[SCCC] WK6I NAQP SSB

[Jeff Stai WK6I]

Call: WK6I
Operator(s): WK6I

Class: SO LP
QTH: CA
Operating Time (hrs): 10
Exchange: JEFF CA

Summary:
  Band     QSOs  Mults
----------------------
   160:      1      1
    80:     12      8
    40:     25     15
    20:     98     42
    15:    174     53
    10:     52     28
----------------------
Total:     362    147  =  53,214

Club/Team: SCCC #2

Soap: Well... I wanted to do better than that: arbitrary goal was 100,000,
or 500 Qs and 200 mults. This would be a several times improvement over
last year, but now I have a 'real' antenna, at least on 20/15/10: A C3SS
at about 30 feet. Still have the poor wire antenna at 20 feet - basically
about 120 feet wire run around the property line, with a counterpoise
wire to keep the tuner from being too sad. This antenna was also 'new'
because I had taken down the ladder-line dipole to put up the tribander.

I believe I gave up a lot of points on 10m by not starting on time. I had
a commitment to meet with friends that morning, including a friend who was
getting out for the first time after a bad illness, and I just wasn't
going to blow that off. But I can see I might have made my goal if I could
have operated that first 69 minutes and filled up the 10m row.

Had hoped to be able to actually run a frequency for the first time - and
I found I could! I also found that no matter how many years you have
been operating from a location without complaints from the neighbors...
I had been operating maybe 45 minutes when my oldest son comes running 
into the shack - "Dad - the neighbor says he can hear you on his TV!". 

To make a long story short, I guess I was now putting more RF into his TV
than I ever had before, thanks to the gain of the tribander. Needless to
say, my complacency left me totally unprepared for this - no quick fixes
in the junk drawer. The good news was that I was able to continue operating
by not pointing the antenna directly at his TV, and by dropping my power
to 50 watts. The bad news is that I could not point the antenna to 60 degrees
and I was operating 3 dB down from where I started.

I now believe that every dB -does- count in a contest, because the combination
of both restrictions made it harder to run a frequency for as high a rate
as I could before. You gotta be loud enough to be worth stopping for!

After about 0200Z it was pretty much impossible to keep going on 20m, so
it was time to do S&P on 40 and down. The 'new' wire antenna was actually a
bit more effective than the dipole had been, mostly I think because it is
maybe 40 feet longer. 80m & 40m were still tough going, however, and I do appreciate
all the stations that took the trouble to dig me out of the noise! And I
would like to thank K6AM for putting my first and only 160m contact ever
into the log!

So... between now and the next contest we get the neighbor fixed (er, his TV,
I mean), fill up the junque box with some spare filters, and somehow figger
out how to better service the lower bands.

(It's either that or next time operate portable from some nice quiet hilltop
or vacant patch of desert...;-)

But in any case I still had a great time - and I can see how to get to 100K 
(or more) from here!

Thanks for reading and if you can add anything helpful, I sure would
appreciate it!

best 73 - jeff wk6i

-- 
jeff stai
WK6I DM13
NAR #21059 TRA #3356 L2
jstai@home.com / wk6i@arrl.net
ROC web page: http://www.rocstock.org/

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