ARRL Sweepstakes Contest, SSB
Call: W5RU
Operator(s): KN5O K1DW K5ER W5WZ KG5VK
Station: KN5O
Class: Multi-Op HP
QTH: Covington, LA
Operating Time (hrs): 24
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160:
80: 155
40: 711
20: 891
15: 275
10: 114
------------
Total: 2146 Sections = 83 Total Score = 356,236
Club: Louisiana Contest Club
Comments:
I was privileged to operate 2014 ARRL Nov SS Phone with a small group of hams
from the Louisiana Contest Club at the station of KN5O.
First, let me say that Ted's wife and mother are excellent hostesses, and these
ladies welcomed the "invasion" of their home warmly and genuinely.
The food was hot and tasty. Nothing was left to chance - the covers on my bed
were even turned down on Friday night for my late arrival!
Second, Ted's station is well designed and easy to operate. The magic of the
antenna switching and other connections between position 1 and position 2 are
complex, but the user interface is simple and straight forward.
Third, the team of ops that Ted assembled are first-rate characters who mesh
very well together. This same group has worked together before and understand
both the strengths and weaknesses that each bring to the table. All are
outstanding operators with very competitive spirits! Definitely a unique blend
to spice up the contest!
Lastly, Ted's understanding and planning of the dynamics of the SS Phone
contest led to a distinct strategy being laid, with specific goals at various
mileposts during the contest. During the contest, he monitored progress toward
the goals and discussed progress with the team to fine-tune the performance
throughout the contest. It was a great weekend and a great effort.
Well, the key question now is what was our error rate? It looks like we're
neck-in-neck with the W6YI team. Only time (and the log checkers)will tell.
Other highlights:
Last year, the LCC team operated at KG5VK and was the first station to make a
Sweep in a little over 4 hours. This time, we bettered that goal by nearly an
hour, completing the sweep in 3 hours and 24 minutes from the start. NP2P in
the VI was mult no. 83 for us.
We surpassed the 1996 Delta Division, HP, Multi-op, record set by Pat Sonnier's
W5WMU station by ~30,000 points, pre-log checking. Hopefully we have set a new
Delta Division, HP, Multi-op record.
Of course we had a lot of hand-gyrations/signaling/inter-digital communications
when some folks got off message and hogged the interlock. To quote Mark, K5ER,
"you could feel the love." Other extraneous and useless phrases like
"Please copy..." earned some ops mandatory razzing.
Before we took our 1st break at 1:00AM Sunday local time, we were ~150 Qs
better than our 2011 effort that got us 2nd place. And as time wore on, the
run rate declined as expected to 50/60 per hr. We were hoping to get a boost
in the last two hours, but that rate bump-up never happened this year as it did
in 2011. According to SH5, our best 60 minute QSO rate was 174 (W5WZ run, K1DW
Mult) which happened in the second hour of the contest.
There were no equipment problems and only one momentary power outage, which
occurred during our 2 hour afternoon break on Sunday. More importantly, we
dodged a bad cold weather front with lots of lightning. It started to come
though 30 minutes after the contest ended.
Of course, 20M and 40M were our workhorse bands. So it was odd on Sunday
evening to point one of the 20 meter antennas W-NW, and NOT hear large number
of 6's and 7's. Oh well, another SS is now history.
We want to thank all newcomers to SS and thanks to everyone for the Qs. You
made the contest for us.
--Scott, W5WZ for W5RU
W5RU ops: Dallas K1DW, Steve KG5VK, Mark K5ER, Ted KN5O and Scott, W5WZ
--Scott, W5WZ
PS:
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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