Unfortunately, I won?t be able to run CQWW RTTY this year as I?m waiting on
the new antennas to arrive. However, I want to get this out to both the
ACG and SECC as about a year ago, Tom, N4KG asked Tom, WX4TM and I to put
together a few Hints & Kinks on RTTY Contesting for the ACG. At that time,
I was getting a business off the ground and had absolutely no time at all.
Well, I still don?t have much free time, but there is a little more balance
to my work and personal life at the moment so here?s just a few things ahead
of CQWW RTTY.
First, you?ll find Tom?s comments in tact from his original post, followed
by mine:
Hints?? First of all I have to establish some dis-claimers.. I don?t know
many facts. All I know is what works for me and I?m not even sure about
that half the time. I?m far from being an electronic, RF, antenna, or
propagation guru. Most of you guys have forgotten more than I?ll ever know
about this stuff. I?m an operator and novice experimenter. A great majority
of contesters are in it strictly for the fun of it and often for other
purposes like working on WAS or DXCC etc. A small group will want to be
somewhat competitive and yet a smaller group will be seriously competitive.
It is rare that I act, think or perform as a serious competitor. I use to
race snow mobiles for fun. When I started entering competitive racing, it
got serious very quickly; became WORK, VERY EXPENSIVE and wasn?t nearly as
much fun as just going out and having impromptu races with my buddies. I?ve
tried to guard myself from letting that happen to my Ham radio contesting.
THINGS TO THINK ABOUT
When I started RTTY contesting back around ?96/97 time frame, I spent a
tremendous amount of time just listening and watching. From this I (think)
I learned to build correct / effective macros. I learned what my equip and
antenna system could and could not do. I learned to recognize changes in
propagation during the contest and to make changes accordingly. I learned to
setup and test my software and radios a day or two ?before? contest start
time. I learned to think about and actually write down a ?strategy? with
IF?S and OR?s and included a reminder ?don?t let anyone get you po?d?. etc
etc. Try not to prejudge what will definitely work or won?t work. Be
flexible, always ready to react / make a change at the ?right? time.
Next issue: personal conditioning ? mind and body. I was doing pretty good
with this until about 3 or 4 yrs ago when age and medications started
slowing me down? sometimes drastically. I use to tell folks down here to
practice staying up late, eat mildly, drink sanely. Get your mind right.
Concentrate. Don?t get distracted. Operator comfort: not too much, not too
little. How do you have your software configured? Can it be made easier or
more efficient? A lot of people like hitting F keys. I?m like the mouse.
Use what works best for YOU. Not what somebody else says is best. But be
open minded as possible.
Now most of you already know all this. Its nothing new. The problem, I
think, is that many of us forget to think about all these kind of things
BEFORE the contest and to take steps to really prepare ourselves and our
equipment.
Operating expertise: Expertise occurs, I believe, based on experience and
practice ? to the point that when you do some things, you do them
automatically without thinking about why or how ? it becomes, to some
degree, instinct. But the more you DO think about the whys and hows, the
better you?ll get. If you don?t, you?ll stagnate like I?ve been doing more
and more.
What about SO2R vs SO1R; a sensitive subject among some of us. I?ll say
this and let the subject drop. Anyone can do SO2R. But few can do it
competitively. There?s a big difference in the cost of equip and accessories
needed to do it competitively. I don?t think you have to be extra smart to
do it. You have to practice and practice some more; and you really must have
full knowledge and understanding of the capabilities of your computer(s),
software, radios, and antennas. You must be able to sustain intense
concentration for long periods of time. And finally, no matter how good or
not so good you are, you can and will increase your score by being SO2R. The
better you get, the bigger the increase. It is rare, really rare, that a
seasoned SO1R op will beat a seasoned SO2R op. (In fact I?ve never seen that
happen). The ?standard reply? to that is ?the SO1R Op is just not smart
enough be a competitive SO2R op?. And to that I say that?s shear unequivocal
BULLCRAP! Now, I?ve said 2 cents worth on that.
About antennas. Oh I can determine when its working and when its not and to
some degree (based on rates!) how well or not its working. I have basic
understanding about how low angle antennas work best for long distance while
antennas with high angles are best for closer in and, generally speaking,
the higher the ant, the lower the angle. But then there?s propagational
effects on all this too. And these effects often change sometime in a few
mins, sometimes in an hr or so. Based on experience with my antennas, I?ve
got a pretty good picture of what works when but I know this is likely to
change and I try to stay alert to that and react quickly. For instance, I
have two tribanders: a TH11 at 85 ft and a TH5 at 50ft. A full size 40V at
50 ft with 8 elevated radials and a regular inverted V at 45 ft. A full
size ground mounted Vertical on 80 with 60 radials and a regular inverted V
at 65 ft. Stateside type contests will find me switching between these a
lot, a lot, a lot. I once told Darrell K9MUG that I?d bout wore out my 6pak
coax switch in one contest. One last point on this: Darrell has demonstrated
that a good wire antenna with a bit of gain and multiple lobes can beat
about any low angle beam in the right contest with the right propagation.
(NO!, I don?t point both beams in the same direction).
Propagation zones. Now this is going to get deep. I fully believe there
are three distinct propagational zones in Alabama. North. Central and South.
Yeah, I know, you think I?m full of it. But based on contest activity,
claimed capabilities, time spent, after contest comments and scores I?ve
seen, I just have to believe this. I?ve seen it when N AL claims props were
good and we here in central AL can barely hear anything, while S Ala is
working?em like gang busters. And I?ve heard N AL saying they had bad props
and we here had great props. I?m telling you, its weird. Really weird.
Specific to RTTY: experiment with your settings. Last year at Huntsville,
Rick K4TD asked me why he couldn?t copy what I was copying even tho the
signal strengths were good. His system just wouldn?t decode what I was
easily decoding. I offered that I had developed a set of MMTTY parameters
a yr or two earlier that were really great but that I had lost them in a
computer crash. Honestly, I?ve not put out a lot of effort to recover them
because MMTTY has worked so good with its default setups. Well almost. For
your comparison, here?s my setup:
Using mmtty ver 1.66g with Writelog, under ?option, setup?, in the
Pre-Filter block, I have BPF checked ON, Tap set at 386, FW to 100
(sometimes 80) and DO NOT have AFC Connection checked. I do not use squelch
or notch. All the rest are standard default settings. On my FT2000, I vary
the width of the DSP bw filter. The more intense the activity, the narrower
I set it. On the radio, I set my XMIT to the 2nd VFO and keep the main VFO
for receiver tuning. My right hand works the mouse and my left hand works
the VFO. When rates get going really good and there?s lots of stations
calling, I start using the IPO function to cut out the ampflier stages to
help better decode the loudest/strongest stations calling. Remember I said I
like using the mouse vs hitting F keys. I do that using a utility called
FKEYS freely available on the internet.
CQ?ing vs S&P. Both must be used with effective strategy. Admittedly I
don?t S&P as much as I use to. I use to run a while and when rates would
drop a bit, I?d go S&P making one or two sweeps up and down the band then
run some more.. I have rarely been able to use the cluster effectively to
quickly identify a needed multi and go get it fast enough to make it worth
my while. If you CQ long enuf and hard enuf you?ll most likely get him, but
sometimes not; especially if that multi never does S&P. Its really a
judgement call. And too, one must be somewhat patient. I see some folks who
change bands back and forth way too much.
RATES: Almost always RATES is the name of the game. Do every thing you can
to maximize RATES. Multis are important and must be had but rarely at the
expense of good rates. Here?s where the 2nd radio pays off if you have one.
Macros. Mentioned that above. Keep?em as short as poss but not so short
you?re asked for repeats. Read the conditions and know when you can use
short exchanges and when you need to use long exchanges. There?s not much
you can do about what I call ?rate killers?. The guys who comes on and
gives your call 3 times, his call 3 times and his report once! (and all the
variations of this). Work?em as fast as you can and get on with. Don?t
argue with anybody. Don?t dilly dalley. If he?s a dup, work him as fast as
you can and get on with it. RATES RATES RATES
Luck? Some will say you make your own luck. But there IS some luck
involved. Here?s an example of luck: when you?re S&P and move up or down
the band, you regularly catch the next station at the end of his QSO and you
nail him fast and move on and do the same thing a dozen or so times in a
row. That?s luck! There?s some luck in doing SO2R. You have to have a good
rhythm going cqing on diff bands or cqing on one and S&P on another. If you
can?t get that rhythm going, you?re going to slow down so you don?t violate
the ?xmt on only one band at a time? rule. You?ve had it happen. You?ve got
a good fast run going, somebody calls, you quickly give him a report, then
wait. You might send your report again before he finally answers you. Why
was he so slow to respond? Good chance he?s working SO2R and he was
answering or giving a report on another band. And if you xmtted yet again
while waiting on him to respond, you just set back his rhythm again. He
can?t answer. Result you?re both slowed down and good run is busted.
I?m sure there?s a few more things I wanted to elaborate on but I?m old,
tired, sleepy (missed my nap thinking about all this) and my short term
memory has kicked in. Besides, I?ve given away too many secrets today. But
I?ve held back a few. Don?t want that young whippersnapper K4TD to clean my
clock too often.
73 Tom WX4TM
WW4LL?s comments:
First, RTTY contesting is not for everyone but it is growing in popularity.
Several new contesters have told me that they got started in contesting by
participating in RTTY tests, as they thought it was less intimidating than
CW, for example. The 2010 CQ WW season opens on 25-26 September with the
24th running of the RTTY mode in this contest. With over 15,000
participants and a record 2307 entries in 2009, the largest RTTY contest
promises to be a great event.
RTTY contesting is not unlike other modes as far as propagation, use of
antennas, logging SO2R and other contesting strategies. However, there are
little shortcuts that you can make to improve the efficiency of your RTTY
contest effort. For example, one elementary shortcut is to program your
software as you would on CW to Zero your RIT once you hit Enter and log a
QSO. With that programmed, you don?t have to worry about zeroing it
yourself after each Q.
Properly programming your macros for your F key usage is also an essential
element. Running a pileup when using N1MM, you can use the Stacking feature
as the incoming calls are decoded and color coded, showing mults vs calls
not worked. Of course you want to work the mults first if possible,
however, you have to do it quickly because the aggressive contester will not
hang around waiting on you to work off your list. Two or three of the
casual contesters may wait on you, but work the mults first when you have
the opportunity.
Partial Calls - When multiple stations are calling you simultaneously and
you receive partial calls, PLEASE, do not just respond by calling CQ again.
This wastes time and creates another pileup that you have to sort out.
Instead, send the partial call with your exchange and then hopefully and
more than likely, the station will be in the clear and send you the entire
call and his exchange. You can then send his call with your Thank You (TU)
confirming that he?s in your log. When working a call that you have fully
copied and also have copied a partial call, you can work the first guy,
finishing that Q similar to this, K1ZZI TU de WW4LL Now 9SVL. You could
also send K1ZZI TU de WW4LL Now 9SVL 599 GA. When the op responds, you?ll
now pick up his/her prefix.
History Files can be utilized for some contests like NAQP and you should
save them and continue to merge them together, expanding your history files
for import into your logging program before each contest. Contest clubs can
put these history files on their websites for others to share and/or, you
can share with your contest friends.
Many novice RTTY operators will wait until the ?tail? entirely drops from
the received signal, however, you can shave a couple of seconds off each
exchange by both watching your screen print, listening and hitting your F
Key just before the incoming transmission stops. The other station will
miss nothing and you will keep things moving.
Message buffers should have a carriage return at the beginning and a space
at the end. Please.....no carriage return at the end as it forces the op on
the receiving end to follow the carriage return down the page. This
separates the end of the message from any noise characters that may be
printed on the receiving station's screen.
End your calls of CQ with CQ at the end. In case someone is just tuning to
your signal, they know that you are calling CQ by seeing it at the end, even
if they?ve copied nothing else. They will know that you are calling CQ
instead of calling another station. So now, just drop your call in
response. Shorten your messages as much as you can, but keeping them
effective. For example, no reason to use BK or SK.
Running RTTY SO2R ? You can run SO2R in the conventional method with a DX
Doubler or some other interface but in RTTY, I don?t use head phones, can
see the print on the two computer screens and listen to the audio of the two
rigs turned down. I use two separate keyboards, computers networked and
monitors. If I have a computer crash on one, I?ve still got the other
computer running with my data in tact and can continue relatively unimpeded.
Key reassignment also facilitates keyboard entry like using the Insert key
which is out on the numeric pad and is easily accessible.
RUN vs S&P ? No pat answer to this but if you have a mediocre antenna
system, I would suggest in general that you S&P initially during the start
of the contest because of the wealth of activity. However, with the
mediocre antenna system, you may find that you do quite well running by
going to the edge of where the activity is, and calling CQ. Overall, if
you?ve got the hardware, I?m a big proponent of RUNNING so give it a try.
MMTTY ? I find that I decode as well running just MMTTY vs running a DXP-38.
I have run both simultaneously and see no benefit to running the DXP-38.
You might want to try running multiple instances of MMTTY in different
configurations though. Most of the time you?ll see little difference, but
occasionally, you will copy clearly in one configuration over another.
Reviewing your old logs ahead of every major contest is a great source for
documenting operating profiles. For example, if you are not a seasoned
contester, you can use your old logs to document beam headings and times of
the day to start looking in different directions for stations based on
previous contests, as a reminder to turn that beam. After a while, it will
become second nature to know that it?s time to swing the beam to look for
stations from different parts of the world, based on time of day and band.
Operating Decorum ? Be on your best behavior. Please respect the CW
operators in this shared spectrum, be aware of old established NETs as much
as you practically can, stay away from beacon frequencies, etc.
There is more to say about setup, operating style, etc. but so much of what
applies to operating the other modes, applies here as well. I just wanted
to get this out ahead of the contest this coming weekend so please have fun
and good luck.
73?....Fred WW4LL
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