[SCCC] RTTY WPX KQ6ES SOAB LP

[John Simmons]

CQ WW RTTY WPX Contest

Call: KQ6ES
Operator(s): KQ6ES
Station: KQ6ES

Class: SOAB LP
QTH: CA
Operating Time (hrs):

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Pts
-----------------
   80:   14
   40:   53
   20:   88
   15:   15
   10:    3
-----------------
Total:  173  344  Prefixes = 105  Total Score = 36,120

Club: Southern California Contest Club

Comments (aka long sad story):

Some enjoyable moments but lots of RFI and equipment problems, and 
conditions seemed poor as well.  I had at least 3 backup plans working at 
once.  A little Africa but no Europe this time, with only a few Caribbean 
and South American stations heard.  15m signals got very loud in the last 
hour or two Sunday but almost nobody was there.

The worst thing was that my new RigBlaster Pro wouldn't send anything.  All 
had been well until Saturday afternoon, I took a break, started up again, 
and nothing happened.  Eventually I bypassed it and used the footswitch, 
then had to track down my cable with isolation transformer to clean up the 
noise on my transmitted signal.

I am still having trouble integrating MMTTY with N1MM, probably something 
very simple I'm missing.  But that was a workout calling CQ and using two 
screens at once when I had little mini-runs, especially with my mouse 
freezing up for a few seconds occasionally.

Another fun thing was that sometime during the night my very low sectional 
mast mounted beam tilted to one side about 40 degrees, requiring a weighted 
rope flung over one element to hold it more or less level, and making my 
usual hand turning of the beam way too much work to bother with.  I'll have 
to bring it down and tighten it and get it back up again.

The RFI problem is a recurring one, only on RTTY, which gets into either the 
monitor or the computer and stops everything.  It didn't last long but it 
made me question whether I should continue, as in the first hour 2 or 3 
stations had their contact with me rudely interrupted.

I had hoped for much better but 173 seemed a good enough number to end with. 
I felt a lttle beat up after this one.  I may pass on the NAQP RTTY but I'll 
be at it next week in the ARRL DX when things will be simpler.

FT-1000MP at 50 watts
A3 at 20feet
Butternut vertical

John kq6es


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