[SCCC] NI6W (W4EF) IARU

[Michael Tope]

IARU Score Summary Sheet

        Start Date : 2011-07-07

     CallSign Used : NI6W
       Operator(s) : W4EF

Operator Category : SINGLE-OP
              Band : ALL
             Power : HIGH
              Mode : CW
  Default Exchange : 6


              Name : Michael Tope
           Address : 11018 Cardamine Drive
    City/State/Zip : Tujunga  CA  91042
           Country : USA

      ARRL Section : LAX
         Club/Team : Southern California Contest Club
          Software : N1MM Logger V9.12.8

         Band  Mode  QSOs    Pts  Zon   HQ
            7  CW      20      52    8    4
           14  CW      12      32    7    2
        Total  Both    32      84   15    6

             Score : 1,764

               Rig : Ten-Tec Omni 6+, Drake L-7

          Antennas : 20M: Spiderbeam @25'
                     40M: Inverted-V @40'

           Soapbox : The "plan" was to have NT6AA's Spiderbeam sitting 
at 50' on my newly acquired AB-577 in time for the start of the IARU. 
Needless to say that didn't work out. The threat of monsoonal 
thunderstorms in the high desert slowed down the roofing crew who 
re-roofed my cabin last week, so I was tied up keeping an eye on them 
until Friday afternoon. It appears that the W8 who did the initial 
assembly on Dave's Spiderbeam didn't cut the 20 meter wires to the 
correct length so I spent a good deal of time Saturday in the hot sun 
working through that problem. By late Saturday evening I had the antenna 
up in the air about 25ft, but it was too windy (and I was too tired) to 
raise the antenna any higher. I did hear A65CA coming in with good 
signals on ~21028 KHz sometime after dark (I think it was around 9PM 
local). He was better on the Spiderbeam compared to the 40 meter 
inverted-V with the Spiderbeam pointed shortpath. I ran out and rotated 
the antenna arm-strong style, but A65CA had QRT'd by the time I returned 
to the shack, so I don't know for sure if he was shortpath, but that's 
my guess. That was the highpoint of the contest for me (and I didn't 
even work him). I made a few other QSOs here and there (probably the 
equivalent of 2 minutes at W1AW/6). After a few hours rest I woke up 
Sunday morning at ~3AM and decided to take advantage of the cool night 
air to finish raising the AB-577 to full height (I couldn't stand the 
thought of driving in those 7ft T-posts with the sun beating down on 
me). One of the lower guys turned out to be shorter than it was supposed 
to be, so I had to stop short with the antenna around 45ft. The 
Spiderbeam appears to play like a Yagi even though the parasitic wire 
dimensions appear to be off a little. Hopefully, I'll have some time in 
August to tweak everything down to the last centimeter and get the 
rotator connected to the shack (the cable I had on hand was too short). 
I am looking forward to having a rotary beam at a decent height at my 
own QTH after all these years of using low wires and verticals.

Thanks to Dave NT6AA for letting me test drive his Spiderbeam.


73, Mike W4EF/6......