[SCCC] W4EF ARRL DX CW SOAB(A)

[Michael Tope]

ARRLDXCW Score Summary Sheet

        Start Date : 2012-02-19

     CallSign Used : W4EF
       Operator(s) : W4EF

Operator Category : SINGLE-OP-ASSISTED
              Band : ALL
             Power : HIGH
              Mode : CW
  Default Exchange : 599 CA


              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 V12.2.0

         Band    QSOs    Pts  Cty
          1.8      16      48   12
          3.5      11      33    2
           21       4      12    3
           28     183     546   36
-----------------------------------------------
        Total     214     639   53


             Score : 33,867

I stopped by my station on Saturday afternoon to meet up with a guy who 
was doing some painting work for me. After he left, I noticed the 10 
meter northern European on DX Summit, so I fired up for a few hours with 
the antenna pointed north. I had a blast running JA stations with a 
northern European calling in every now and then. I don't ever recall 
hearing an auroral zone opening on 10 meters extend that late into the 
night. I was hoping that the auroral zone opening would shift over 
toward UA9, so I could pick up a zone 17 on 10 meters for the last one I 
need on that band for WAZ, but no such luck. The closest I got was being 
called by 9N1II. He must be on the side of Mt. Everest with a shot at 
the US as his signal was just amazing. I stayed on the band until it was 
completely dead just to make sure I didn't miss any freak openings to UA9.

Aside from a couple good hours on 10 meters, I otherwise suffered with 
horrible allergies all weekend, so I mostly slept (I still can't find an 
allergy medicine that is effective and doesn't also make me drowsy as 
heck). Topband didn't sound too good. I had a hard time making a QSO 
with PJ2T and the best I got from PZ5RO was a couple of question marks. 
I am also hearing a cyclical noise now when I have my receiving array 
pointed northeast and northwest (~2Hz rate with ~50% duty cycle). It 
came and went, but was mostly present Saturday evening and into Sunday 
morning. This is a bummer as it used to be super quiet to the northeast 
and pretty quiet to the northwest. Hopefully it won't persist as a 
permanent presence, but who knows.

Congratulations to all who actually put in a sustained effort.

73, Mike...................