[VHFcontesting] Are EME/MS digital QSOes reducing rovers contributions?

[Marshall-K5QE]

Hello James....this last contest was pretty bad, all right.  We spent 
way too much time on digital MS, because that was the only way that we 
could make any contacts.

I see the problem that you are bringing up and it is certainly valid.  
When I was fighting for Assistance for VHF, one of the things that I 
used as an example of what was wrong with the old legacy HF rules, was 
that rovers could get to some rare grid and no one would work them, 
because they could not find them.

It seems to me that what you are saying is that we are not using 
Assistance very well as of yet.  Proper Assistance would solve most, if 
not all, of these issues.  As you said, maybe we need a "Rover 
PingJockey" type of page where the rovers could post their location and 
indicate that they were ready to run.  For stations within tropo range, 
this should not take too long.  I am not sure how this should work, but 
the bigger / better rovers should be able to tell us what works best.

The most experienced rovers probably know who the big fixed stations are 
and if they can be worked from a given grid.  I would suggest that you 
could just call the fixed station on the phone.  This certainly attracts 
their attention and gets you immediate results.  And yes, they can just 
work you during one of the 30sec or 1min RX periods.  Obviously, there 
will be times where a rover gets to a grid and there is no cell phone 
coverage, but mostly there is decent cell phone coverage in most grids 
nowadays.

All this needs to be carefully thought out.  I like the idea of a "rover 
PingJockey" page.  It might not work if hundreds of rovers were posting 
on the page every minute.

IF the rover itself is going to do digital MS, then the rover needs to 
have plenty of power.  This is a really common problem that I keep 
running into.  Many, many stations(fixed and rover) are running the 
proverbial 100W and a 3el beam on digital MS. Guess what??  They don't 
work very much and it takes a lot of time to do it.  I run a 7el beam 
and 1200W on MS.  I worked stations in this last contest out to 1200 
miles--most in about 5 min.

When we are running EME, we coordinate closely with the 2M tropo op.  
When we have "railroad tracks" for RO or RRR, we can decode those by 
eye.  Then EME op signals the tropo op who can use the rest of the 
minute to make calls or work stations.  It is a delicate dance, but any 
time the tropo op needs to work someone, he can use a short part of the 
EME station's RX time to do it.

I do NOT want to see the larger rovers marginalized by digital MS or 
EME.  I hope that others will weigh in on this topic and that some good 
ideas can be found.

73 Marshall K5QE


On 9/15/2015 10:09 PM, James Duffey wrote:
> The digital modes for EME and MS have become important tools for fixed stations to increase their grid multiplier totals in contests. There are few other ways to increase one’s 2M grid total in all of the contests, and to increase one’s 6M grid total in other than June or July contests.  These digital scatter QSOes, productive as they are, can take a half hour or more. That is time when the fixed station can do nothing else on that band, and for many stations, on any other band.
>
> During the September contest last weekend, operating as part of W7QQ/r, three different stations missed us in one or more grids due to being involved in WSJT MS or EME QSOes and not being able to take the time out to work us while we were stopped in the grid. By my count one station lost four mults by not working us while involved in an EME/MS QSO to get one multi, one three, and one at least two. The QSOes we lost amounted to about 5% of our score. With digital MS QSOes taking half hour or more, and the typical rover stop an hour or less, it is quite likely that the fixed station running a MS sked will miss the rover. With rovers being the mother’s milk of VHF contesting, this is probably bad in the long run for VHF contesting.
>
> I am concerned that there is a real danger that the drive by fixed stations to get new grids on a single band with MS or EME digital modes is diluting rover efforts. With rovers being a significant driving force in VHF/UHF contesting, I think that this is a bad trend. If we rove to a rare grid, and ops don’t work us because they are on WSJT modes, that will reduce our overall QSOes, and hence reduce our incentive to go out roving, Simply put, there are fewer stations for a rover to work with the fixed stations concentrating on MS or EME contacts. With fewer stations to work, the incentive to rove is decreased.
>
> I wonder if there is a way to deal with this potential conflict that is mutually beneficial to both the rover and the fixed station?  Perhaps a protocol that would allow the fixed stations to work rovers during their 30 seconds off?  A mechanism to notify the rover that they may have to wait 30 seconds to get a reply to an exchange would help. A closer attention to the rover’s route as put up by APRS or the clusters by the fixed stations would help as well. Perhaps a combined rover/ping jockey site? Fixed stations being able to work more than a single band at once?
>
> I fear that if this trend continues, the WSJT activity by fixed stations will drive out rover activity to the detriment of both fixed stations and rovers.
>
> I don’t mean to criticize those who use the digital modes to obtain more grid mults. I understand that motivation. More mults are better. I just want people to think about the consequences to rovers of this activity and see if there is some way that the two activities can coexist without significant detriment to either. I am concerned if this trend gets too far down the road it cannot be changed and rover activity will suffer. That will hurt us all.  - Duffey KK6MC, sometimes KK6MC/r, sometimes part of W7QQ/r
> --
> KK6MC
> James Duffey
> Cedar Crest NM
>
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