ARRL DX Contest, CW - 2020
Call: W6YX
Operator(s): WD6T N7MH
Station: W6YX
Class: M/2 HP
QTH: Stanford
Operating Time (hrs): 48
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 54 28
80: 255 72
40: 945 99
20: 1160 112
15: 127 47
10: 5 5
-------------------
Total: 2546 363 Total Score = 2,772,594
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Comments:
Several weeks before ARRL DX CW David, WD6T, asked if I'd be interested in doing
a multi-op, with just the two of us, alternating 8 hour shifts so that we'd have
plenty of time for rest and could each experience all 24 hours of the day. David
suggested M/S but I countered with M/2, suggesting that we could use my K3 SO2R
set-up with two Alpha-9500s.
Fast-forward to just over a week before the contest. My wife got the flu on
Wednesday and I got it on Friday despite a flu shot. With the help of Tamiflu I
was much better by Wednesday before the contest but my wife was still housebound
and needing my help so I finally got to the W6YX shack late on Thursday. Neither
of the two main antenna rotators were working with our big Yagis for 40, 20, and
15 all beaming at about 130 degrees, where TI9 was most recently worked. One of
the Alpha 9500s had developed a Gain fault that couldn't be resolved. The
internet wasn't working!
I sent a message to Pete, K6TJ, who was able to get to the shack before noon on
Friday and determined that the circuit breaker for the rotators had tripped. It
hadn't happened in my experience of the past 20 years at the current shack
location, but now I know. Pete also found that the internet was now working.
I got to the shack two hours before the contest start and David showed up
shortly after. We maneuvered an Alpha 86 into the main console of the shack to
use in place of the Alpha 9500.
We decided that instead of just one operator SO2R we'd operate with two separate
radios in more traditional M/2 fashion for up to several hours around our shift
changes. It was inconvenient to separate one of the K3s from the SO2R
arrangement so we set up an FT1000MP as the third radio and just had to move the
feedline and keying line from the amp between the two radios to effect the
switch. The second K3 was turned off while the FT1000MP was in use.
Moving the amp and setting up the third radio plus refamiliarizing David with
Writelog, particularly SO2R, ended up taking almost all of the time before the
contest start. We weren't able to get computer keying working on the FT1000MP
even though I've set it up probably more than 100 times in the past.
It was already 2 minutes into the contest so we just decided to go for it and
start. I started on 20 and David was on 40 keying by hand with the paddle. I
stayed for the first two hours and then turned things over to David. He did a
great job on 40 and 80.
We operated on two separate radios for just over 11 hours of the contest and the
other 37 hours were single operator, mostly doing SO2R except... after I left at
midnight Sunday (0800Z) David operated for over a half hour when suddenly the
computer monitor went nuts and the main logging computer shut off. He tried
calling me but I'd fallen asleep minutes earlier and the phone vibrating on the
bedside table didn't wake me.
David swapped monitors but then realized he didn't know how to restart Writelog
and the SO2R box. I'd left fairly detailed instructions but had suggested he
overlook them and focus on the operating part of my instructions. David
resourcefully got the computer running, restarted Writelog and turned on the
SO2R box. But it wasn't working properly so he discovered he could use the SO2R
box to key one radio with the paddle and spent the next 6 hours keying with the
paddle using one radio.
I got back at 1500Z and quickly restarted everything and got it working again.
By that time 20 was open to Europe so I took over running on 20 while David
checked out long path on 80 and 40.
Some noteworthy QSOs on different bands:
David had a good run into Europe on 80. I don't recall running Europe on 80
before and having much success.
Lots of good European runs on 40 until well into our morning. We discovered that
the ground wires for our EU beverage had disappeared so they were recently
replaced with a copper stake. This helped a lot in digging out weak signals on
40 as well as 80. We also terminated our JA beverage as the opposite direction
was aiming straight at San Jose and extremely noisy. In the past the transmit
antennas had always been better for JA on the low bands but the reduced noise on
the beverage made all the difference in making it the best RX choice.
20 had great runs into both Europe and Asia. Many strong signals from EU until
late in the morning.
15 was mostly Caribbean and South and Central America. We worked 3 JAs for our
only Asia Qs. 8 Europeans from 6 countries - CT, EA, EA6, EI, F, LA. G0TSM was
heard but didn't copy us.
10 had one loud signal - PY2UDB, worked on Saturday and also loud on Sunday.
8P5A was worked at 1929Z on Sunday and then PJ4, PJ2 and ZF were worked after
2000Z. The band was open for about 20 to 30 minutes and I CQed briefly, hoping
that one of the P4 stations would show up. Only other non-local signals heard
were N2IC and AA7A.
I used a paddle more than I'd done for the past 20 years and even CQed for a
while by hand. There must have been some simple reason that the FT1000MP
computer keying wasn't working but both David and I adapted to the hand keying
and didn't waste operating time trying to fix it during the contest.
Thanks to all for the QSOs. David and I both enjoyed the contest and it was
great to get more rest than trying to do a full-time SO effort.
73,
-Mike, N7MH
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