Topband: PJ2T Expereience in CQWW 160 CW Contest

[Jeff Maass]

Extracted from 3830 posting: full report at
http://lists.contesting.com/archives/html/3830/2009-01/msg02222.html

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Can't Sleep, Clowns Will Eat Me! 
(http://www.k8nd.com/Radio/Planning/CQWW160/Clown_3588.jpg)

This was the second time Jim W8WTS and Jeff K8ND have operated the CQWW 160 CW Contest
from the PJ2T station, having had to miss last year due to the demands of our mutual
employer. K8ND was single-op at the station in 2006.

This year, we had two significant new technological resources to test: 1) an Elecraft K3,
and 2) CW Skimmer, using RF Space SDR-IQ.

The good Topband conditions in the North were not good to us at 12 degrees above the
Equator. With the North American stations and the Europeans in a feeding frenzy, they
didn't listen down our way. Our usually-loud signal was lost among the European and USA
stations CQing at and among each other. Our pileups were not as deep as usual, and were
often encroached by others seeking a CQ frequency of their own, making it difficult for
the "second tier" stations to hear us. The result for us was just a few more QSOs and a
few more multipliers than we made in 2007, with only a slightly higher claimed score.

We had only two hours with rates over 100, two with rates over 90, and three with rates
over 80. 

We have never worked so many JA stations on Topband from the PJ2T station! A total of 76
Japanese stations were logged, mostly on the first night, between 0800Z and our sunrise
around 1100Z. This is more stations worked for any single country besides the USA (1011),
even more than Canada (63)! We attribute this to very low Auroral activity during that
first night, so our usual aurora-skimming signal path was clear to Japan. Our breakdown by
continent is shown below:

           160   Total      %
    NA    1112    1112    71.7
    SA      19      19     1.2
    EU     320     320    20.6
    AF       5       5     0.3
    AS      90      90     5.8
    OC       5       5     0.3

Station Equipment:
Transciever: Elecraft K3
Amplifier:   Cary LK-800 (2 x 3CPX800A7)
TX Antenna:  Inverted-L over ~60 radials (~60' vertical, sloping up to ~90') RX Antennas:
1000-foot Beverage - Europe
             650-foot  Beverage - USA/JA
             DX Engineering RX 4-Square
             Flag - Northern Europe
             Flag - VK/ZL

RX Antenna Switching: K9AY RAS-8x2
Contest Software: Writelog v10.69D
CW Skimmer: RF Space SDR-IQ receiver
            CW Skimmer v1.4 Software
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73,

Jeff Maass  K8ND