[UK-CONTEST] 80M SSB Contest report - G3NKC

[Dave Lawley]

Message text written by "David L Sharred"
>Started very well tonight; like a steam train in fact.......  Then, about
40
>mins in, G4BUO parked himself far too close; and anyone below S9 could not
>be heard.  I noted that I moved up to 750Hz LF; but sorry Dave - you were
>far too close - Cheers mate -  I owe you one.

The band was very crowded so I spent a lot of time running up and down the
band
in S+P mode trying to find a frequency. With the Band Map in Writelog I
could see 
there were 4kHz between M0AJT and G3NKC. Not ideal because both were loud 
with me and probably better placed geographically, in the middle of the
country. 

If the two of you had been 3kHz apart I couldn't have squeezed in, but in
this situation 
I'm sorry but a 4kHz gap is too much. I suffered as well, but there was no
other slot 
on the band at all. For the last half hour I also had to contend with two
stations, Spanish
I think, who came up and started ragchewing 500Hz closer to Dave's
frequency. As he 
is further north they may not have troubled him, but they gave me problems.

When drafting the rules we felt that the contests wouldn't need as much
space
as SSB AFS, perhaps we were wrong. The SSTVers seem to start up as soon
as anyone goes near their segment (recommended, not exclusive!), and there 
were also several ragchews on the band including a group on 3.750.

I don't think it's appropriate for these contests, but the sprint format is
a great
leveller because then no-one can claim a right to 'their' frequency.

Dave G4BUO