CQ Worldwide DX Contest, CW
Call: ED9M
Operator(s): EA9LZ DF4SA DL9USA HA3NU HA1AG
Station: ED9M
Class: M/S HP
QTH: Ceuta
Operating Time (hrs): 48
Summary:
Band QSOs Zones Countries
------------------------------
160: 225 14 68
80: 1057 23 99
40: 2042 36 126
20: 1527 36 122
15: 2125 37 146
10: 573 22 94
------------------------------
Total: 7549 168 655 Total Score = 18,465,651
Club:
Comments:
After all the fun last year with CR5X we decided to try something larger this
year and moved to a 3-pointer dream location. We had a great time putting ED9M
on the air.
The team consisted of Jorge EA9LZ, Con DF4SA, Andreas DL9USA, Lacy HA3NU and
Zoli HA1AG.
This year we decided to go on Wednesday (Con and Andreas even on Tuesday) and
build up a station in a beautiful beach-side aqua park of downtown Ceuta. This
year the weather challenged us on many ways but none of those were expected in
Africa!
Even while waiting for our transfer in Madrid we were shocked by the weather
forecasts promising 100+ km/h wind and 15 l/h/m2 torrential rains for the
weekend. They were right, just as in Portugal last year antenna building was
done in rain and strong winds.
The time pressure of getting everything set up in time almost led to mutiny
when the German ops were rebelling against the iron-fisted Hungarian who did
not let them to break for lunch until the 160m antenna was set up!
On Friday evening we had Spiderbeam Yagis for 40-10, two verticals for 80 and
160m and two complete stations (FT-1000MP + Alpha91b, IC-735 + Titan III,
filters, network etc.) were up & running. We even built a prototype of a
super-lightweight but full size 40m Spiderbeam (< 10 kg) on the stage of the
aqua park, maybe 10m from the sea which must have had a very grim expectation.
The contest began with an astonishing rate on 40m and exactly 3 hours and 21
minutes and 801 QSOs later the 40m yagi surrendered to the winds. It had
survived the 90km/h winds, but when the gusts went over 110km/h it broke and we
had to switch back to the loaded 40m dipoles.
In the first night we had an additional role in the team: the sweeper who had
to keep the rainwater out of the operating room and our sleeping room. Equipped
with only a broom that was an uphill battle. Con even constructed a cover for
the door hole from plastic sheets we "recycled" but the wind was simply pushing
the rain above the edge of the gutter and it was flowing down the wall - inside.
80m was cruel as soon as we were reported in the cluster our nice 200+ pileup
turned into a 1Q/min chaos. It got somewhat habitual to spin the VFO a bit when
the packet mess got overwhelming. Hand-made CW and frequent speed changes helped
to disappoint the skimmers.
Saturday the QSOs were flying by quickly, especially enjoyable were some 230+
hours running EU on 15m. High bands to EU are excellent as the audience is big,
the ops are good and the moving Es cloud generates an healthy S/I distribution
among the callers favoring very high rates.
At half time we were at 4300 QSOs and hungry for more. The only downside was
the lack of wide-open propagation on 10m. There were short openings to EU, but
EA9 seems to be too close to EU to get a good skip to zone 14. The NA run which
came very fast with big signals disappeared as fast as it came.
Despite the reduced antenna we enjoyed nice rates on 40 and later on 80. On
160m the noise was about S9 and we really felt to be alligators with the beach
mounted 26m vertical. XE2WWW called us with a booming signal well above the EU
QRM and the noise. Next time we have to construct receiving antennas!
Andreas DL9USA was working the MULT station to increase our multiplier total
but with the packet spots it was often hopeless. I even lost my temper when
IR4M jumped to a cluster spot, sent his call 5 (69?) times and after 20
milliseconds waiting he did it all over again. And again. And again. He was not
even disturbed by the fact that the DX was transmitting at the same time. When
all the other stations stopped calling IR4M sent his report to the interstellar
universe and went away. I will love to see their UBN report.
Our local friends kept stopping by and we were treated very nicely with coffee
and cookies and also news about improving weather. :-)
Sunday morning greeted us with somewhat slower pileups and beautiful sunshine.
Funny that most of the outdoor photos were made in the weather which was least
typical for our stay!
The 10m sunset opening to Zone4 was amazing. Mike K9NW was like 30 over. H7V
was an easy double but XE1AI and W6YI (iirc) could not hear us. It gave us the
hope for a long lasting 15m opening followed by 20m. However somebody pulled
the plug on those bands very early.
On Monday we had a tight schedule to disassemble everything and pack them for
shipping. Sunday night the rain started to fall again, turning to a torrential
rain by the morning. It lead to some joking when DF4SA and HA1AG were taking
down one of the Spiderbeams DF4SA wanted to move the antenna away from the edge
of the roof - right into the middle of a puddle. HA1AG protested about standing
in ankle-deep water then the question back was: "and what is the difference?" -
and he was right - nothing :-)
We finished right in time to catch the last ferry which was allowed to leave,
so there was no chance to have a goodbye dinner with our local friends.
Crossing the Gibraltar straight with waves over 3m was interesting. I was only
wondering why the Finnish tourists were talking about "Estonia". As later Timo
OH1NOA pointed out, our ferry was the sister ship (or maybe the same) serving
Tallinn - Helsinki until 2008! Anyway we crossed back to the European continent
without problems and soon later said goodbye to Jorge in Algeciras, before
heading back to Malaga for the night.
Our score delighted us very much and we are very grateful for this
unforgettable experience. Regardless of the rain and wind after a few weeks we
will only remember the laughter this contest was and should be all about. Many
thanks again to all the EA9 team for their great support and hospitality,
especially Jorge for arranging everything, and Mariano for bringing the
Elefant. See you next time!
73,
Zoli HA1AG
2 QSO in minute 546
3 QSO in minute 757
4 QSO in minute 605
5 QSO in minute 265
6 QSO in minute 53
7 QSO in minute 4
8 QSO in minute 4
Period Rate QSO Time
10 4.90 49 0155 - 0204
20 4.55 91 0146 - 0205
30 4.33 130 0142 - 0211
60 4.13 248 0106 - 0205
120 4.03 484 0014 - 0213
ED9M - Continents
By band - All modes
QSOs (with dupes)
| Band | EU | NA | SA | AF | AS | OC |
--------------------------------------------------------------
| 160 | 68.1% | 22.6% | | 2.7% | 6.6% | |
| 80 | 52.5% | 42.2% | 0.6% | 1.3% | 3.0% | 0.5% |
| 40 | 55.4% | 37.2% | 0.9% | 0.8% | 5.0% | 0.6% |
| 20 | 47.1% | 45.7% | 1.5% | 1.3% | 3.8% | 0.6% |
| 15 | 55.9% | 36.0% | 1.6% | 1.0% | 4.8% | 0.6% |
| 10 | 64.4% | 26.0% | 4.6% | 2.9% | 2.1% | |
--------------------------------------------------------------
Worked zones
| 160 | 80 | 40 | 20 | 15 | 10 | TOTAL
======================================================
01 | | | | | | |
02 | | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | | 4
03 | | 59 | 91 | 116 | 108 | | 374
04 | 20 | 182 | 268 | 241 | 306 | 33 | 1050
05 | 27 | 185 | 370 | 299 | 330 | 104 | 1315
06 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 5 | 2 | | 11
07 | | 1 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 1 | 13
08 | 2 | 13 | 16 | 15 | 19 | 13 | 78
09 | | 4 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 7 | 32
10 | | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 6
11 | | 1 | 8 | 6 | 16 | 8 | 39
12 | | | 1 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 7
13 | | | 4 | 6 | 8 | 8 | 26
14 | 80 | 201 | 449 | 284 | 414 | 85 | 1513
15 | 54 | 203 | 390 | 225 | 432 | 136 | 1440
16 | 16 | 139 | 256 | 202 | 266 | 114 | 993
17 | 7 | 17 | 32 | 19 | 55 | 4 | 134
18 | 1 | 3 | 16 | 6 | 9 | | 35
19 | | | 5 | 3 | | | 8
20 | 6 | 22 | 52 | 34 | 78 | 38 | 230
21 | 3 | 2 | 6 | 5 | 8 | 1 | 25
22 | | | 1 | 1 | 2 | | 4
23 | | | 2 | | 2 | | 4
24 | | | 4 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 11
25 | | 1 | 18 | 9 | 6 | | 34
26 | | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | | 6
27 | | | 3 | 1 | 3 | | 7
28 | | | 1 | 1 | 3 | | 5
29 | | | 1 | 1 | 3 | | 5
30 | | | 3 | 1 | 2 | | 6
31 | | 1 | 2 | 3 | 2 | | 8
32 | | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | | 13
33 | 4 | 11 | 11 | 10 | 8 | 4 | 48
34 | | | | | 2 | 1 | 3
35 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 22
36 | | | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 6
37 | | | 1 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 8
38 | | | | 2 | 2 | 3 | 7
39 | | | | 1 | 1 | | 2
40 | 1 | | 4 | | | | 5
======================================================
| 224 | 1056 | 2038 | 1525 | 2122 | 572 | 7537
By band - All modes
QSOs (with dupes) - By time
| Hr | 160 | 80 | 40 | 20 | 15 | 10 | Total |
------------------------------------------------------- --------
| 00 | | 2 | 226 | | | | 228 |
| 01 | | 19 | 219 | | | | 238 |
| 02 | 8 | 14 | 215 | | | | 237 |
| 03 | 19 | 2 | 165 | | | | 186 |
| 04 | 7 | 133 | 13 | | | | 153 |
| 05 | | 183 | 8 | | | | 191 |
| 06 | 31 | 105 | 2 | | | | 138 |
| 07 | | 36 | 83 | 12 | 1 | | 132 |
| 08 | | | 1 | 192 | 21 | | 214 |
| 09 | | | | 72 | 137 | 5 | 214 |
| 10 | | | | 5 | 226 | 7 | 238 |
| 11 | | | | 9 | 67 | 54 | 130 |
| 12 | | | | 9 | 157 | 4 | 170 |
| 13 | | | | 37 | 111 | 1 | 149 |
| 14 | | | | 3 | 188 | 7 | 198 |
| 15 | | | | 5 | 129 | 62 | 196 |
| 16 | | | | 4 | 123 | 41 | 168 |
| 17 | | | 8 | | 195 | | 203 |
| 18 | | 5 | 2 | 138 | 20 | | 165 |
| 19 | 1 | | 1 | 153 | 4 | | 159 |
| 20 | 1 | 2 | | 195 | 1 | | 199 |
| 21 | 1 | 2 | | 167 | | | 170 |
| 22 | 3 | | 132 | 5 | | | 140 |
| 23 | 9 | 18 | 72 | | | | 99 |
| 00 | 81 | 13 | | | | | 94 |
| 01 | 1 | 126 | 1 | | | | 128 |
| 02 | 1 | 167 | 1 | | | | 169 |
| 03 | 2 | 36 | 128 | | | | 166 |
| 04 | 1 | 47 | 74 | 2 | | | 124 |
| 05 | 3 | 155 | | | | | 158 |
| 06 | 52 | 3 | | 1 | | | 56 |
| 07 | | 8 | 51 | 2 | 57 | | 118 |
| 08 | | | | 2 | 110 | 61 | 173 |
| 09 | | | | | 6 | 151 | 157 |
| 10 | | | | 3 | 132 | 64 | 199 |
| 11 | | | | 58 | 141 | 3 | 202 |
| 12 | | | | 181 | 4 | | 185 |
| 13 | | | | | 174 | 3 | 177 |
| 14 | | | | 10 | 66 | 19 | 95 |
| 15 | | | 1 | 163 | 3 | 1 | 168 |
| 16 | | | | 37 | 109 | 7 | 153 |
| 17 | | | | 98 | | 85 | 183 |
| 18 | | 1 | | 23 | 46 | 9 | 79 |
| 19 | 2 | | 147 | | | | 149 |
| 20 | | | 165 | 1 | | | 166 |
| 21 | 1 | 1 | 157 | | | | 159 |
| 22 | 1 | | 126 | | | | 127 |
| 23 | 1 | 2 | 126 | | | | 129 |
------------------------------------------------------- --------
| | 226 | 1080 | 2124 | 1587 | 2228 | 584 | 7829 |
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