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WRTC Notes from W6P (long)

To: <3830@contesting.com>
Subject: WRTC Notes from W6P (long)
From: k8cc@ix.netcom.com (David Alan Pruett)
Date: Sat, 20 Jul 1996 13:32:20 -0700
              CW     CW    SSB    SSB   HQ+
     band   QSOs    pts   QSOs    pts  zones   ctys
                                                   
      40     365    730     46     46     18     14
      20     768   1536    439    439     41     41
      15     327    654    243    243     15      8
      10     115    230     89     89      8      5
                                                   
     TOTAL  1575   3150    817    817     82     68    SCORE: 595,050
                                                          (claimed) 
 
CONTINENT STATISTICS

             40    40    20    20    15    15    10    10 
             CW   SSB    CW   SSB    CW   SSB    CW   SSB   total
                                                                
N America:  316    46   714   425   313   241   113    89    2257 (94%)
          (14%)  (2%) (31%) (18%) (13%) (10%)  (5%)  (3%)  
S America:    2     0     6     2     1     1     2     0      14 (0%)
          (14%)       (42%) (14%)  (7%)  (7%) (14%)      
   Europe:    0     0    37     5     0     0     0     0      42 (1%)
                      (88%) (11%)                        
   Africa:    1     0     2     0     0     0     0     0       3 (0%)
          (33%)       (66%)                              
     Asia:   39     0     8     0    12     1     0     0      60 (2%)
          (65%)       (13%)       (20%)  (1%)            
  Oceania:    6     0     1     7     1     0     0     0      15 (0%)
          (40%)        (6%) (46%)  (6%)                  
     
QSO RATES

       40   40   20   20   15   15   10   10
UTC    CW  SSB   CW  SSB   CW  SSB   CW  SSB  rate total
                                                        
12Z   114    0    0    0    0    0    0    0   114   114
13Z   104    7    0    0    0    0    0    0   111   225
14Z     0    0  157    0    0    0    0    0   157   382
15Z     0    0  120    0    1    0    0    0   121   503
16Z     0    0   31   83   86    0    0    0   200   703
17Z     0    0    0   23    0  176    0    5   204   907
18Z     0    0    0    0   56    1   80   11   148  1055
19Z     0    0    0    0   79    1   13   68   161  1216
20Z     0    0    2   14   49   33   22    0   120  1336
21Z     0    0    1  127    1   31    0    5   165  1501
22Z     0    0   37    1   50    1    0    0    89  1590
23Z     0    0  112    0    3    0    0    0   115  1705
00Z     0    0   90    0    2    0    0    0    92  1797
01Z     1    0  107    0    0    0    0    0   108  1905
02Z     2    0   56   77    0    0    0    0   135  2040
03Z    27   39    0   98    0    0    0    0   164  2204
04Z     0    0   55    9    0    0    0    0    64  2268
05Z   117    0    0    7    0    0    0    0   123  2392
                                                        
tot   365   46  768  439  327  243  115   89  ----  2392


STATION DESCRIPTION:  

(2) IC-765 transceivers
Wilson System 1 tribander @ 40'
40M Dipole @ 36'

Like the other competitors, our first hope was to get a "good" station 
(i.e., a big tribander on high ground).  In the station drawing, we 
drew the Electronic Museum Amateur Radio Club station, WB6WSL, located 
in Los Altos near Foothills in the middle of a residential area.  We 
didn't get our big tribander, and the big hills to the west were not 
too far away.  However, the shot to the northwest and east looked 
pretty good and the antenna foreground appeared to slope downhill, 
although it was hard to tell because of the residential trees.

We were met at the station by EMARC members Omri, AA6TA and Arv, 
WA6UUT, both of whom were a tremendous help throughout the contest.  
The shack was pretty small (8' x 10') so we had to remove almost all of 
their existing equipment to make room for our gear.  There was just 
enough room in the shack for three chairs - one for each op, and one 
for our judge; Steve, K7LXC.

The club antennas were supported by a 20' tower on the roof of the 20'
high building which housed the club station.  The fifteen year old 
tribander checked out pretty well, although by the nicely defined SWR 
dips up high in each band it was obviously set for SSB.  The 40M dipole 
was another matter - the MFJ SWR analyzer showed dips at 6800 and 7400 
with over 2:1 at band center.  We spent three hours messing with this 
antenna looking for resonances in guy wires and replacing the balun, 
before discovering that the culprit was the nearby 80M dipole.  Once 
the 80 was removed, the SWR curve looked just as it should.  The 
internal tuners in the IC-765s handled the impedances of both antennas 
quite nicely.  The location was not particularly quiet RF-wise, and the 
S-meters rumbled at approximately S5 with no signal on 40M.

Since the shack was so small, the club brought out a small Red Cross 
trailer for us to use on breaks.  We kept food in styrofoam picnic 
coolers, Field Day style, and the bathroom was several hundred feet 
away across an asphalt parking lot.  In order to ventilate the shack, 
we had to leave the door open to the outside (immediately next to the 
SWL radio).  Fortunately, the weather was perfect throughout the 
contest.

THE CONTEST

We decided ahead of time to do one hour shifts on the run radio, and I 
let Stan have the start.  Things started slowly on 40 CW at about one 
per minute for the first 20 minutes or so, then the rate took off.  
Most 40M QSOs were domestic, but a number of S9 JAs called in.  I tried 
a short stint on 40 SSB at the end of the second hour - good signals, 
but only 7 guys would answer my CQ.

By the time we hit 20 CW in the third hour, Stan had the keyer speed on 
the IC-765 against the max stop and was sending the entire exchange by 
hand.  I, on the other hand, needed the computer.  (I teased our 
referee that my rusty CW fist was my way of telling that K8CC was at 
W6P...) Surprisingly, everybody seemed to handle the fast CW speed OK, 
and we spent the entire contest around 40 WPM all the way to the end.

Both Stan and I prefer CW, and the WRTC rules giving double points for 
code made it the preferred mode.  However, when things slowed down 
(i.e., below 100/hr) we'd go to SSB for short bursts.  I'll never 
forget my 20/15 SSB stint in the 17Z hour (204 QSOs including a 
bandchange) - it was just like being in the Caribbean; "KA5XYZ five 
nine six...Whiskey Six Papa".  On at least one occasion I had the Last 
10, Past 10, and Last 100 indicators all over 300/hr, although it 
wouldn't last through an entire hour.  Incredible!

Working W/VE was easy; making DX and multiplier QSOs was where our 100W 
had a hard time being heard.  Most of the time we had moderately severe 
interference on the SWL radio, which made finding multipliers 
difficult.  By late afternoon, we began to be more successful finding 
multipliers and getting them into the log.  Best QSOs were finding 
ZD8DEZ on 40 CW at 0142Z (over an hour before sunset!) and snagging 
9K2MU from a CQ on 20 CW at 0439Z.  The only station we moved was 
VY1RAC from 15M to 20M - in the end, it was obvious we should have 
moved more stations for band-multipliers.

All the radio equipment functioned flawlessly, however Stan's TI 5100 
laptop with an external keyboard, monitor, paddles, and CW interface 
crashed several times per hour throughout the contest.  Adding RF 
chokes made only minor improvement.  Fortunately, we had a spiral-ring 
notebook that we would use to log on paper until we could get the 
computer to re-boot.

RESULTS

Back at the "WRTC Village" (a.k.a. Motel 6), it appeared that our 595K 
claimed score put us in a pack of stations all around 600K.  During log 
checking, the judges found 23 unique QSOs, 6 deemed "bad" and 2 
not-in-log.  In the final analysis, we lost 22 QSOs and a multiplier.  
With lost QSO points for penalties, our official score was:

              CW     CW    SSB    SSB   HQ+
     band   QSOs    pts   QSOs    pts  zones   ctys
                                                   
      40     361    698     46     46     18     14
      20     760   1472    436    427     41     41
      15     324    630    242    239     15      7
      10     114    230     87     81      8      5
                                                   
     TOTAL  1559   3020    811    793     82     67    SCORE: 568,435

A lot of discussion has centered around the log checking process 
employed at WRTC, so after looking at the referee's analysis I feel 
qualified to offer my opinion concerning how our log was treated.

Nobody would argue that the two not-in-log QSOs should be removed.  I'm 
not sure how the judges characterize "bad" versus "unique" QSOs in the 
printouts.  Where clear similarities exist, the QSO was removed - for 
example, we were the only ones to log KA4GA, but 111 other QSOs were 
logged with AA4GA.  On the other hand, nine of our uniques appeared to 
be truly unique, and the judges left these in.  Overall, the process 
seems pretty reasonable to me.

That's not to say that everything was fair.  K6OG was removed from the 
log because a number of similar calls were worked.  However, K6OG lives 
just down the block from WB6WSL, came by during the contest to visit, 
then went home and worked us (no, we didn't solicit a QSO from him).  
Another case was that our QSO with ZL1GQ was removed.  Most contesters 
would figure that we busted ZL3GQ's call, but Stan asked the guy to 
repeat his call and it was pretty clear what he sent.  The QSO was 
removed because 29 other QSOs were logged with WB1GQR.  Go figure...

Overall, we're very proud of our score.  We wound up tenth in overall 
points, sixth in total QSOs, fourth lowest in unique QSOs, but 
(arrrrgh!) twentieth in multipliers.  K8CC should have listened to his 
partner more...

KUDOS TO THE ORGANIZERS

I cannot say enough good things about the way the WRTC was run.  The 
final playing field (40M-10M, tribanders/dipoles, 100W) was perfect.  
The hotel was more than adequate, and the social events were superbly 
executed and paced to not wear anyone out.  If I start mentioning 
calls, I'll undoubtedly forget someone, so please accept my highest 
accolades to the team that pulled off this wonderful event.

Once again, thanks to Omri, AA6TA and Arv, WA6UUT who graciously let us 
ransack their club station and antennas to deploy our WRTC setup.  
Thanks also to our referee, Steve Morris, K7LXC, who jumped in to help 
with the 40M dipole and got the VCR working.  And finally, thanks to 
Ann, KC7RN, whose cheerful enthusiasm and willingness to make "go-fer" 
runs kept W6P humming along.

WE WANNA BE PART OF THE NEXT WRTC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

73,

Dave Pruett, K8CC
Stan Stockton, K5GO


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