CQWW WPX Contest, CW - 2023
Call: HB0A
Operator(s): PC5A
Station: HB0A
Class: SOAB HP
Class Overlay: TB-Wires
QTH:
Operating Time (hrs): 35
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 2
80: 64
40: 701
20: 997
15: 248
10: 31
------------
Total: 2043 Prefixes = 937 Total Score = 4,984,840
Club: Bavarian Contest Club
Comments:
In summary I can use Julius Caesar's words: "Veni, Vidi, Vici" (very
close anyway)
I decide just a few days before the contest to travel to HB0. My two friends who
always join me had other appointments this weekend so I wanted to give it a try
as single op. I hadn't done that in long time. I arrived Thursday evening in
Triesenberg. Friday around midday I went to the station and had slight setback.
Since the station owner was still in the US I had to use a spare key to enter
the shack. This key is stored in an key safe box. After triple checking that I
had set the 4 digit code correctly I could not open it... hmmm. Now what?
I managed to get in touch with another member of the AFVL and luckily he had a
spare key which I then picked up in the valley. HB0A is up in the mountains at
almost 1500 meters asl.
Setting up the station and prepare the contest logging etc was done within an
hour and I started to play around a little and check all antennas. I went to the
airbnb where I stayed, had dinner, prepared a bag with all contest necessities
like food and went to bed. I got up at 01:00 and headed for the station. I gave
a first CQ with still 7 minutes before the start. That was a first :-)
My goal: a score of 5M points (roughly 2000+ Q's and 900+ mults)
I started at 40M where we have a rotary dipole. The first three hours went fine
with hourly QSO rates around 100. I stayed on 40M for 6 hours to get as many
6-pointers as possible. At 7Z I had 200 NA stations in the log.
I took my first rest around 13Z and returned just before 19Z. I had higher
expectations of 15 and 10. I was not able to get any nice runs on 15M, 10M was
not really open. At around 18:30Z BA7MT was worked on 15M with the beam to the
west. I crossed the 1000Q mark at 20:17Z. I was on track.
Most of the night I stayed on 20M with nice strong signals from all of the
world, although the mountain ridge to the east of us blocks many signals from
almost 0-150 degrees. (that's why we usually struggle in most contests except
ARRL :-))
I took my second break after sunrise and returned at 11Z. The score count was
3.1M. 6 hours later the score was 3.8M.... 10 and 15 were just not any good. In
fact I saw myself CQing for 5 min on 15M and not a single skimmer picked up my
signal. i had never experienced that before. At this rate I would end up around
4.2M... It was looking grim to reach my goal if things didn't improve.
Things improved and in the next 3 hours the score went up to 4.2M. One hour
later it was 4.5M with two more hours to go it would be a close finish. I
concluded I needed more multipliers and focussed on those (especially EU mults
on 40 and 80). With 30min left I switched from S&P to running, closely
watching any new mult appear that was in reach. Boy the adrenalin was really
cooking with 2 minutes left and I needed either 30 QSO's or 2-3 mults. At 00Z
that counter stopped at 4.992M. Re-scoring brought it down to 4.984M.
I am still very pleased with the result and surely have learned from the
experience.
CU in July as HB0HQ
TRX: TS870
AMP: TL922
ANT1: Eantenna 59+ @21M
ANT2: LZAntenna 30+40 ROTARY DIPOLE @ 22M
ANT3: FD5 @20M
73
-- Aurelio PC5A
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