[SCCC] CQWW CW N6KI(@W6HCD) SOAB QRP- YES ! QRP !

[Dennis Vernacchia]

CQ Worldwide DX Contest, CW

Call: N6KI
Operator(s): N6KI, PACKET
Station: W6HCD

Class: SOAB QRP
QTH: CA
Operating Time (hrs): 9

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Zones  Countries
------------------------------
  160:    0     0        0
   80:    5     4        3
   40:  127    23       63
   20:    0     0        0
   15:   31    20       27
   10:   59    13       24
------------------------------
Total:  222    60      117  Total Score = 103,368

Club: Southern California Contest Club

Comments:

Since I could not get enough members of San Diego Contest Club together to
put together a Multi Effort, I decided to come up to the W6HCD portable site
and play with my Elecraft KX3 and enter QRP mode - Assisted and see what I
could do
with some great antennas driven by 5 Watts with just S&Ping. I had some
setup
issues as I had never interfaced my KX3 QRP rig to Wintest and and my shack
computer. The computer fought me the a USB port anomaly and also the keying
setup but after an hour and help of Computer Guru, Dick K6KAL, I was on the
air albiet 29 hours after start of contest.

To my surprise I found I could be easily heard by most DX stations if there
was no pileup and when there was a
pile-up - timing was everything. I could insert my call at tail end of
pileup
or toss it in during a moment of confusion and the DX stations, not wanting
to
waste anytime would pick me up so they wouldn't have to spend time fighting
with getting partials sorted out. I had hoped to start on Friday night
and put in maybe 24 to 30 of the 48 hours but life got in the way as the
weekend came near and I didn't get on the air til 9 PM Saturday night. 20
was
just about gone so I went to 40 which was going strong with signals from
most
continents. I stayed on 40 til around 3:30 AM and worked 63 countries and 23
zones, then hopped over to 80 for 15 minutes and found I could not get thru
any
pileup and just worked some stations that were begging. Going from 2
Elements on
40 to a 80 mtr inverted V with only 5 watts was definitely like bringing the
knife to a gunfight. I quit around 3:45 AM to get some ZZZZzzzzz

Slept in Saturday morning and got on 10 mtrs around 11:30
AM and worked 10, then 15 mtrs til I had to leave site around 2:30 PM and
did
not get back til last 10 minutes of contest. Spent that time trying to
craftily slide my call into a pile-up for XV2RZ but time ran out. Luckily
he sent QRX
and came back on air a few minutes later and called "CQ DX" and signed
"UP"- I
was ready and split the KX3 up 1 kHz and got thru almost immediately while
the
rest of the pileup fiddled with their split vfo setting! This was my first
time
in 25 years of contesting I ever attempted running QRP and it was quite an
experience and I was amazed of the amount of DX I was able to work, albiet
with
some nice antennas and location !( Doing QRP with marginal antennas would
definitely not have been as much be fun !)

KX3, 2 EL 40 Yagi @ 76Ft, 3 El SteppIR Yagi @ 70 ft, 80 mtr Inv V Dipole at
70 ft apex.

73 de Dennis N6KI