[VHFcontesting] rules

[Marshall Williams]

RRR....if we could just get the HFers out of the world of VHF, most 
things would work better. 

The VUAC made some very good changes to the VHF contest rules.....they 
just did not go far enough.  All the nit-picking restrictions are the 
results of HF contesters injecting their way of doing things into VHF 
contesting.  There needs to be a General Rules for HF contesting and a 
General Rules for VHF contesting.   These two sets of rules do not 
necessarily have to be closely related, since the nature of HF and VHF 
contesting is significantly different.  If the VUAC were to propose a 
new set of rules that removed all the silly restrictions, the HF old 
timers at ARRL would swat them down.  It is most discouraging.

Take a look a the rules for the CQ VHF contest.  Basically, anything 
goes.  You can look at the Internet(anywhere in the Internet, I 
believe).  The prop logger pages, spotting pages, realtime scheduling 
pages, APRS, whatever.  You can make schedules on line, you can call 
them on the phone and remind them to get on.  You can do whatever it 
takes, BUT you still have to make a VALID contact.  The CQ VHF contest 
is fast becoming one of the Majors precisely because it is not burdened 
down with arcane restrictions that were put there by HF ops that have no 
clue what we do.

VHF contesting should about making the contact now about HOW you found 
the station on the other end.  Either you can work them, or you can't.  
If you can work a station, how you found out that he was there is 
immateriel.  If you can't work the station, all the restrictive rules 
are meaningless anyway.  Focus on the CONTACTS.....the rest will come 
along nicely.  73's to all ..... Marshall K5QE

aa4zz at aol.com wrote:

>Perhaps this change would be a good time to review the General Rules and see if some of them should be altered for VHF. It seems that often the issues that arise are with the general rules not the?VHF Rules and have to do with rules that mainly make sense in the HF world.
>
>73 Paul AA4ZZ
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Kenneth E. Harker <kenharker at kenharker.com>
>To: Nate Duehr <nate at natetech.com>
>Cc: VHFcontesting at contesting.com
>Sent: Mon, 28 Jan 2008 4:31 pm
>Subject: Re: [VHFcontesting] rules
>
>
>
>On Mon, Jan 28, 2008 at 02:06:03PM -0700, Nate Duehr wrote:
>  
>
>>Tom Staley wrote:
>>    
>>
>>>The only thing that would make it easier would be if all of the rules for a
>>>given contest were in one site or document, not 2 or 3. 
>>>      
>>>
>>Yeah, pretty much the only way to make this all easier is to keep the 
>>rules to a minimum, and in ONE place.
>>    
>>
>
>My understanding is that part of the reforms in contest coverage/promotion 
>that have already begun (see the February, 2008 QST) within the ARRL Contest
>Branch will be to do just that.  The rules were originally split into three 
>parts (General, HF/VHF, contest-specific) mainly to save page space in QST,
>and there's no reason to do that in the web presentation of the rules.  I 
>think it will be real soon now that the Contest Branch web site will start
>displaying the rules for a contest in their entirety in one document.
>
>  
>