[UK-CONTEST] VHF FD

Mon Jul 6 03:15:58 PDT 2009

>>> On 05/07/2009 at 21:53, in message <4A5112CE.9010400 at greenrover.demon.co.uk>,
Paul_group <paul_group at greenrover.demon.co.uk> wrote:

I was about to compose a "VHF FD" email when Paul wrote so many things I agree with I've kept his comments inline.    I decided to have a go as a "sweeper" on 6 and 2 this year,  but never made it to 6  (2 sounded like 6 for 3 hours anyway so there didn't seem much point :-).   I won't be bothering with a sweeper entry again, unless the "committee" change a number of significant rules.

Seeing as it was such a beautiful day I'd carted the whole station outside onto the garden table.  I expected to fit a bit of operating in around cutting the grass etc as I didn't expect to work too many people.  For this reason also I abandoned the idea of using a PC as I didn't expect to do that much logging and making dupes wouldn't be a problem with so few....  Well I ended up with 64 in the log so it was starting to get tricky!   It was helped by a page and a half of EAs and CTs.

> 
> Agreed, I was only active on 70cm this year and the two skills that were 
> sadly missing in some groups were the key and a rotator !
> how many times I struggled to exchange only to be told oh yeah.. your 
> off the back of the beam....

And you were sadly missed by me on 2 Paul :-(   Not that I would have been allowed to work you anyway because one of us would have had to be disqualified for breaking the rules and CQing.    Many thanks to those who did turn their beam this way when I called and it was going to be a struggle to make the contact, it was much appreciated.    There were those who it seems just couldn't be bothered:

 I was surprised to hear no stations at all from Wales, except for one who, when I called on sunday morning  had the gall to say "I'm beaming south east, call again later".   (You know who you are,  thanks OM I needed you for the multiplier)   This sums up the attitude that I hate most in VHF contesting.    As it was I had to go out to my "part time job"  just after that and never did get the chance to "call again later"  (we are not worthy to have you beam this way....).     Well I hope you realise you were called by several GMs so that's a few points you threw away.    So thankyou to the ones who displayed the proper spirit and turned their beam,  It was amazing to hear all these signals that had been just over the noise romping in at 57.

> 
> I won't bother restricting myself to <100W for the sweeper category next 
> year as its way too frustrating, it might work in jo01 etc but from here 
> PA and DL were stronger than a lot of UK stns.... taking 20 mins to 
> complete with someone at 150km isn't my idea of fun...

And <100W on 2M from IO86 doesn't work too well either.  Although the old tube can't do much more so it wasn't too difficult to restrict myself this time.   BUT I have some shiny new ones and they're going in real soon now......

> No cq for fixed stns meant I never heard some of the regular VHF crowd, 
> see you next time I hope.

And that's another reason why I won't bother being a sweeper again (unless you change it).   Not being able to CQ was an absolute bane from here.   It was excruciating hearing things like someone in IO70 working Alan 'ZUK knowing they were also S&P.    I could hear a lot of the smaller portables also S&P and of course most of the fixed stations were not workable by me either.    OK, I think I can see why the no cqing rule was introduced for the sweeper section in what is really a _Field_ day  but it certainly doesn't work from here for me.

Was it just me being a "grumpy old man" but was the standard of operating generally pretty appalling?   Things I heard:  Gxxxx/p in JO0xxx having a long natter to some local pal  when they surely must have realised there were other people calling them, I had to wait about 5 minutes expecting them to drop from S7 into the noise at any moment.     G5xx/p on sunday:  "CQ  CQ CQ CQ CQ CQ contest CQ contest CQ CQ CQ CQ CQ CQ contest CQ contest golf five mumble mumble <and they fade into the noise> CQ contest CQ contest"    Now, let me think what's the bit of information that I actually want to hear?  that they're CQing or what their callsign is?  Think about it........    And they were'nt the only one, for pete's sake give the callsign umpteem times CLEARLY and ditch the CQs.

And the portable that came back with "Can I give you the report on the next over?"  deserved the "NO"  he got from me!   (Actually now I think about it that was last NAC, not FD)

So generally  I wasn't impressed, OK I'm sure there are times I only open my mouth to change feet, but I hope most of the time I keep it crisp and to the point with minimum woffle.

Of course the highlight was when the Es started , I couldn't believe it!   Neither unfortunately could a lot of the people at the other end.  EA3xxx "Ehhh ehhhh what what what country what country again again......."   And the F in JN03 who just simply could not get my call whether I gave it with English pronounced letters or French or phonetics...   A lot of the ops just didn't seem to understand what Es was and that they really could be being called by someone from Scotland!   When the Es started it was soooo hard not to just ditch the contest and go to CQing like I normally would.   But I stuck it out and didn't,  maybe lost a few as a result :-(    Most Es I've worked before on 2 has been truly "Sporadic"   with just a few strong stations in very localised areas.   This time it was the whole of spain and portugal for 3 hours.   Joe, CT1HZE was in here for about an hour and a half.....

I have a few questions regarding the Es contacts:  A few folks were not giving full locators, just the first 4 characters.   There was no way I was going to disrupt some of the better known stations flow by demanding the rest, I always sent the report, serial and full locator.   So how do I log that for the contest log and to work out the points?    Also a number of them weren't giving serials, I know the normal way is to log that as 001 but then I heard some of them had started sending a serial -  they may have sent someone else 001, so what do I do?   I don't want to have the QSO busted because its a duplicate serial?!

So, not really a Field day report more a Garden day (there is a field over the road, does that count?), but a fun contest anyway.   Ditch the "No CQing for sweepers"  and the 100W limit and I might consider doing it again but otherwise not.   Now I just have to type it all into the logger and fix the times, doh,   No doubt I'll loose half the QSOs 'cos I can't read my writing!

73
Andy
gm8oeg

, and the grass never did get cut.....

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