[VHFcontesting] ARRL Jan VHF WM5R/R Rover

[Kenneth E. Harker]

ARRL January VHF Sweepstakes
                    
Call: WM5R/R
Operator(s): WM5R
Station: WM5R

Class: Rover LP
QTH: West Gulf
Operating Time (hrs): 6

Summary:
 Band     QSOs  Points  Mults  
-----------------------------
  144:     10     10      4
  432:      5     10      3
-----------------------------
Total:     15     20      7  +  5  =  240

Club/Team: CTDXCC

Comments:

Grids activated: EM13, EM12, EM11, EM10, EM00.

     This weekend had too much stuff going on to do a full-out
VHF contest effort.  Saturday morning, my fiancee and I competed
in an orienteering meet held at the LBJ National Grasslands near
Decatur, TX.  So, we began the contest in EM13, about an hour
after the start, and drove back to Austin, working stations as we
could.
     The gear in the car is not well-suited to a VHF rover contest
effort.  It was an Icom IC-706MkIIG, a Larsen dual-band mobile
whip on a trunk lip mount, and an MFJ six meter whip on a mag mount
in the middle of the roof.  When we first got rolling in EM13, I
discovered that the six meter antenna had extremely high SWR,
and did not put out any power, so I was limited to 2M and 70cm.
I had brought a Super CMOS Keyer III I built years ago and some
paddles, but despite checking out fine the night before, the keyer's
keying line seemed to be shorted out.  So, we went with phone-only.
I started out using a brand-new Heil HS-706 headset mic, but it
ceased working after just a half-day of use.  I got it free with the
purchase of the radio, so I suppose it's not a big deal that it
died, but it reinforces my opinion on Heil's spotty record of
mechanical quality.
     Anyway, with a tiny, vertically-polarized antenna less than a
meter off the ground, there were a limited number of stations I could
work.  I had anticipated this, and as I could only operate a portion
of the contest period anyway, I figured I'd just work what I could.
I was happy to be able to say I worked at least one station in every
grid we travelled to, although I would have been sweating it
had N5TIF not been such a consistently strong signal in EM11, even as
far south as Temple.  He was the only station heard in that grid.
     As we drove into Austin, I heard not a single contester calling
CQ.  All of my CQs went completely unanswered until finally, less
than ten miles from downtown and three minutes before we arrived
at our destination, I heard W5DF/R.  We tried to work each other
for a couple of minutes, as we faded in and out of each others' receivers.
Finally, we pulled up into the parking lot of our destination and
all I can hear is one of the big gun stations in EM00 _conversing_
with W5DF/R!  He's telling the rover who I am, from which station I
normally operate, etc., etc., and basically prevented me from completing 
a QSO with W5DF/R.  I waited around as long as I reasonably could before
getting out of the car, but he just wouldn't shut up.  I never did
hear W5DF/R again.
     I got on again later in the evening on my drive to and from
Georgetown (EM10,) where I put in a couple of hours in a multi-two
effort in the North American QSO Party, and worked a couple more
stations.  On Sunday, we drove over to see friends near Johnson City,
hitting EM00 in the process.  We drove all the way through Austin and
Dripping Springs, calling CQ on every hilltop, but heard nobody until
we were almost at our destination.  I was then able to work K5LLL on
two meters, but we couldn't connect on 432, even though I heard him
quite well on that band.  It was weird - there was a sharp ridge
right in front of our path to K5LLL, and sometimes he would peak
to S6 or so - I guess the ridge diffractions were occasionally
lining up just right.  Much later in the evening, on the drive home,
I worked another station on two bands in the last hour of the contest.
     I don't know if I'll be rovering again or not.  It wasn't
something I'd put a lot of preparation into.  I just figured as long
as we were travelling through so many grids, I would make a few
stations happy.

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Kenneth E. Harker      "Vox Clamantis in Deserto"      kharker at cs.utexas.edu
University of Texas at Austin                   Amateur Radio Callsign: WM5R
Department of the Computer Sciences      VP, Central Texas DX & Contest Club
Taylor Hall TAY 2.124                         Maintainer of Linux on Laptops
Austin, TX 78712-1188 USA            http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/kharker/
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