[UK-CONTEST] The first 144MHz UKAC of 2010

[Rob Harrison]

Hi all,

Late but still valid comment I think.

The evening netted 63 qso's, 8 in Europe, all the rest were G, no 
GM,GD,GI,GW or EI. Only one in IO83. Due to lack of EU contacts, did in fact 
spend most of the contest looking for stations in the north west to no 
avail. Either calling CQ, or search & pounce. This seems to be a trend from 
here, difficult to work anything north of Birmingham, I am screened in the 
general direction of NW. So it's not through lack of trying. I noticed G8APB 
was quite high up the claimed scores, but not a peep from him, or GD8EXI. 
Conditions weren't the best however.

The increase in activity has caused a few problems finding a clear frequency 
to call on. Most of the problems are innocent, stations co-channel just 
don't hear each other initially due to beam headings. So don't get "out of 
the pram" if you find this happening to you, both of you could have been on 
the same frequency for 30 mins or more without interference, before turning 
the beam and discovering " your" frequency was occupied. A case in point. 
I'm in search and pounce mode, hear a weak DL in JN49 calling CQ, it could 
have been a GM/GI, a UK station comes up and says "is the frequency 
occupied" (well done that man) I say "yes", he says "I can't hear anything", 
I say "there's a DL on here calling CQ", he says "oh ok" and goes off to 
find a frequency. All quite innocent and aimiable.

If you keep an eye on the cluster, you'll find some of the "bigger" stations 
will get spotted by non-contesters, or europeans. In chosing your frequency 
to call, it may be prudent to avoid the spotted frequency. At the end of the 
day, 200Khz (144.15 to 144.35) isn't enough for all to have a truly clear 
frequency, so it's compromise.

As for how close is too close, 2.5Khz is reasonable, but unfortunately a lot 
of the modern black boxes aren't too clever on TX, add an amp not set 
up/driven properly and high gain antennas, you start looking at a lot more 
bandwidth you can't use for receive.

73

Bob G8HGN JO01fo

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Keith Maton" <g6nhu at me.com>
To: "UK Contesting" <uk-contest at contesting.com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 05, 2010 11:27 PM
Subject: [UK-CONTEST] The first 144MHz UKAC of 2010


>
> That was an interesting evening, very cold in our Martello Tower, every 
> time I breathed out I had to use an ice pick to get through it.  Luckily 
> we didn't get the snow that was forecast but I think a lot of the rest of 
> the country did.
>
> One thing I found very frustrating was that I'd been sitting on a 
> frequency just keeping it occupied for around fifteen minutes prior to the 
> start of the contest (I always make a point of spinning the beam the full 
> 360 degrees while doing this to make sure that there's nobody doing the 
> same thing that we're not hearing because they're in a null) with not a 
> peep heard but 30 seconds before the official start time (according to my 
> MSF set watch) someone started calling CQ contest just 2.5 KHz above us 
> forcing me to tune down a couple of k to clear them.  I wish people would 
> take the time to actually listen on the frequency they want to use rather 
> than what appeared to happen, ie just turn the radio on and start shouting 
> without having a good listen around first.
>
> Conditions were poor this evening, the highlight was when I suggested one 
> of our operators point the beam towards Scotland and see what we get and 
> after his  second call we did indeed work GM!  No Wales, Ireland or the 
> Channel Isles this evening though.
>
> Looking forward to the 70cms contest next week, providing we can find 
> someone brave enough to get the aerial up!
>
> 73
> Keith, G6NHU
>
>
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>
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