I was on 15 the hour before the contest started (I forgot about the
Daylight Savings Time offset...) and had good propagation into the East
Coast, but it all seemed to go away by contest time. I had a little bit
of a run on 15, and only 20 Q's on 10...it seemed pretty spotty, but I
think everyone found it only sporadically open. Things can only improve.
I took all of my off time before 0100 whenever the rate got real slow. 20
just didn't take off, and I figured that 40 would pick up the slack. I
had a very nice couple of hours on 7030 from 0230 to 0430, using the
second rig to pick up bits and pieces on 20 and, later, 80. QRN on 40 was
tolerable, but really tough on 80 and 160. I was able to work into the
East Coast on 80, but IL and WI were as far east as I got on 160 with the
perverted-L.
All in all, I was satisfied with my effort, given that its August at the
bottom of the cycle. I was blissfully spared the presence of
Murphy...just the not-sufficiently-occasional operator error to cause
trouble.
73, Ward N0AX
|