[VHFcontesting] VHF contest tips, tricks, and techniques

[Andrew Glasbrenner]

I have an SDR-iQ tapped to my 910h IF, and it is a HUGE help during Eskip and Tropo openings, and contests!

73, Drew KO4MA

Sent from my iPhone

> On Jul 23, 2014, at 7:04 PM, Ken Alexander <k.alexander at rogers.com> wrote:
> 
> I shut down my 2m transceiver on Sunday morning, tired of endlessly tuning up and down the dial for 1 or 2 contacts.  I hooked up the yagi to my Funcube Dongle Pro+ SDR receiver and kept an eye on 2m that way.  What a difference!  We nabbed several of the casual call-a-few-CQs-then-go-mow-the-lawn types that way.  I'd hear one, disconnect the antenna and pass it to VE3EG (our 6m op) and call out the frequency.  He'd connect it to his FT-857D and make the contact.  It was clumsy but effective.  I'm sure we would have missed these guys because they weren't "regulars" and didn't stay around after working us if no one else called them.
> 
> This convinced me that SDR is the way to go in a VHF contest...you can monitor a big chunk of the band and miss nothing.  I am hoping to begin roving in the September contest and will be using my Flex-1500 on 6m and 432 (with an Elecraft XV432 transverter, just ordered) and an old Kenwood TR-9130 on 2m.
> 
> The Funcube Dongle Pro+ is no slouch on 2m.  The Funcube kept pace with the 857D with the same antenna, and its built-in 2m bandpass filter kept everything clean even when he was transmitting on 6m at 100W.  The antennas were on the same mast, about 3 ft apart.
> 
> 73,
> 
> Ken Alexander
> VE3HLS
> 
> 
> 
>> On 2014-07-23 4:04 PM, Chet S wrote:
>> I use the N1MM logger. In addition to the colored prompts that show up in
>> the main window to signal you that you need someone's contact or grid on
>> another band, there is a multiplier window that will display a map of the
>> grids worked on the band that you are currently using. That keeps you from
>> missing an adjacent grid, likely because you had not aimed that way enough.
>> Often then CQing that way will get it and others in that direction.
>> 
>> And, in the grid map window, a right button mouse click on a grid square
>> will display a list of calls worked in that grid.
>>