CQ Worldwide DX Contest, SSB
Call: K3FIV
Operator(s): K3FIV
Station: K3FIV
Class: SOAB(A) LP
QTH: Point Arena, CA
Operating Time (hrs): 17
Summary:
Band QSOs Zones Countries
------------------------------
160:
80: 12 5 5
40: 31 15 20
20: 101 21 36
15: 175 24 43
10: 3 2 2
------------------------------
Total: 322 67 106 Total Score = 151,202
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Comments:
Nice to see 15 open. 20 was an absolute jungle. Stations running on the same
frequency, other stations calling, passing exchanges, and acknowledging. It
will be interesting to see how many of those QSOs actually match up in the
logs. I heard lots and lots of broken callsigns and exchanges.
My 100 watts and dipole couldn't do the job on the too-short 10 meter openings
to SA. I heard lots of SA stations, but LU4DX gets my vote for "best ears in
SA" - he was the only one who could pull my call from the noise and pileup.
Nothing on 10 from the West though. I spent some time on 20 meters, because
you have to, and after getting beaten to a pulp in the pileups retreated to 15
where it was a little more civilized. 15 is much bigger, but it was also
wall-to-wall with RF. Fortunately the wall was only one station deep, so at
least it was clear who was trying to contact whom.
A few times I found a hole on 15 and tried a run, without much luck. If the
band sounded as wild on the other side as it did on mine, I'm not surprised few
people could hear my CQing. Only a handful of my QSOs were from runs. S&P was
much more productive, sometimes 2 or 3 a minute, using the panadapter display
on my Flex-3000 to go from station to station.
I ran assisted, mostly to see what the spotting did to help. I found it wasn't
as helpful as in other contests. There were so many stations that spots only
indicated where the pileups were, which my measly signal had little chance of
breaking. Since I'm on the shore of the Pacific Ocean, as propagation changed
I managed to find several weak Asia stations calling CQ with no responses. So
I worked them, and then spotted. In less than 30 seconds there was a pileup!
It was nice to work a bunch of BYs, and to get a new country as well - 3W1. I
heard C91, 5R8, JW, and others but couldn't break through.
Mostly I concluded that a bandscope is more helpful than the spotting network
if you're an LP station. Actually, 100 watts and a dipole on 20/15/10 should
be classified as QRP. It certainly feels like it. But it's fun to see what you
can do with 100 watts and a wire.
40 was OK, not as good as in other contests. 80 was disappointing, just not
many stations on, at least that I could hear or work. I worked a lot of JAs,
but it didn't seem that there were as many as usual. The ones I worked were
very loud, but I got few responses to CQs. Usually there are more.
Thanks to everybody that pulled my signal out of the noise. There are some
very good ears out there!
Rig: Flex-3000, 100 watts
Ant: Carolina Windom @ 12 meters on all bands
QTH: Point Arena, CA CM88eu
73,
/Jack de K3FIV
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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