TopBand: Re: Counties on 160M

[John Mitchell]

At 12:25 11/4/98 +0100, Leif.L.Hammarstrom@telia.se wrote:
>
>Hello,
>Does anybody know about a good map to determine
>county borderlines. Marked out with lines possible to
>see for an oldtimer with poor eyesight.
>I am now using a road-atlas with blurred grey lines which
>makes it very difficult ...
>My new challenge: US-CA 160 m.

Hi Leif, and all,

At the risk of taking bandwidth (I haven't posted here in months, so perhaps
I may be granted some latitude), might I suggest another possibility, one
that I believe is reachable.  (I do not think all counties will be workable
on 160M, because of the general difficulty in mobile comms with EU, and the
fact that fixed stations for Top Band just do not exist in all counties.)
What about Worked All Grids, or a WAG award?  This would be a significant
challenge, but, I believe, do-able.  

During the discussion a few years ago on how the Stew Perry Top Band
challenge was to be configured, I offered that the Grid concept, with two
numbers and two letters, as a multiplier during an annual contest, would
foster Top Band participation from many areas which, presently, have few
serious operators.  Being a somewhat 'rare' grid would be fun. The Stew
Perry (unfortunately, I believe) ended up being a complex "distance
challenge", requiring a rather complicated set of software to score grid
distances, and which, in my opinion, has not fostered the participation
simply using grids as multipliers would have brought. 

The grid system offers many more multipliers than states, yet, manageably
less than the number of counties.  I wonder if there is any support for a
WAG-US award?  There could also be WAG-EU awards, etc... ;-}

At the risk of losing any credibility I might have ever had in this forum, I
will stop now, but I am serious.

73,
John
K4IQ


--
FAQ on WWW:               http://www.contesting.com/topband.html
Submissions:              topband@contesting.com
Administrative requests:  topband-REQUEST@contesting.com
Problems:                 owner-topband@contesting.com