[RTTY] GU0SUP SOABLP

[pcooper]

Hi all,

The plan was to make a big, serious effort, but having got out of my nice new bed early on Saturday morning, I just could not get a run going, and so I spent way too long in S&P mode.

Conditions seemed to be OK, although 10m and 15m were as dead as the proverbial dodo (or should that be Financial Institutions???), so 20m was the bread-winner.

I started at around 0500UTC on Saturday morning, and was pleased to work a few W's, plus P49X and HI3T. The pile-up for HC8N was just too big to bother with, so I thought I would leave that for Sunday morning.
I then went to 40m, and quickly found HC8N, worked them (thanks Ramon XE1KK), and they asked me to try 80m, so I did, and worked them.
40m seemed to be quite lively, and there were W's workable till about 1 hour after our sunrise.
Most of the rest of Saturday was spent chasing mults and building up the QSO tally.
Without the cluster, I did take time to manually fill in the band-map, and also place some of the nice DX into the memories for later. Nice to see the W6/7's and VE7's so loud late afternoon, and this helped the mult score.
Some time around 1930UTC, I had a quick check on 20m, and was very pleased to find it had again opened nicely to W7, and I also bagged KH6ND for an extra bonus!

Sunday morning wasn't quite as planned, as I woke up at 0430UTC, but fell asleep again until 0530UTC.
Again, some nice strong W's around on 80m, although the stronger ones weren't always as easy to work as the weaker ones. I was very pleased to work Steve AI9T in IL though!
This time, there were W's on 80m until way past sunrise here, and they were on 40m as well.

During the Sunday, I did manage to get a few runs going, but they often didn't last too long. I think I must have been spotted a few times, as the rate increased a bit, but the main problem were callers that were just too weak to copy, and most persisted in calling over and over again.
At one point, I had some serious bother from EM9F, who was about 4kc above me when I started calling, but he then gradually moved down in frequency with each call. He went right over me, and carried on down, and about an hour later, he was moving UP and again went right over me.
Late on Sunday afternoon, around 1820UTC, having been on 40m, I went to check 20m again, but I somehow hit the button for 10m, and was very surprised to see a huge signal! It was EA8AH, and he was the ONLY signal audible here, but it was a very welcome contact.
Just out of curiosity, I tried 15m, and was amazed to see loads of huge signals. I logged HC8N, LT1F, HI3T, CQ85F, P49X, YV5AAX and (most pleasingly!) J88DR, which I thought may be a new band-slot, but isn't, to go with our 40m contact on Saturday morning.

Overall, a good contest, and everything seemed to work as it should except the propagation.
A few callers seemed to be a bit unsure on how to conduct a contact, but I guess they will learn!
There were a few who didn't use callsigns, and after a contact, just sent TU QRZ? I am always a little unsure when I call someone, and they simply come back with TU 599 16 16 16. I sent XX1XX TU 599 14 14 GU0SUP, and usually just got back TU QRZ?

And do you all think enough of the bands were used? 
On 20m, there were stations way down low, and way up high, so much so that a quick trawl of the band almost gave me the bends!
I did note a few CW fanatics trying hard to keep a barrier on their frequencies, especially on 20m.

The highlights? Well, I guess one of the ones up there was working Don AA5AU, but also bagging a few new bandslots such as J88DR.

Here is my cleamed score:
 	 QSOs	Points	Zones	DX:	States
80m: 	  50	114	8	30	7
40m:	 135	295	12	49	5
20m:	 403	985	25	64	43
15m:	  29	73	9	17         0	
10m:	   1	3	1	1	0
Total:	618	1470	55	161	55	
Multipliers:	 271
Claimed score:   398370

My log will be on LoTW very shortly, but as always, paper QSL's are always welcomed.

Thanks to all for the fun, especially those that went to the rare places for our benefit.

Very best 73

Phil GU0SUP