[VHFcontesting] ARRL June VHF QP Participation Question

[Terry]

Alex,

Using either a 4 ele beam or a turnstile will be very disappointing on 2m. A rotatable dipole and a vertical on 6m will be even more disappointing. A Yaesu Ft-897 is a good modern rig and with just modest antennas, you could hear and work lots more. You need at absolute minimum a 3 ele 6m beam and a 5 ele is better. These would be roughly a 6 or 12 foot boom respectively. On 2m, an 8 foot boom is minimum but a 15 -17 foot boom is better.  Can you get the antennas up 30 feet or more in the air?

To give you a measuring stick, from K8GP where I operated this past weekend in FM19bb, I worked rovers using 8 foot 2m beams 300 miles with the best dx being a rover in northern Indiana at over 400 miles!!! He was running a 150w amp. From where you are located, you should have been able to work several hundreds of QSO's.

73,

Terry - W8ZN

-----Original Message-----
From: VHFcontesting [mailto:vhfcontesting-bounces at contesting.com] On Behalf Of Alex
Sent: Monday, June 15, 2015 10:59 PM
To: vhfcontesting at contesting.com
Subject: Re: [VHFcontesting] ARRL June VHF QP Participation Question

Hi Terry,

 

A brief description of the setup can be found at:

 

http://3830scores.com/showrumor.php?arg=6haLzlfsmicc3

 

The FT-897 certainly is nothing to write home about when it comes to VHF/UHF operation, but I couldn’t bring myself to try to find and unbox the IC-275H for the amount of activity I was hearing. Signals from stations (on 2m) at 175-200 miles were consistently very strong (S9+, whatever that means on an 897), even on a simple turnstile, which made me think that I should be hearing many more weaker stations. 

 

Now, I realize that there are a 101 things we can point out why I was not hearing more stations, but at this time I’m mostly curious to know what folks think what the contest participation seemed like this past weekend compared to other years.

 

Thanks for describing your experience.

 

73,

--Alex KR1ST, FN21

 

From: w8zn54 at verizon.net [mailto:w8zn54 at verizon.net]
Sent: Monday, June 15, 2015 9:44 PM
To: alex at kr1st.com; vhfcontesting at contesting.com
Subject: Re: [VHFcontesting] ARRL June VHF QP Participation Question

 

Alex,

 

Before answering your question, it's only fair to see what you were running for equipment and what band you were listening on. If you were on 2m with a loop, then you probably didn't hear much. If you were on 6m, unfortunately, the propagation gods didn't smile on the northeast. Why not describe your station for the group.

 

We are in northern Va. and while activity wasn't as good as it's been in the past, it wasn't that bad given conditions. 

 

73,

 

Terry Price

W8ZN - ex K8ISK/WD8ISK

1.8 MHZ - 47 GHz - FM18dv

Member of the K8GP Contest Group

FM19bb

 

On 06/15/15, Alex<alex at kr1st.com> wrote:

 

I worked the ARRL June VHF QP to gauge what the activity level is in order to determine if I want to bother investing in larger VHF/UHF antennas. I'm in NEPA and live very near the top of one of the highest mountains around here and should have a clear shot to many areas with high participation rates. However, I was rather disappointed by the number of stations I could hear and work.



My question is, especially to those in the North-East, do you think that participation in this contest was especially low compared to other years, or was it about the same?



73,

--Alex KR1ST, FN21



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