TopBand: Grid Square Look up site?

[John Mitchell]

I'd like to know what the consensus of the contest committee is.  It only
makes a few points difference in my modest log anyway, so what's the
verdict?  Can someone who enters the contest casually, and doesn't know
their grid square participate for credit by giving a city as a qth?  Seems
since many logs are only calcualted after the contest that the arguments
below relative to when the contest ends may not be that relevant.  The grid
square is not something that everyone is going to know, especially
non-vhf'ers.  Why make the contest harder to join?  Participation is already
low.  This was my first year playing; has this question come up in past years?

John K4IQ

At 19:57 12/27/98 -0800, Patrick Dayshaw wrote:
>
>I think the difference is clear.  Are you "just working the DX to work the
>DX" or do you expect it to "count for contest points".  For the straight DX
>contact all you need is the call sign and concurrence on each end that the
>contact was valid.  Most contests however seem to require a completed
>exchange. The SP exchange is very short (one piece of data) and doesn't even
>require the RST that so many have made jokes about or questioned the need or
>value of on this and the other reflectors.  Other events like Sweepstakes
>require a lot more. Should a SS QSO count if there is missing data like the
>Check, or the Section or do we just look them up in a call sign data base or
>via other sources and fill it in after the fact?  Seems to me that the rules
>are clear, the exchange is supposed to include the grid or it's not a valid
>QSO, it still counts as DX, but not for SP points.  The whole "massaging the
>log after the test" thing has been covered on the Contest Reflector by the
>Big Guns and lots of opinions stated pro and con.  I was just asking a
>question that again touches on when the contest ends and the ethics of
>altering or enhancing logs after the official end of the contest.  I'll go
>back to lurking.
>
>73
>
>Patrick


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