[NCC] W3USA/M PaQP Report

[Jimk8mr at aol.com]

Pennsylvania QSO Party

Call: W3USA/M
Operator(s): AC8E,  K8MR
Station: K8MR/M

Class: Mobile LP
QTH: 15 Counties
Operating  Time (hrs): 7.5

Summary:
Band  CW Qs  Ph Qs  RTTY  Qs  PSK Qs
-------------------------------------
160:                             
80:  129      53                 
40:  202      44                 
20:   60       0                 
15:    4       0                 
10:                             
6:                             
2:                             
-------------------------------------
Total:   395     97       0        0  Mults = 90  Total Score  = 83,315.0

Club: North Coast Contesters

Comments:

Score  includes 800 N3KAE bonus points and 7500 mobile bonus points.

By  county:

CW    SSB
MER   49     0
LAW    15     0
BUT   47      3
ARM   31     0
INN    36     4
CMB   26     14
BLA   12     6
HUN    10    18
CEN   19     10
CLE   39    13
CRN     5     8
ELK   26      5
JEF   16    11
CLA    39     5
VEN   25      0

TOT  395    97

SECS     45
CTYS    45


Again this year AC8E and I did a  Sunday only route around WPA. I've decided
that driving/riding for 6+ hours  after dark when 80 meters is the only real
band is not worth it. A big part  of mobile contesting, and especially in 
PA at
this time of year is seeing the  scenery while driving, which doesn't work 
well
at night.

Our route  takes us through a 5 mile corner of rare Cameron county. Along 
this
stretch  is a very nice trail head parking area where we've stopped in past
years.  This year I decided that if we were going to spend an hour parked 
there,
we'd  throw up an 80/40 dipole and have a chance to be heard.  The PAQP  
rules
don't allow mixing fixed rover setup operation with mobile operation,  so we
used K8MR as the call while parked in CRN. Did exactly on hour on the  air 
plus
setup and teardown time. See the K8MR report for more about that. We  were 
in
fact low power, not high power as listed.

Conditions seemed OK  other than an hour around noon in Blair county.  We 
had
the same thing  happen last year, maybe there is something about that time 
of
day. Out of  state activity did seem down a bit, with a number of the ususal
folks who  follow around in the various states missing in action. Not sure 
what
that was  about, maybe they can't take seriously a contest that requires a 
snail
mailed  summary sheet?

Despite the break for the CRN portable operation, our  score was up from 
last
year. 80 meters played well for most of the time. As  we did in Ohio, we 
used a
"mini-window" concept of using 3540 for short  frequent visits. Our 80 
meter CW
QSOs were up a hundred from 2008, and with  also more 75 meter visits had 
about
15 more counties.

All four 15  meter qsos were with NN3NN. Found that we could "QRB" (Q-can 
you
Run the  Bands?) very efficiently. Had 20 qsos with Ty, plus one from the 
K8MR
CRN  operations.

So a good time was had. The mobile gear has been packed away  until next 
April's
Michigan QSO Party.  See you then!  (Plus in a  few contests from home until
then).


73  -  Jim   K8MR