CQ Worldwide VHF Contest
Call: K2DRH
Operator(s): K2DRH
Station: K2DRH
Class: SOAB HP
QTH: EN41vr IL
Operating Time (hrs):
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
6: 328 129
2: 129 52
-------------------
Total: 457 181 Total Score = 106,066
Club: Society of Midwest Contesters
Comments:
It looked hopeful when the during the first hour of the 2014 CQWW VHF there was
a smattering of brief spotlight Es bursts to small areas in the FN grids out as
far as VE1SKY in FN73. Between that and working a lot of tropo contacts from
locals hoping for a sustained 6M opening, I managed a 70 hour. That was by far
the best hour of the contest, nothing else even came close. The second hour was
half that with no Es to speak of, and it tapered off quickly to a 10-20 per hour
or less grind until 1600Z Sunday when we had more spotlight Es openings until
the end of the contest, but mostly out to the west where pickings are slimmer.
After the initial hour on Saturday 6M was pretty much brute force out 400 miles
and the one highlight was working W9RM in DM58 on CW, probably more ionoscatter
than Es. Of course I heard him again for an hour or more on Sunday sometimes 20
over as I called CQ with few takers in that direction. 2M tropo was relatively
good out 500 miles or so Saturday night and Sunday morning. Grid totals on
tropo were very good, there were just not a whole lot of stations taking
advantage of it.
The WSJT portion of the night worked out really well too and added a lot of
grids on 6 and 2. I made 3 skeds beforehand, but worked W9RM and K1TEO on 6M
before our sked times (N0KE my 3rd sked reported he heard me 59+ calling CQ on
Sunday afternoon with few takers, and I was the only station he could hear on
the band). The rox were quite good as they usually are for this test, so I
announced a few CQs and responded to several others I saw on the PJ page,
working a lot more that way too. After such a slow day it was very welcome to
see a lot of stations calling CQ spread out on different frequencies, and by
inference from the announced TX sequence what direction they were looking in.
Much better than having everyone stacked up on one calling frequency. I did
check for JT65 on 50276 off and on but did not see any activity … of course I
only looked while the band was not open. Taking 6 minutes to make a single Q
while the band is actually open isn’t really very appealing to a contester.
When I’d worked pretty much everyone I saw on the PJ page I noticed that the
moon was above my horizon, so I looked for stations calling CQ on EME. Could
not hear most of them but HB9Q was loud and finally worked him on 2M after
several tries. First time I have ever added an EME contact to my contest log.
Sunday morning was a long slow slog with rates in the 10’s for the most part.
There were a few rovers around like K9JK/R, K9PW and AC0RA/R who I found in
multiple grids. AC0RA/R made sure we swept in all his grids by keeping me
informed and calling me on 6M after the band opened when I was busy calling CQ.
But there seemed a lot less rovers than usual and I worked very few others on
Es. Having 6M open to the west for the last few hours really helped the score
a lot and I was really glad I had concentrated on 2M in the evening and morning
since very few called me that were local enough to do 2M (or even had 2M). It
was moving around very rapidly to different areas and I wish it had stayed
longer in the more populous areas. As it progressed it swung further south and
every once in a while I’d work a small cluster of 4 or 5 landers, but each
time it would dry up quickly. I was getting very few callers during the last
hour and all I heard calling CQ were dupes, so I went back to 2M to add a few
more there. Conditions seemed good and I snagged WB7PMP in EN88 right at about
400 miles, but was disappointed I didn’t hear anyone else in that direction or
much of anyone at all. Worked a long distance trucker (that I had worked near
Chicago on Saturday) in two other grids in the last hour at around 200 miles,
so 2M had to be pretty good.
73 de Bob2
K2DRH
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