ARRL DX Contest, CW - 2021
Call: N8II
Operator(s): N8II
Station: N8II
Class: SOAB LP
QTH: WV
Operating Time (hrs): 20
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 17 15
80: 75 33
40: 108 39
20: 980 71
15: 87 34
10: 25 11
-------------------
Total: 1292 201 Total Score = 779,896
Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club
Comments:
I woke up around 5AM Friday morning, much earlier than desired. Consequently, I
just did not have the desire or energy to operate into the late night where many
Q's are a battle to break the pile up. This past December marked my 50th
anniversary on the air starting as WN8IJW with a crystal controlled HW-16.
When the flux rises so will my desire to push for a better score (I hope).
Condx at the start were quite good on 20 and the low bands, several JA's had
strong 20M signals. 40 was marginal to north EU, then starting to worsen to all
of EU at 0230Z. 80 was in great shape EU Friday evening. E ven some EU stations
had good signals on 160, but I could only work about half of the EU stations
heard there. S52AW was S9 and never heard ne calling.
Running on 20 went very well; there were very few incursions onto my run
frequency. It always helps to have a string on loud EU callers to hold a
frequency. The first hour was frustrating and draining. EU stations were mostly
zero beat to each other; the 12Z rate was 156. It was still good at 17Z with
125/hr, but I had to take off almost a whole hour at 1315Z for a very quick
breakfast and to help XYL get ready for our daughter's wedding dress shopping.
Total morning Q's on 15M were 26 and that was the better day, Sunday was nearly
dead. Friday before the test, there was a good opening around 16Z to HA,OM,I,
and EA, not be when needed.
Breaking pile ups seemed more difficult this time around; more W/VE activity was
to blame. I tried to be smart and move on fairly quickly when my odds were not
good. Starting around 23Z Saturday, conditions and activity declined. 40 was
poor to EU at 23Z. Surprisingly JA's were again workable but not loud at 24Z on
20. My 80M noise took its toll on me, hard to copy the much weaker EU signals.
10M opened, but mainly to deep SA; I barely worked KH6LC on scatter beaming
about 240 degrees vs. normal 280.
Sunday all day was poorer with definitely disturbed conditions. Stations as far
south as Germany and some auroral flutter on them at times on 20. The Russians
and northern EU were mostly quite weak. I was surprised both days by the number
of Russians who were able to copy my weak signal and call me. Numerous EU
callers were very weak; the new FTDX-101D helped a lot. Northern EU activity was
better than I had hoped under such poor conditions. I started running out of
callers around 13Z, but it did not get really slow until about 1630Z. 20 closed
very early, no running after about 1710Z and only SW EU remaining by 18Z.
Thanks for the calls and special thanks to those who dug me out of the noise and
pile ups.
73, Jeff
Thanks
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