[UK-CONTEST] 9M2RPN CQWPX SSB 2003

[Dr K Kerr]

Hi Folks,
This is now ancient history and I apologies to my co-operator, Rich 
9M2/G4ZFE, for being very late with this story. During last year’s visit to 
9M2 in August, Rich suggested that, should I ever be back during one of the 
big contest weekends, we could try out the 9M2RPN station at the National 
Planetarium in KL, at the kind invitation of the station manager, Sangat 
9M2SS. I did not expect to back in KL just quite so soon but events 
conspired (happily for once) to have me back in 9M2 for CQWW WPX. Our plan 
evolved as soon as I had confirmation of my travel. The introduction to 
WPX, of the M2 category seemed ideal for the situation at 9M2RPN.
The weekend before WPX SSB I made another IOTA trip to Pulau Pangkor AS072. 
Conditions were pretty awful but it whetted the appetite for the contest. 
Rich was overseas for most of the time leading up to the contest and we 
both made it up to the shack at the Planetarium around midday Friday, the 
day before. The antennas at the station include a TH3 at about 35ft, a low 
trap dipole for 40/80m and an R7 vertical a few feet from the beam. 
Although in the middle of the city, the shack sits in several acres of 
parkland open to the public, on a hill with a 360 degree view around the 
city, barring a few trees here and there. It is an excellent site and the 
low antennas are compensated for by the sharp slope away from the shack 
especially from west through north to east

.ideal. Our main concern was 
interstation QRM. We had two amps capable of the legal 400W limit and aimed 
to run two stations most of the time. Ordinarily there are usually 2 or 3 
bands open from 9M2 for a fair part of the day, to support contest QSOs. 
Although I took our GM7V club bandpass filters out with me, we needed to do 
something about antenna separation. There was also some concern about the 
high SWR on the TH3 on 15m. Our options were limited but eventually, and 
amidst the obligatory thunderstorm and downpour, we had installed Rich’s 
F12 Sigma5 vertical, my fishing pole with a 10m vertical and my 20/15m 
vertical slung in a tree. Every permutation of testing told us that the 
FT900 caused a lot of flack on the IC756, the Sigma5 did not reject 
out-of-band signals too well, but the wire verticals seemed to work quite 
well. The replacement of the FT900 by an IC775 was an improvement. We 
seemed set by nightfall. I returned home for some sleep but Rich stayed 
guard at the shack and did some WARC CW.
The contest began at 0800 local. I live a good distance from the shack when 
in KL but despite leaving tons of time to cross a waking city, I arrived 
about 5 mins before the ‘off’! Rich was to begin on 10m (IC775 plus AL80 to 
vertical) while I would begin on 15m (IC765 plus ICPW1 to TH3). At 0000z, 
about 1 hour after sunrise in KL, 15m is usually open to the west coast of 
NA, while 10m is open to JA. Rich was making some headway on a slowly 
opening 10m; I had a dud microphone. After 7 years of flawless service, the 
Heil plug chose this moment to lose both wires! Repaired and we were off. 
It was soon apparent that the TH3 was not working well on 15m. We could 
hear a number of the big W6 contest stations but they could not hear us. 
Change No 1 was to dump the beam on 15m, and use it on 10m and 20m. 15m ran 
on the wire vertical for the rest of the contest. Change 2 came a few hours 
later when I remembered that the reason I could not drive the IC765 
properly was that HC4 inserts are a bit low on output and some ICOM rigs 
require a preamp to run with them. I knew this mic worked perfectly with my 
own IC775 so we swapped rigs and that was us for the rest of the contest. 
So, after a sticky first hour we were rolling. After about 0200z 15m really 
faded out as absorption increased and 10m was the only productive band. 
Rates were quite good to begin with but after 4 hours they dropped to 40-50 
per hour at best as midday and afternoon absorption took its toll. It 
seemed worth plugging away on 10m throughout the day and although the 
majority of stations worked were JAs, some nice DX appeared. There were a 
few PY’s, CE and XE (all antipodeal from 9M2) and my European perspective 
made being called by H44, KH6 and A35 on 10m a little special. The band 
died for about an hour in midafternoon, but wakened up quite well. First EU 
on 10m was LZ1NG at 0651z. Rich got going again on 15m about 0700z but it 
was hard work. We were also in the middle of our late afternoon 
thunderstorm, which was fairly lively, very wet, extremely noisy on 15 and 
10m and lasted several hours. This made reading the weak EU sigs on 10m 
quite a challenge as the band slowly opened to east and central Europe. It 
was interesting to note how incredibly loud some of the well known contest 
stations from these areas were on 10m, when everyone around them was real 
weak with deep QSB. 15m was really not opening up well with few signals 
around but 10m kept up well despite deep QSB and generally weak signals. 
G0NNA was our first UK station on any band at 1022 on 10m. Few others were 
worked on 10m and we were inaudible in GM, I was to learn later. 10m died 
very quickly after our sunset and we went QRT for a while at 1130z. 15m had 
still not really wakened up by then although a few EU had made it through. 
We started again at 1300z, with Rich suggesting I try 40m before 15 and 20m 
get going. 40m produced JA, some VE7 and a few USA stations working split. 
I can tell anyone who is interested that the BC QRM above 7100 is even 
worse in 9M2 than it is in EU!! 15m was coming to life and Rich was 
beginning to get some interest from EU. By 1430z 15m was going well into EU 
admixed with some JA and other Asian callers. 40m was no longer productive 
so I went to 20m, long before I would normally consider using that band 
from 9M2. I guess the poor propagation in EU was taking its toll on 15m and 
10m. Several stations told me that from Eu, there was no propagation to NA, 
so I guess that helped our rate on 20m. We both slugged away for the next 
few hours on 15 and 20m mostly into Eu, Rich doing a sterling job with the 
vertical antenna and relatively weak signals. Signal strengths seemed 
better on 20m as the band opened up and the pileup developed. There were 
many excellent signals from the UK and it was very encouraging to work many 
M3 stations, some with loud signals. By 1900z 15m had all but gone, was not 
runnable but there were a few stations on S&P. 20m was still OK into 
Europe. WA2AGE (? State) called at 2018 but this was a unique event! At 
2035 I found and worked KQ2M. The only other east US station I heard was 
K3ZO but he could not hear me. Rich started to work JAs on 40m. By 2100z EU 
was loud on 40m but, with a few exceptions, impossible to raise. Having 
heard this from both ends, it really is hard to see what the solution is, 
given the width of the 40m SSB band. Let us hope that the whole band is 
opened up for everyone soon!
 From about 2100 some sleep was in order, just before our sunrise, 
especially when neither 40 or 20m were very productive. By 2230 20m was 
beginning to liven up with early morning JA and even the occasional 
straggler from Europe (EA, I or UR5). By 0000z (half way) we had about 2500 
Qs and some W7s workable on 15m. As the sun rose 15m faded after some 
reasonable activity and 10m became our only QSO source. It was less 
productive than the previous day and by 0400z (local midday) it was time to 
go QRT. We started again at 0830z, late afternoon and although there were 
no storms the bands were sluggish. 10m was reasonable again into Europe. 
Rich was unable to start on 15m until 1100z but even then there was little 
happening. The first, and last, UK station on 10m on Sunday was G4CUS near 
Hastings at 11119z (kinda late!). 10m died just after 1130z. When 
propagation is bad, this period of ‘transition’ is always difficult and we 
could do nothing for about an hour. 20m was poor and 40m produced little. 
By about 1400 we were back to 15 and 20m again for the long haul through 
the night. 15m was reasonable in the early part of the night but 20m was 
slow to get going
.perhaps there was more of a NA opening from Europe 
today? By 1800z 15m had pretty well dried up. 20m was still OK, Rich tried 
40m. As 20m dried up rather early 40m became the focus of attention, though 
hardly a great source of QSOs. I finished my stint on 40m but lost a run 
frequency and could not get re-established. Trying to run EU was very hard 
since Eus would CQ very close or right on top of us
.we could not compete. 
By 2100 (0500 local) I had to start packing up some gear and leave the last 
three hours to Rich. I had a class to take at 1000 local and needed to get 
home, sleep(!) and try to rearrange my brain. 15m was the place to run out 
the contest and Monday morning got into full swing.

CQ WORLD WIDE PREFIX CONTEST -- 2003


Call: 9M2RPN
Category: Multi Two
Power: High Power
Band: All Band
Mode: SSB
Country: West Malaysia

BAND    QSO     QSO PTS         PTS/Q           PREFIXES


160             0       0               0.0             0
80              1       6               6.0             0
40              202     584             2.9             17
20              1350    3614            2.7             205
15              1078    2484            2.3             229
10              1292    2804            2.2             382
--------------------------------------

Totals  3923    9492            2.4             833 = 7,906,836

Continent Statistics
9M2RPN CQ WPX SSB 2003 Multi Two

                 80      40      20      15      10      ALL     percent


North America  0        7       14      15      10      46      1.2
South America 0         1       8       7       15      31      0.8
Europe  0       25      1105    655     691     2476    62.0
Asia            0       158     221     382     552     1313    32.9
Africa          0       0       11      9       6       26      0.7
Oceania         1       12      17      26      45      101     2.5

All in all, we had a good time. All the comments about conditions are past 
and forgotten. It hurt us in the sense that NA was almost invisible (1.2% 
of QSOs!) but we probably benefited from having a nonpolar path to Europe 
while EU was struggling to work NA. My first major contest from outside GM 
was certainly different and great fun. I have to thank Rich for giving me 
the chance to join him and for letting me loose in the station. I know that 
SSB is not his favourite mode
.I hope it was not too much of struggle! We 
both owe thanks to Sangat 9M2SS, for access to the station and, of course, 
to all those who called. QSL is via 9M2RPN.
CU in the next one
Keith GM4YXI