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CQWW WPX Contest, CW
Call: NJ8J
Operator(s): NJ8J
Station: NJ8J
Class: SOAB(TS) LP
QTH: GA
Operating Time (hrs): 22:53
Summary:
Band QSOs
- ------------
160:
80: 6
40: 108
20: 155
15: 305
10: 4
- ------------
Total: 578 Prefixes = 369 Total Score = 531,729
Club: South East Contest Club
Comments:
Equipment:
Alinco DX-77T
LDG AT-11MP Automatic Antenna tuner, MFJ-969 Antenna tuner
Antennas:
100' OCF Dipole fed with ladder-line
Logger: yfktest
Bedsprings Brigade Manor is BACK! It's lovely being able to actually
hear real static, instead of the ugly noise of an errant laptop
(and/or power brick). Wish I had found the problem a few months earlier.
To celebrate, I decided to jump into WPX for the whole weekend. Or at
least most of it. I started off the weekend rather tired, so I ended
up having to take a nap Saturday afternoon(!). I did *not* plan to
get along on 6 hours of sleep a night, so I knew I wasn't going to put
in a full 36 hours. The nap plus the food and stretch breaks (I find
I *do* need to take the occasional stretch break) pulled it back to
about 23 hours.
Started Friday at contest beginning on 10 meters, as it sounded
active, and didn't get a single contact for 25 minutes. I just didn't
seem to be able to make myself heard much on 10. Having trouble on
the first 30 minutes isn't unusual, but I think the OCF dipole doesn't
do well on 10. It's the only band the AT-11MP can't match by itself,
and when I switch the MFJ tuning in, you can hear the band drop by an
S-unit or two. I need to get the Antron A99 back up - it should do
decent (by BBM standards) on 10, if nothing else.
Jumped down to 15 (where I could be heard) at 0025Z, spent a couple of
hours there ( though I made a brief jump over to 10 for 4 contacts,
but it obviously wasn't going to be productive). Then poked around 20
and 80 a bit before settling on 20 S & P. Finished up the evening at
0430Z with 100 Qs in the log.
Got back on Saturday at 1413Z, and for the most part S&P'd 15 until
about 0115Z, then dropped down to 20 for an hour and a half before
moving onto 40 for the rest of the night. I did poke at 80 a little
aboui 0550Z, but found little activity there. Shut down at 0620Z,
when 40 seemed to be fizzling out, with 426 Qs in the log.
Sunday, got going at 1550Z, S&P'd 15 until 2002Z, 20 until 2251Z, and
finished up on 15.
At some point, I realized I should have spent more time on 40 on
Friday evening, but I was enjoying having 15 and 20 open until the
late hours of the night.
I started out with a goal of beating my previous best score from 2006,
39824. That happened Friday night or early Saturday morning. Now
what? I decided on a goal of 400 Qs. Got to that on Saturday
evening. To finish out, I decided on trying to beat my brother's
(AA4LR) score from 2006, 421935. Unless I made a lot of mistakes, or
my logger is calculating the score wrong, looks like I made that. I
figure not bad for a pipsqueak station, and all the sending done with
a straight key (yes, I know it's ridiculous for a computer guy to not
have the computer hooked up to send CW. I actually made up a serial
port CW cable once, but made an Obiwan error (was one off on the
pins). Since then BBM has undergone a round or two of musical PC
parts, and the shack computer no longer has a spare serial port. I
need to take that cable and remake it for a parallel port.).
Ben
- --
Ben Coleman nj8j at benshome.net
"I love the way Microsoft follows standards. In much the
same manner that fish follow migrating caribou."
Paul Tomblin
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