[UK-CONTEST] Original QRP contest

[Clive Whelan]

Disappointed not to have heard/worked any of you QRP freaks in this one 
  :-(  In fact I worked a solitary UK station, being a GM4.

The ARRL RU caused some problems around the 40m QRP freq. of 7030, but 
nothing untoward. 20m around 14060 was surprisingly completely clear of 
RTTY.

Running SO2R I quickly discovered the unfortunate harmonic relationship 
between the 40 and 20m QRP frequencies, so that CQing around 7030 made 
S&Ping around 14060 a little tricky, although I could copy the better 
signals through my second harmonic.

I ran about 800mW on 14Mhz and a massive (!) 1w on 7 and 3.5. I just did 
a couple of hours on Saturday evening and then again on Sunday morning 
before the football.

QSO totals

3.5Mhz   7
7Mhz      22
14Mhz    18

Total       47

Antennas were a plain vanilla Butternut on HF and a C3SS cranked down to 
15ft and fixed due East on 14Mhz. There's nothing like QRP to tell you 
how your antennas are working, and 80m was really tough with a vertical 
only about 27ft high. Conversely it went very well indeed on 40m

Sadly nothing heard or worked outside Europe and the event seems to be 
studiously ignored on the other side of the pond, which is a shame, 
particularly as I know my 800mW gets into e.g VK6, so the USA is local 
really!

I am not myself a real QRP freak, but I have to say that I am puzzled by 
the inclusion of a 20w category which imo cannot be considered QRP. 
Personally I believe even 5w is QRO ;-) .


Life's just toooooo short for QRO c'mon!

73


Clive
GW3NJW