[UK-CONTEST] Letter to Radcom

[John Lemay]

Hello Barry

Good of you to pop your head over the parapet !

Firstly, well done and welcome back on your re-entry into VHF Contesting. I
too can remember the times of tuning low-to-high, well it gave us something
else to do between CQ calls. 

There have been supplementary comments to yours about the rules, and I can
appreciate they must look pretty daunting to a newcomer or occasional
contester. The only place I've seen a text copy is in the RSGB Yearbook.
There, the rules run to 7 pages.

Perhaps one or two members of the Contest Committee will be reading this and
might consider some simplification of the rules.

I hope you can stick with VHF Contesting, get to grips with the rules, and
we (Colchester Contest Group) will be looking for you on all the bands you
can field, every time you venture out!

Regards

John G4ZTR
Member Colchester CG, G0VHF/P, M1CRO/P, M5C.

-----Original Message-----
From: uk-contest-bounces at contesting.com
[mailto:uk-contest-bounces at contesting.com] On Behalf Of Aanside Studios
Sent: 16 August 2007 17:06
To: uk-contest at contesting.com
Subject: [UK-CONTEST] Letter to Radcom

OK guys, don't hang me!

Yes, in my letter to Radcom I got it wrong BUT I stand by my assertion that
all the effort will be put into 50MHz because contacts are easy. I do not
consider 50MHz "VHF" as we know it and it is, in summertime, just another HF
band with the advantage of bucket loads of Sporadic E. My main point was to
highlight the lack of activity on the higher bands, and that the only way to
encourage contesters to use these bands, which for some reason are perceived
as "difficult", is to reinstate the incentive scoring that they used to
attract. The last time I operated in a VHF Field Day we did not have 50MHz,
the lowest band used was 70MHz, 70cm and 23cm received a bonus, the scoring
was based on Maidenhead Locator without the benefit of computer programs for
scoring and log verification was done manually. (And the rig was powered by
steam, and we tuned high to low)

I too am amazed that the Editor of Radcom did not pick up on my goof, it
only goes to show that they do not read the letters and simply use them to
fill space.

Incidentally, in my own defence have a look at the General Rules and see how
unclear the normalization clause is - in this day and age it is easy to put
an equation into a format which displays it as such on the web page.

Barry GM4TOE




_______________________________________________
UK-Contest mailing list
UK-Contest at contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/uk-contest