ARRL 160-Meter Contest
Call: W0AH
Operator(s): W0AH
Station: W0AH
Class: Single Op LP
QTH: SC
Operating Time (hrs):
Summary:
Total: QSOs = 461 Sections = 66 Countries = 6 Total Score = 67,680
Club: Grand Mesa Contesters of Colorado
Comments:
When you're 65, you don't climb trees in the rain for anything unimportant! No,
this was the ARRL 160M contest, and despite a sloping, drooping inverted L with
the top at 50' and only a few radials, it was fun to get on and work so many of
the topbanders that I've been working for decades. I was still putting down
those few radials durig the first hour of the test. Friday night was quiet. I
knew my signal was pretty weak when I couldn't hold a frequency calling CQ. I
stayed up past the European sunrise S&Ping. DX in the log was VP2E, 6Y0A,
P40TA, P44A, ZF2AH, KV4FZ, CO6JD, and PQ7Q. Few from across the pond seemed to
call CQ besides ON4UN, and he had a huge pileup. Saturday afternoon I added
another couple radials and climbed another tree (several times) to get the end
of my drooping antenna another 20' off the ground. Saturday night started quiet,
and I was able to run a few times before high power stations took my frequency.
But the band got real noisy by 10PM local, and by midnight I could hear no one
new through the continuous summer-like static crashes, so I went to bed, or
rather lay down on the RV couch where I was sitting and pulled a blanket over my
body. I got back on at my local sunrise and heard a few ESP JA's working the
west coast. My goal had been to work 48 states, but I missed ND and LA as well
as AK and HI. No Europe and only two Californians. Even N6RO and K6SE were weak
and went unworked. The difficulty working CA reminded me of my 160M contests as
W2CRS in upstate NY using a low dipole all those years ago. Thanks for the Q's.
A year from now maybe I'll have a shunt fed tower and a bunch of radials on top
band. Doug W0AH/4
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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