1999 ARRL DX CW Contest
Contest Dates : February 20 and 21, 1999
Callsign Used : K2UA
Operator : K2UA
Category : Single Operator, All Bands
ARRL Section : WNY
Band QSOs Countries
_________________________
160 11 9
80 130 46
40 500 68
20 910 78
15 658 77
10 646 66
_________________________
Totals 2855 344
Score = 2,945,328 points
Rate sheets, 1999 ARRL DX CW, K2UA SOAB
HOUR 160CW 80CW 40CW 20CW 15CW 10CW TOTAL ACCUM
---- ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ------ ----- -----
0 0 0 61 7 0 0 68 68
1 0 13 41 3 0 0 57 125
2 0 0 38 6 0 0 44 169
3 0 12 25 1 0 0 38 207
4 0 9 22 0 0 0 31 238
5 0 21 14 0 0 0 35 273
6 6 7 14 0 0 0 27 300
7 0 3 61 0 0 0 64 364
8 2 5 30 0 0 0 37 401
9 0 0 5 0 0 0 5 406
10 0 0 2 0 0 0 2 408
11 0 1 2 89 20 0 112 520
12 0 0 0 0 110 22 132 652
13 0 0 0 0 8 110 118 770
14 0 0 0 0 12 113 125 895
15 0 0 0 0 27 78 105 1000
16 0 0 0 1 101 5 107 1107
17 0 0 0 93 7 0 100 1207
18 0 0 0 82 9 9 100 1307
19 0 0 0 105 0 0 105 1412
20 0 0 0 86 3 0 89 1501
21 0 0 6 37 4 0 47 1548
22 0 0 13 29 3 8 53 1601
23 0 0 57 1 2 0 60 1661
0 0 0 31 6 2 0 39 1700
1 0 20 9 4 0 0 33 1733
2 2 37 3 0 0 0 42 1775
3 1 3 14 7 0 0 25 1800
4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1800
5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1800
6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1800
7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1800
8 0 0 12 0 0 0 12 1812
9 0 0 24 1 0 0 25 1837
10 0 0 7 30 0 0 37 1874
11 0 0 0 46 68 0 114 1988
12 0 0 0 0 69 35 104 2092
13 0 0 0 0 0 122 122 2214
14 0 0 0 0 5 91 96 2310
15 0 0 0 0 38 41 79 2389
16 0 0 0 8 60 5 73 2462
17 0 0 0 40 2 1 43 2505
18 0 0 0 24 38 0 62 2567
19 0 0 0 3 55 3 61 2628
20 0 0 0 50 5 1 56 2684
21 0 0 0 71 1 0 72 2756
22 0 0 0 52 5 3 60 2816
23 0 0 12 32 5 0 49 2865
TOTAL 11 131 503 914 659 647
1999 ARRL DX Test K2UA
1107: 4 per minute (240/hr)
1326: 28 per 10 minutes (168/hr)
1234: 141 per hour
Total Qs: 2855 Average rate: 59 per hour
Continental breakdown, K2UA SOAB 1999 ARRL DX CW
160 80 40 20 15 10 ALL
--- -- -- -- -- -- ---
NA calls = 7 12 22 18 24 13 96
SA calls = 2 2 11 12 11 11 49
EU calls = 2 116 419 830 590 604 2561
AF calls = 0 1 4 5 1 5 16
AS calls = 0 0 22 32 24 10 88
JA calls = 0 0 17 9 5 0 31
OC calls = 0 0 8 7 4 4 23
Total calls = 11 131 503 914 659 647 2865
--Commentary--
What went right:
A lot!
I worked for several weeks before the contest to complete some major
station improvements, which really paid off. This was the first time
I've used TR Log in a DX contest. The computer is interfaced to the
hardware for automatic antenna-relay control, radio A/B selection, PTT
outputs (no more hot switching and relays dropping out while sending
slow CW), CW paddles, and CW sending (of course). I'd say I spent 100
hours on this project before it was ready to go, but it was well worth
the effort. In retrospect I don't know how I found the time to do it
all!
With the Dunestar 600 BPF on the second radio and the stubs I built
Friday before the contest started, I had zero interstation interference.
What a wonderful new experience!
The 20-meter stack is awesome. I had about 90 more Qs than any other
single op on this band-but the cost on 10 and 15 meters was high (see
below).
Two-radio operation with TR Log is amazingly smooth and fun. According
to TR, I made 439 band changes and 230 second-radio QSOs. The actual
second-radio QSO number may be a bit higher, since there were times when
I was CQing on one band at a relatively slow rate and found QSOs on a
second band two in a row.
1100 QSOs in 10 hours on Saturday is one of the best streaks I've had
from the States. It felt great to be doing so well!
Automatic antenna control and BPF selection is awesome! It all worked
without a catch. There's not much to remember to do during band changes,
other than making sure the amplifier is on the right band and tuned to
the correct presets.
For the first time, I experienced the joy of not having every fourth or
fifth station I called bust my call! K2UA is *so* much better on CW than
NJ2L that it was a real pleasure; this call has a lot of punch. A few
stations busted my call as K2UU, K2AA, and, of course, K3UA, but the
number was quite small compared to contests I did with my old call.
What went wrong:
Being unprepared. Instead of resting on the Friday of the contest, I was
working hard to get the station ready. I was out in the cold for a
couple of hours putting connectors on the hardlines to the back tower.
Until I was finished with this, the back-tower antennas had never been
fed into the shack. The tower went up in November, the first two
antennas went up January 3 (the top 4-element 20 and a 5-element 15),
and the third antenna, the lower 4-element 20, went up on February 19.
Who says you can't do antenna work in Western New York in the
wintertime? :-) Truthfully, in spite of getting 50 inches of snow in
January alone (and 30 inches so far in March!), we've had a relatively
mild winter. I also wound up building coaxial stubs and routing the
Beverage to both rigs on Friday, leaving almost no time to do other
household stuff I had promised my wife I would do before the contest.
Speaking of the Beverage, it was zero help this time. It was
unterminated, and I had no time to fix that. Also, I discovered after
the contest that the Beverage had a faulty coax adapter in the shack
that was keeping me from being able to hear anything on the Beverage
that I couldn't hear just as well on the transmit antennas. This was a
sore spot, since the antenna had played so well last year that I used it
for almost all of my European runs on 40 meters. I'd have done the same
this year, since I could hardly hear anything on the beam. There's a lot
to be said for F/B ratio on 40--which my Cushcraft doesn't have! In
addition to that, I got crushed on 160 because I couldn't hear the DX
through the QRM and QRN on the inverted L. I think the lack of a
good-functioning receive antenna was the single biggest factor in the
gap between my score and the top ten.
Propagation Friday night was horrible. I made up for it by working the
second radio hard to keep the rate reasonable.
No JA runs all weekend. Worked only about 120 JAs all together, which is
much less than normal. Others seemed to have good JA runs, so this
remains puzzling.
My high-band antennas are way too high. My only 10-meter antenna is a
3-element Cushcraft on an 8-foot boom at 68 feet, which is about twice
as high as it should be for these conditions. The 15-meter antenna is in
a similar situation--a Hy-Gain 155CA at 90 feet. This cost me a huge
number of QSOs on 10 and 15 meters. I had to fall back to 20 meters
quite early on Sunday to keep a decent rate, since the arrival angles of
the European signals got so high that I was unable to maintain a decent
rate on 10 or 15 meters with my antennas. It really felt like I was on a
desert island, propagation-wise.
I have to learn to do a better job of finding multipliers in this
contest. I do pretty well at it in CQWW, but not so well in ARRL DX CW.
This cost me several places in the results, though even 30 more
multipliers alone would not have gotten me into the top ten.
Missed the European sunrise opening Saturday night because I fell
asleep. And overslept. When I dropped off at about 0400Z (too early), I
set the alarm for 0530Z. I woke up at 0720Z, at which time the opening
had come and gone. This opening was good for about 60 Qs the night
before on 40, so I missed a lot. I also missed a lot of low-band QSO and
multiplier opportunities by pulling this bonehead maneuver.
Only 42 hours on the air. Six hours is a lot to miss. I should have been
in there for 44 to 45 hours, with sleep times better chosen.
Other Comments
My biggest disappointment was beating my previous best in ARRL DX CW by
a factor of two, in the process making 600 more QSOs than I've ever made
in a CW single-op from the States, and still not even breaking the top
15. I was really working to get into the top ten this time. It's
interesting to see the number of serious single ops in the Northeast
this year--clearly the YCCC is pulling out all the stops to win the club
competition. This raised the bar significantly; you had to make about
3000 Qs and more than 3.25 million points just to make the top ten!
The more years I operate this contest, the more contrast I see between
it and CQWW. There are far fewer DXpeditions and DX activity in general
is much lower, but Western Europe has a huge presence in both contests.
South American activity was much lower this time, and almost nobody in
continental Africa was on the air. We routinely see 20 or 30 more
countries on the air on each band in CQWW than ARRL DX. What is it about
CQWW that ARRL DX doesn't have? What seems most likely is that people
are generally more interested in getting on and making big efforts in
contests where there's no limit to the geographic area you can work for
points.
On the other hand, ARRL DX remains a great contest because of the focus
the DX stations have on working us North Americans. This contributes to
a larger number of stations we work on four, five and six bands, which
adds a special dimension to this contest. It's also great to not suffer
through Friday night, when rather than working each other, the Europeans
are working us. There's no doubt that these contests significantly
differ in character, which keeps them both quite interesting.
I'm looking forward to the IARU contest in July--that's the next time I
plan a big single-op effort on CW. By then the stacks for 10 and 15
should be up and the antennas that are now fixed should be rotating. See
you all on the reflectors until then.
--73, Rus, K2UA (ex NJ2L)
__________________________
Rus Healy
Senior Systems Engineer, Microwave Data Systems
Web: http://www.microwavedata.com
Tel +1-716-242-9600
--
FAQ on WWW: http://www.contesting.com/3830faq.html
Submissions: 3830@contesting.com
Administrative requests: 3830-REQUEST@contesting.com
Problems: owner-3830@contesting.com
|