[SCCC] CQWW CW VK6N(N5ZO) SOAB HP

[marko.n5zo at gmail.com]

                    CQ Worldwide DX Contest, CW - 2022

Call: VK6N
Operator(s): N5ZO
Station: VK6ANC

Class: SOAB HP
QTH: VK/ZL
Operating Time (hrs): 45
OpMode: SO2R

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Zones  Countries
------------------------------
  160:   27    10       18
   80:  236    21       58
   40: 1187    27       82
   20: 1100    30       75
   15:  992    27       68
   10:  603    19       60
------------------------------
Total: 4145   134      361  Total Score = 5,983,560

Club: VK Contest Club

Comments:

After CQWW SSB from E2A I stayed in Thailand and XYL also travelled there
for some vacation time at beach and some time exploring sights in Bangkok.
XYL then returned to CA and I travelled to Perth on Friday week before the
CW contest and got to meet everyone at "car boot sale" that was happening at
club on Sunday.  Big Ultrabeam's rotator was bust and there was mad scramble
by club members to find tower climber to swap rotator on it.  Over here one
has to be official tower climber in order to do any antenna work at tower.
That Ultrabeam was going to be my main weapon as tests showed it to be much
better than 3 element Steppir yagi at slightly lower tower.  Fortunately
rotator was swapped on Tuesday before the contest and I was back in
business.  There were few complications inside shack but nothing that could
not be eventually solved by hard work during the week.  Due to some existing
automation with Ultrabeam I had to use completely unfamiliar beast size
TS-990 as left radio and I had carried
K3 to use as right radio.  Ultrabeam was on TS-990 and Steppir on K3 and
there were also 2 different low dipoles for 80 and another low dipole on
160.  So at the end both radios were able to be on any band 10-80.  There
were no RX antennas and probably those would not survive very long with many
kangoroos jumping around after sunset all night in bushes.  Station is
inside large park and there are probably thousands of those jumpers around
and they seemed to emerge always around sunset.  I did have few equipment
hick-ups during contest as there wasn't enough time to test everything but
with 2 radios I was most of the time on air with something.  2 yagis
although in separate towers are very close to each others and there seemed
to be some RFI getting into left side station that locked up my PTT line
with certain antenna directions and required restart of logging program and
power cycle of 990 to get out of it.

Somehow I had lots of problems to get good night sleep whole week when in
Perth.
 Maybe because it is summer here and days are long with quite early sunrise.
I kept waking up very early every morning and just could never get back to
sleeping, including Friday-Saturday night before the contest when I only
slept
2-3 hours althogh starting time here would be otherwise optimal at 8 am
local time.  But due to lack of sleep all week I think I have never entered
CQ WW so exhausted as I was when contest began.

Contest began with good conditions and I just kept going all Saturday on
high bands.  I had quite low expectations for 80/160 due to antennas that
were available but I was very surprised when few EU stations actually heard
me (and I also heard them) with those low dipoles, and I think it motivated
me to try even harder on those bands and at the end scoore there was quite
reasonable considering etreme distance from everywhere.  Sunday conditions
on higher bands were much worse that Saturday including almost completely
missing 10 m except at very end when band opened to US West coast just
before contest ended.  But night on 40/80/160 was again quite productive.  I
only slept about 2 hours at beginning of Sunday and it completely refreshed
my operating and I was able to continue to end with not too many "what I'm
doing here moments".  It was definetly interesting experience again to
operate this contest from this unique location and experience some good
long path propagation also here !

I wish I would have more time to explore Perth area as one does not travel
this part of the world too many times but after 7-8 weeks away from home I
also want to get back and will be flying on Thursday already.

I want to thank Northern Corridor Radio Group members for allowing me to use
this fine station.  There are some antenna improvements planned at the
station in future, including new tower and dedicated 40 m yagi, so it should
be even easier to get always rare zone 29 into log in future.  Special
thanks to especially following club members who helped to arrange station
for my use, solve equipment issues or other troubles before the contest
and/or bring food for me during contest: VK6ML, VK6APK, VK6NU, VK6EI,
VK6MIT, VK6LIN.  I'm sure I'm already forgetting someone but your help was
appreciated much !  Great new friendships were made !.

This was my 35th zone to operate CQWW contest from, working all 40 is
getting ever closer.  73 de Marko N5ZO


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