[Fourlanders] June 2018 Contest Summary

[Bob Lear]

W4NH - June 2018 VHF Contest Summary

We had decided at our yearly January meeting to not make the trip to the 
mountain for this contest and do the June contest from the W4ZST QTH in 
EM84ao.  That helped me out as antennas were still in the air from 
January and a couple of the stations still set up. With only a couple of 
workdays we got it all ready over a week before the contest. We now have 
done the past FOUR year's June contests here in GA.
Usually the problem is trailer pullers and one time we couldn't get our 
reservations in time.  We recently learned that will be the situation 
next June as someone got our sites reserved before we had our chance.  
Continuing to look at alternative locations to try for the June contest 
next year.  Any suggestions appreciated.

We had also decided to go ahead and change over to the N1MM logging 
program from WriteLog, where we had continued to have problems.  Thanks 
to those Ron, Jim, Johnny and Bill who came and helped out with testing 
the new logging software a couple of times a month before the contest 
where we learned the new program and tested it on live stations with all 
the contest computers. As usual, Murphy showed up for the contest and 
even though we had everything working well during the week before the 
contest, it didn't stay that way.  We also had significant radio 
problems this time that usually aren't a problem.  Apparently a Voltage 
Regulator went out on Johnny's Flex 6600 in the 6m station which made us 
scramble to get a back up station on the air.  I did manage to get a 
Yaesu 920 on the air on 6m with the amp but not fully functional with 
the software.  We have learned some lessons during this contest about 
needing back up equipment tested and at least partially set up to be 
able to put in service quickly.  We missed some band openings on 6m 
because of this.  We were also off the air on 2m for about 10 hours as 
something happened to the 2m station during a power-line glitch that 
occurred after the thunderstorm.  We hadn't thought to run the Flex 1500 
SDR radio on a UPS but maybe that would have helped.  I had problems 
getting another FT-920 working with the transverter on 2m and we were 
off 2m from about 10PM until 9 AM on Sunday morning and again, I 
couldn't get it all working properly with N1MM.  I had not tried that 
combination before and this points to the need for tested back-up 
systems.  In retrospect, we probably should have taken Kos up on his 
offer of letting us use his usual 2m contest station even though he was 
not going to be able to make the contest.

As usual, when 6m is open it really hurts the higher bands as everyone 
is trying to cash in on 6m and 6 was open for most of the contest.  We 
did make some FT8 Q's on 6m but there were stations that didn't have 
contest mode selected and also seemed to not yet be experienced enough 
with FT8 to know how to make Q's up and down the waterfall.  Much 
traffic on the reflectors about this after the contest.  Less than 10% 
of our 6m Q's this time were FT8. Only one MSK-144 QSO overnight.  I 
think the problem here is the bandwidth of the 920 is lacking.  Wish we 
had had the Flex on for that as it probably would have meant more 
QSO's.  Even though EME conditions were not good, we did make some Q's.  
3 on 2m and 2 on 432.  We also did for sure copy our own echoes off the 
moon on 222, but no Q's there.  This was the first time we had Az-El and 
cross-pol antennas on 222.  We will continue to try here.  Thanks to 
Johnny pushing for 222 EME and for assembling the antennas and helping 
me set them up and to Brian for supplying them.  I just took my 432 EME 
relay box and put a 222 preamp in it for using with the 222 station.

Here is the submitted score summary. I don't think we'll make the top 
ten in multi-op with this score.

BAND         QSO's        Grids
6m             185            83
2m              25            12
222             10             7
432             16            12
1296             1             1
Totals         237           117        for 32,520 points.

Operators for the contest were:   Johnny Kludt K4SQC, Bob Lear W4ZST, 
Brian McCarthy NX9O, Ron Rogers WW8RR, the band captains for 6, 2, 222, 
& 432 and operators Kim Hensley WG8S, Bill Pence KI4US, and Jim Worsham 
W4KXY.  We were very pleased that Brian NX9O got to come for the contest 
and operate his 222 station as he has not been able to for several 
contests.  Jerry Long W5TDY cooked us a great dinner Saturday night but 
didn't come in to operate. Kos Kosmetatos N4NIA, our usual 2m band 
captain did get to come to lunch and visit for a few hours on Saturday.  
Several new Fourlanders joined us for this contest: Rich St.John KX4KD 
from the Cleveland club, Richard McCrory KF1SH from Waynesville NC, Bob 
Hensey K4VBM from Peachtree Corners.  Richard had tried to visit with us 
last September on the mountain but missed us on Sunday as we were forced 
to leave early because of the hurricane. He met up with Paul W4SKI who 
was still there and learned more about us.  He also visited here the 
weekend before the contest. Bob Hensey has been here before and used to 
work with Jim at ATT&T.  HS student and computer whiz Carter Bailey 
KN4DLY from the Cleveland club also stayed overnight.  Much software and 
hardware issues were discussed between the regulars and Carter. Carter's 
Dad Craig Bailey KN4DLS, Mike Stipick KC4RI from Atlanta, Russ Duteau 
K4WQS from the Dahlonega club, Vince Pardinas W4VDP and wife Athey from 
Cumming and Ashton Locher KJ4AMA and Curt Garnto W4DPM from the 
Cleveland club all got to visit.  Kevin K4GTR and Bob AB4VT who operated 
portable from Chestatee Overlook just a few miles north of us, stopped 
by on their way home Saturday evening to visit for a time.  I think I 
got everyone who visited but someone could have sneaked in with all this 
crowd and mayhem and I might have missed them.  My apologies if I did.  
We had 9 ops staying Saturday night.

Two new contest stations were put on the air for this contest: Six 
meters used Johnny's new Flex 6600 complete with three 22" monitors 
(very impressive looking) and Jim's new M2 6m-1000 Solid State amp with 
the stacked pair of 5 element beams and M2 HO loop omni's; The 2m 
station this time was Johnny's 2m EME station, Flex 1500, DEMI 2m 
transverter and M2 2m1K2 amp which we connected to the usual stacked 
pair of 9 element beams along with the 144 "beam omni's". For 2m EME we 
connected the pair of M2 20 element dual-polarity beams with Az-El;  222 
was Brian's usual station with an FT-1000MP, DEMI 222 transverter and 
Lunar Link amp this time with a pair of M2 222XP30 cross-pol beams with 
Az-El; and 432 was Ron's station with his IC-910, HB K2RIW amp and a 
four-square of K2RIW 432 beams with Az-EL  along with the 432 "omni 
beams". For 1296, Ron loaned me his spare IC-910 which ran barefoot with 
the pair of 45 element loop yagi's.  Only made one Q but tried with 
several.  Could have been the new growth leaves on the trees around that 
kept us from making more Q's there.  The antennas were not particularly 
high. Ron and I had tested a SK sale 1296 amp that was here but couldn't 
get it on the air.  As mentioned above, after the problems with 6 and 2m 
stations, I substituted FT-920's as they were my only radios ready and 
for 2m with transverter connections.  The 920's have been on for various 
contests on all bands from 6 thru 432, but had not been set up with N1MM 
and had not been tried with new modes like MSK-144.  There is a known 
bandwith problem with them but they were the only thing I could set up 
on short notice.

As usual we ate well, again starting at Rooster's in Dahlonega where 10 
of us met up for lunch before the contest on Saturday. Saturday night 
dinner was another feast provided by Jerry W5TDY. He smoked Boston 
Butts, brought a pot of Greek Green Beans, smoked sausage, home-made 
cole slaw and his famous bacon-wrapped, cream cheese stuffed, smoked 
Jalopena peppers.  Special thanks to Jerry for another great contest 
meal. We had scrambled eggs, biscuits and sausage for breakfast on 
Sunday and ham/turkey/cheese sandwiches and chips for lunch.  For the 
few of us left Sunday evening, we worked on the left-overs.  There were 
three of us who stayed to the bitter end at 11PM.  6m was still open and 
I made some Q's but would have done better if I had the computer 
connections working to allow calling CQ rather than search and pounce.  
The band was still open and crowded.

Thanks to all who participated and we hope all enjoyed operating, eating 
and just hanging out with us for the contest.

Put the September contest dates on your calendar, September 8th and 
9th.  Again this is one of those years when the contest is only 1 week 
after Shelby.  We do have our reservations for this one. Let's just hope 
we don't have another situation where we just can't get a large enough 
group together to make the trip and pull all the trailers.    We do also 
have our reservations for September 2019 but as mentioned, we won't be 
able to go there for June 2019.

Thanks and 73, Bob

PS, Johnny has sent the Flex 6600 in for repair under warranty, but is 
pretty sure it's just a Voltage Regulator.  But with an expensive radio 
like that, seeing it go down and not come back and later releasing the 
'magic smoke' is not a good feeling.  As to the Flex 1500 problem, I've 
been troubleshooting and I don't think it's a major problem or will it 
have to go in for repair.  It appears to be something external and I'm 
still working on it but fortunately NOT thinking of having to kiss it 
goodbye.

Also special thanks to Rick Woodard KK4LPP who came up for the workday 
the weekend before the contest and did the long overdue oil and filter 
change on the generator even though we weren't using it for the contest 
but for the NFARL club to use for Field Day.  He had another commitment 
and missed the contest.  We also had Rich KX4KD, Johnny K4SQC, Ron WW8RR 
and myself here for that workday.  Ron and Johnny were mostly doing 
computer setup work and Rich helped me a lot with getting the new 222 
EME/contest antennas in the air for the contest along with some other FD 
prep work.
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