[UK-CONTEST] April 2007 Radcom Letters...

[James Hill]

Hi Guys,

I can see both sides of the argument here, for what it's worth.

Normally, I work 12h days, which means that radio is only a realistic option at
weekends, and then only with the say so of the XYL, if there are no important
domestic jobs or similar to do etc.

It can be frustrating, to get sat in front of the radio of a weekend, and to
find that most weekends, there is a contest on of some description.

I only have a modest setup (FT-857, 100w and Carolina Windom), and I usually try
to make the best of the situation by getting a few countries in the log, that I
wouldnt normally be able to get. If I want to bang on for hours about the state
of my health/the price of coal/the weather etc, then I'll generally go do it on
2m/70cm Simplex, or use Echolink or even MSN!!

However, it can be disheartening, when you have to compete with all the big boys
(kilowatts & beams) in a pile up, and to a lot of "DX", G's are 2 a penny, and
not worth any mults, as they have probably worked 2 dozen already....

Then you get the Eastern Europeans & rude Italians with 2Kw and signals wider
then the proverbial barn door..... :-)

Then you have the CW boys whining about the whole of 40m getting littered with
SSB signals.... I listened during one major CW contest a while back, and guess
what? yup..... (no offence to CWers.. I do it myself, but cant get up to
contest speed)

It's definately a case of "you cant please all of the people all of the time".

Yes, I am a contest op with my local club (M5ARC/G2F), and can be found on the
mic during most phone contests, having fun (serious fun though, you
understand!).

One event that sticks in my mind from CQWW SSB last year....

It was 0600z on the Saturday morning, and we had been running on 80m for
approximately 45 mins, on the same frequency. Bang on 0600z, we got told to QSY
by a French station, as it was THEIR frequency, THEY had been having THEIR
morning net on there for YEARS, and they were going to have it there this
morning, come hell or high water. Needless to say, we were QRM'd with +40 of
music, until we gave up and went elsewhere....

Hope all the above makes sense, as I'm on some pretty strong painkillers, and it
makes the old mind go a bit daft sometimes!

I could go for a 5MHz NoV, but it would appear that not even that band is immune
from the "waffle brigade" :-)

Cheers,

James