Topband: Radios and contests

[rick darwicki]

Weak signals on 160 are usually not a problem. I'd rather have an old S-40 on a remote mountain in Montana than a K-3 here with S-8 noise.

Sure there are more guys with K-3s than $10,000 7800s, bet most are married. You can only work a weak station if he has a good antenna, 160 isn't like 6m or 2m where low noise preamps help. It is amazing how many S-9 stations needed repeats on my call when other very weak guys in MN and MT would answer 1st time. It takes a pretty good location to have internal receiver noise a factor in hearing weak signals on 160.

In the contest weak stations faded S-1 to S-9, calling them when they were on the top of the QSB is probably a better idea than spending $10,000 on a radio and hoping it will make a difference.

I installed an INRAD filter in my PRO III after the first night. Big difference working weak stations next to strong but not really a magic bullet to hear downtown Europe from So Cal. I worked a bunch of EU, AF, PAC last year, nothing good this year.

Hearing the good DX is always a problem because as soon as it is posted to the internet, some big gun calls CQ on that frequency, I noticed that a lot in CQWW and the 160 contest..... great way to win !!!  hi hi

I've done the 160 contest when it was paper logging and I think this was the worst year for 1, 2 and 4s ever. Didn't stay up late or get up early because things seemed lousy. 
 
269 QSOs 565 Pts  75 Secs = Weak Score of 42,375

Thanks to all that stayed with me

Rick, N6PE ORG CA
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 I  thought I wanted a career, turns out I just wanted pay checks.