[UK-CONTEST] 59 reports on VHF

[Paul O'Kane]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "John Wilson" <uk-contest at grebe.plus.com>

> An input to the IARU VHF committee to seek to "encourage" entrants
> in VHF contests to send real reports would be a good idea, in other
> words to penalise entrants who send more than a certain percentage
> of 59 reports.

All reports are subjective - they depend of the absolute
signal strength at your antenna, the gain of your antenna,
your feedline losses, the sensitivity of your rig, the 
calibration of the S-Meter - and the mood you're in.

To anyone concerned about "real" reports, I'd suggest a
contest is the least appropriate environment.

In the "real" world, contesters who want to do the very best
they can will not vary their reports, because the fastest
option is to accept the 59(9) default.

> the trend is for European stations to send 59 regardless
> and UK stations to give real reports which puts us at a
> disadvantage.

Finally, someone admits that there is a disadvantage in
giving "real" reports while contesting :-)

> so if all reports are 59 this only leaves the serial number
> as the unique piece of information.

There is a simple solution, not unlike RoPoCo.  Send two
serial numbers.  The first is your normal serial/sequence
number, the second is the serial you received from the
previous QSO.  You are forced to copy the second serial -
it cannot be guessed or interpolated.  For your first QSO,
the second serial is 000.

For example:

QSO    Callsign   Sent   Received.

1       G3ABC   001/000   010/005  
2       G4ABC   002/010   099/043
3       G5ABC   003/099   291/001
4       G6ABC   004/291   033/106
5       G7ABC   005/033   etc.

Like RoPoCo, exchanges can be fully cross-checked to see
where an "error" occurred.  If three digits is not enough,
use four.

73,
Paul EI5DI