[VHFcontesting] January VHF-N3NGE Makes 99!

[Les Rayburn]

My second ever VHF SSB contact was with Jimmy Long, W4ZRZ during the January 2008 VHF Contest. Using a four element Yagi mounted in my attic, everyone but Jimmy was at or near the noise level. That year I operated for over 20 hours of the contest, and worked a total of five stations. Believe it or not, after that experience, I was hooked. 

This year’s January event saw me continuing with indoor antennas (and some temporary outdoor ones too on a push up mast), and the results were a little better. After three years of “listening to noise” as my XYL calls it, I’m still hooked. Conditions were awful here, to the point of almost being supernaturally bad. Also struggled with equipment issues...including high SWR on the 222 antenna which meant the near total loss of that band. My antenna order for 902 and 1296 didn’t reach me in time, so I was limited to small loop Yagi in the driveway for 1296 and nothing at all on 902. Murphy stuck in other ways too, like a brand new footswitch for the 2 Meter station ceasing to work in the middle of  a contact, and computer crashes. 

Despite all that, a sked on Saturday night netted an easy and fast contact with N3NGE in FN20 via WSJT meteor scatter. This is grid #99 worked using the indoor antennas, and the contact took less than eight minutes from start to finish. All the credit goes to the fine operators at N3NGE and that killer station, but still a great feeling. I held out that I might work that elusive 100th grid during the event, but it was not to be. Conditions were poor, and I hadn’t set up enough skeds on Meteor Scatter during the late hours. Plus two of the three rovers who were scheduled to activate some much much needed grids to our West came down with the flu, so Grid #100 will have to wait for another day. 

After three years I’m within striking distance of 2 Meter VUCC. Thank you to everyone who has helped me so much with the journey. I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again now...I wasted almost four decades on HF. Even when conditions suck, and contacts are few, VHF is still the most fun you can have in amateur radio. See you all in the Spring Sprints! 

ARRL January VHF (SOLP)
Total Contacts: 52
Total QSO Points: 80
Total Multipliers: 32
Score: 2560
6M: 13 Q's 8 M's
2M: 25 Q's 14 M's
222: 2 Q's 1 M's
432: 9 Q's 6 M's
902: 0 0
1.296: 1 1
2.3: 0 0
3.5: 0 0
5.7 0 0
10ghz: 1 1
Light: 1 1

73,




Les Rayburn, N1LF
EM63nf
121 Mayfair Park
Maylene, AL 35114

6M VUCC #1712
Grud Bandit #222