but maybe they will make it next time on the mountain. 
Make your plans for June 11-13 and Sept 10-12 for our annual trips to 
the mountain top in NC and July 16-17 for the CQWW VHF that we will do 
again at the W4ZST QTH.

I got things cleaned up enough on Monday morning that my wife Judy 
didn't have anything to comment on in the house when she got home. 
Everything looked normal.  You all do notice that she is nowhere near 
here when the mayhem commences.

Hope all had a good time like I did, and hope you will be able to 
participate or visit with us again for another contest.

73, Bob W4ZST, Fourlanders President