California QSO Party -- 1998
Call: W6KC (+ W6SW) County: Mono
Category: Multi-Multi, High Power, County Expedition
QSO Breakdown
CW SSB
160 0 0
80 63 74
40 59 4
20 313 472
15 209 255
10 61 53
ALL 705 858 = 1,563 Total QSO's and 58 Sections for 222,198
Points
Equipment Description:
Station 1: TS-930, Swan 1KW Amp
Station 2: TS-450SAT Barefoot
Antennas:
80/40 Meters: Two 80m Dipole @ 70'
20 Meters: 3 Element Wire Beam @ 60'
15 Meters: 3 Element Wire Beam @ 60'
10 Meters: 3 Element Wire Beam @ 35'
Comments:
Since 1992, Randy and I have enjoyed our annual trek to Mammoth Lakes in
Mono County for the California QSO Party. Mammoth Lakes is small town
built around the Mammoth Mountain ski area. Its really a beautiful place
that is located at about 8,000 Feet elevation on the eastern slopes of the
Sierra Nevada Mountains.
This year we were especially optimistic about improving on our prior year's
score of 1,752 QSO's and 251,372 points. Propagation should be better and
we were adding two more wire beams to our existing antenna arsenal. How
could we not blast right through into the 2,000 QSO barrier? Well, with a
little help from Murphy and lost ground on 40 & 80 Meters we finished about
200 less QSO's and 29,000 points below our 1997 effort.
Last year the 20M 3 element wire beam performed so well that we build two
more for 10M & 15M. Never mind all work of setting them up and finding
just the right combination of pine trees to hold all this wire. These
antennas are a thing of beauty (to us anyway) when you pull them up 50 or 60
feet in the air. Even though it was extremely windy on Friday, Randy was
dead-on with his sling shot as we pulled up the 10 guy lines needed to hold
the three beams and two dipoles. By 4 PM all wire was high in the trees.
That left plenty of time on Friday night to set up the equipment and enjoy a
nice pre-contest meal at the local Chart House Restaurant.
Saturday morning all started all out pretty well. Randy was running strong
on 20M SSB and I was working 15M SSB & CW. Our combined last 10 QSO rate
hit above 300/Hour on several occasions. Then at about 1800Z my QSO rate
dropped to zero. I switched to the dipole and could make contacts again.
It was still very windy and the picture in my mind of a fallen 15M wire beam
turned out to be true when I walked over to were it previous was secured
between two trees. One of the guy lines had snapped and it was now dangling
in one of the trees. Nothing to do but stop, untangle, reassemble and
re-launch a new guy line.
For the balance of the weekend the 15M beam worked well. The 10M beam was
another story. We never could get much going on the band and most signal
reports were just fair. We're not sure if it was the antenna or the
combination of pine trees and elevation we that used. More work is needed
to figure this one out. Since I just finished building both of these
antennas the night before we left, CQP was their first test.
Our combine QSO's of 1,363 on 10, 15 & 20 were 173 above last year's total
of 1,190. But on 40 & 80 we were off by 362. We're not sure if was the
propagation, the antennas or the operators. Well, that's what drawing
boards are for. Guess we'll have a whole year to keep sketching strategy
and antenna designs.
As usual, this year's CQP was great fun, but the work associated with a
county expedition can be pretty exhausting. As we have increased the
sophistication of our effort, it has become more of a challenge for just the
two of us to accomplish. However, the reward is that we both enjoy the
accomplishment and get lots of time to operate in a great event.
After finishing the contest at 3 PM on Sunday afternoon we took down all of
the antennas and packed up all the gear and didn't leave Mammoth until about
8PM for the 300-mile drive back to Santa Monica. Getting home at 1AM and
knowing that you have to be at work in only 7 more hours was once again a
true test of dedication to CQP!
73's and thanks for all the good QSO's,
Jim (W6KC) + Randy (W6SW)
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