[UK-CONTEST] The Internet-Remote-Contesting age arrives!

[David Gould]

Having been involved with remote operation in the UK for 10 years and 
having built four remote systems I thought I would make a few comments.

There are two distinct scenarios
1) operating your existing home station when away from home
2) setting up a new station in a location that has benefits - eg 
quieter for rx and bigger/better tx antennas, fewer neighbours

Operating in the first case is simply a matter of convenience for 
those who have to travel away from home.
The following are a few bullet points about the second case

* A remote station still has to be (completely) within the boundary 
rules of the contest.
* Think of it as just having very long headphone and mic/key leads.
* It confers *no* benefit that could not be obtained by travelling to 
the site.
* In fact there are several downsides to a remote station - the main 
one being latency which makes it more difficult to operate, and the 
greater the distance the greater the latency.
* You need to be careful to stay within the licence conditions of the 
place where the station is located, (not where it is being operated from)

As I see it, to have part of the station remote, and part at the 
control location would be contrary to the boundary rules of the contest.

If you are building and maintaining the remote station yourself then 
distance is also a big issue.  I have had to move my remote station 
from 10 miles away to 65 miles away and the travelling is a real 
PITA!!  Every day I visit the remote site I loose about 3 hrs in 
packing and travelling.

73,
Dave, G3UEG















At 08:30 01/02/2010, Rob - G4LMW wrote:
>Interesting Nigel
>
>Is it me, or does anyone else feel that the operator should be within a
>reasonable distance of the station?
>
>Maybe I'm just old-fashioned?
>
>73, Rob
>G4LMW
>http://www.G4LMW.co.uk
>
>
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Nigel G3TXF" <nigel at G3TXF.com>
>To: "UK Contest Reflector" <uk-contest at contesting.com>
>Sent: Monday, February 01, 2010 7:00 AM
>Subject: [UK-CONTEST] The Internet-Remote-Contesting age arrives!
>
>
> > The last weekend in January is traditionally busy for
> > contesters with several contests running in parallel
> > including the CQWW-CW-160m and the REF-CW. However the ever
> > interesting postings on 3830 reveal that the "internet
> > remote contesting" age has really arrived.
> >
> > There's a W4 (sitting in a warm shack in Florida or
> > somewhere?) who has entered the REF-CW Contest was F/WA4PXP
> > and the CQWW-160m Contest as DL/WA4PXP through separate
> > remote stations in France (F4JRC) and Germany (DJ3AA).
> > Presumably somewhat tongue in cheek, Jim WA4PXP comments
> > "Operating in Europe is non-stop action" !
> >
> > Standby for the brave new world of "internet remote
> > contesting"?
> >
> > 73 - Nigel G3TXF
> >
> > PS : G3TXF remained very much in the old world of Single-Op
> > unassisted for CQWW-CW-160m, netting 1,480 Qs, 73 DXCC, 49
> > States/Prov for 1.1m points.
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > UK-Contest at contesting.com
> > http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/uk-contest
>
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