CQWW WPX Contest, SSB
Call: N2WN
Operator(s): N2WN
Station: N2WN
Class: SOAB(TS) QRP
QTH: Grainger County, Tn
Operating Time (hrs): 32:57
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 25
80: 47
40: 93
20: 207
15: 219
10: 80
------------
Total: 671 Prefixes = 428 Total Score = 740,868
Club: Tennessee Contest Group
Comments:
I had to get pumped for this one as I always find SSB a strain on the senses.
It's a real love/hate affair, nice to put a voice with the regulars and work
places that seem like they should be really tough QRP, but... frustrating with
the VERY wide signals, absolutely horrible audio (PARTICULARLY the recorded
messages (still)), and literally screaming into the mic at times (I know better
too!). Still there were a few exhilarating moments that are unique to phone
contests.
So on to the test...
My 160m Tee lost half of it's top hat Thursday. 7 years of wind finally took
it's toll, so now had a short L. Built a little L network to match it slapped a
baggie over it (rain and storms were expected) and hoped for the best.
Propagation looked a bit dicey as we started and the low bands were a bit
noisy, but passable. Virtually all of my domestic prefixes were on the low
bands and other than the big guns, activity seemed light from the US and
Canada. Most of the QRP and LP folks would agree the Canadians are vital to a
good showing on the low bands, still worked a VE8 which is unusual for my QTH,
Ontario was light.
40 was so-so, heard a number of JA stations Saturday morning, fewer Sunday, but
didn't work any (going to try and fix that with phased verticals, concrete work
involved but that is another story...) 40 is intimidating on SSB to me, with
little nighttime spectrum attempting to run is a pleasant fantasy. Still
managed some decent DX with EU, VK, KH6 heard KL7RA on two bands but very
light. 67 prefixes on the band and 23 countries it weren't bad!
160 and 80 were less productive. It was nice to work KG9N/C6A and have NP4A
call me when I was running. Missed HK1NA, who was really loud at times, on 160,
but not from a lack of trying. Friday night/Saturday morning was definitely MUCH
better than the following night. Only seven DXCC on 160/80... Never heard D4C on
160 or 40 (MEGA pile-up).
15 was the game band for me, followed closely by 20 and a distant 10 (which was
better than I had expected). 15 has a bit more room to spread out and brute
force is usually not necessary if it's open... and it was! 68 countries were
worked including A71AM (way loud at times and had to really WORK to land them),
HZ, 4X, 4L, 5W and 4U1ITU were some of the neat catches. Some of the weak (on my
end) stations were much easier to work than the boomers. On Sunday, things were
percolating along well on 20 early. Made the switch to 15 and at one point it
was like someone said "oops, we forgot to throw the switch" and the
band just "popped", everyone jumped a couple S units it seemed. This
was good and bad, easier to hear some stations, but the "blooms" came
out in force as some stations covered twice as much spectrum with rumbling as
they had before.
Saturday was nice and steady on 10, providing many prefixes from the Southern
regions and Pacific and Africa, but nothing from EU. Heard EU on Sunday, after
the "big switch" was thrown, but all were weak and very distorted. 10
was not much help on Sunday for me.
20 was interesting as it there were more attempted jamming or intentional QRM
events. Someone was plating music over on DL station (didn't seem to phase the
operator or his run), a number of "tuners" and one broad spectrum
noise event. There was one Polish station I heard who moved when asked for a US
net.
I did try to run a few of times with very limited success, less than ten
stations. Have better luck running on RTTY and CW than on SSB, but it's not
from a lack of trying! SSB is pretty much a S&P and band change game. Think
it's much harder to stay focused with long NoQ periods.
Heard ND0C and KC0MO, who generally run QRP on Saturday doing S&P, was
ahead in QSOs by 100+ QSOs. Which I took to mean that conditions weren't too
good for either. Had hoped to work them on the low bands, if for no other
reason than to chat (OK, the multipliers would have been nice too!) and do a
lil' QRP high five.
Wasn't sure how the Easter weekend would play out. Sunday had the potential of
being very quiet. which was true early in the morning, but it picked up, and a
number of stations where sharing Easter greetings. All in all everyone seemed
to be in good spirits, little complaining was heard. About the only negative
comments were related to static crashes with storms across the US.
A few other observations: I commented to a couple stations about audio issues
all of them made adjustments as I listened and sounded much better. It still is
a mystery to me how many stations hear "zero" instead of
"two" in my call. Having a call that starts with N and ends with it
isn't the best for contesting. DVKs are nice, but LISTENING for more than a few
nano-seconds should be mandatory hihi.
There were a lot of patient stations who worked hard to make sure the exchanges
were good, which was a challenge at times. My hat is off to them. Heard many
female and young voices, which is encouraging. A few seem to be developing new
contesters and I hope they will try other modes. Thanks for all the QSOs and
efforts, even if we didn't manage to make it happen.
Elecraft K3
160M former Tee, not short inverted L
80M Vee under the yagi at about 40'
4 element SteppIr @ about 15m (AB-621 mast)
Fat butt stuck to chair.
72,
Julius
n2wn
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