North American QSO Party, SSB - August
Call: W6YX
Operator(s): N7MH
Station: W6YX
Class: Single Op LP
QTH: CA
Operating Time (hrs): 10
Radios: SO2R
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 17 6
80: 49 17
40: 183 47
20: 484 56
15: 111 33
10: 15 4
-------------------
Total: 859 163 Total Score = 140,017
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Team: NCCC Team #1
Comments:
Last weekend I saw signs saying that the W6YX access road, also a popular hiking
route, would be closed for gate renewal from Monday to Friday so I was surprised
to find the road still blocked by a construction crew on Saturday morning.
It took an extra 35 minutes of driving to rediscover the second gate and slowly
maneuver around all of the hikers on the narrow road. I scrambled to install the
SO2R box, set up the logging software and shift coax jumpers to the two K3s.
After making a quick QSO with WX5S on 10 only 2 minutes after the start I was
frustrated at not being able to work anyone for several minutes on 20 or 15
until a call from KH6TU got me to look at my beam headings which were still
beaming EU from the WAE contest last weekend. Rotating to a more NA-friendly
heading started a decent rate on both bands.
I alternated between CQ/S&P SO2R and dueling CQs. SSB SO2R has always been
much harder for me than CW but I found that with a little practice I was able
to copy callsigns or exchanges on one radio while I was actively talking,
giving a callsign/exchange on the other radio.
15 meters slowed down after the first hour so I tried CQing on 10. The SWR was
over 3:1 on our main 10m Yagi so I used the C31XR on 10. I got answers from
several WA, ID and BC and had a few successful moves from 20. I was hoping MT
or UT might be workable but those moves didn't succeed. It was only after
leaving 10 that I realized I had accidentally rotated the wrong antenna to beam
east and the C31XR had remained pointed north, a fortunate mistake since I
worked more mults on 10 than any of the other posted scores from CA.
During a couple of my breaks I troubleshot the 10m Yagi high SWR since the same
feedline is used on 160. Tightening a loose PL259 at the tower base got the SWR
down so I could get on 160 later. I also spent one of my breaks helping to
install petals on a 10 GHz dish for an EME contest in September.
15 came to life again later in the afternoon and for a while it was only KP2RUM
and I that showed up on the panadapter until a few others caught on that it had
reopened.
After 15 died and before 40 opened I had both radios on 20, S&Ping with one
while running on the other. At low power and with antennas beaming almost
broadside to the straight line between them I could get within 1 to 2 kHz
without hearing the other K3. When I tuned across my own CQ I stopped briefly
and listened for callers on both radios, a diversity reception that really did
work better than listening to either K3 alone. The big downer was that once I
tried to talk the time delay caused by the DSP in the K3s was so noticeable on
the non-transmitting K3 that my reflexive response was to slow down my speech
to try to match what I was hearing so it felt like I was talking in slow
motion. The delayed feedback was quite unnerving and I only made 3 or 4 QSOs
before I moved on.
The low bands were tough. I tuned across both 80 and 160 multiple times and
also tried to run but just did not hear much beyond what I worked.
Thanks for all the Qs and attempted moves.
73,
-Mike, N7MH
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