A reminder that the Vermont QSO Party will take place in a little over a
week from now, on February 2-3, 2013.
The event runs the full 48 hours UTC, which, in Eastern Time corresponds
to Friday, February 1, starting at 7PM and ending Sunday, February 3,
7PM. There is no limit to operating time - have as much fun as you want!
The QSO Party site is
http://www.ranv.org/vtqso.html
All the details are there.
Vermont stations - PLEASE get on and call CQ. Stations outside Vermont
can only work Vermont stations for credit, so it's no fun if they can't
find any of us! Best bet is to get on daylight hours on 20 and 15 meters
(and 10 if it opens well). Last year, we had good success with lots of
QSO's on 40 meters at night, but that is propagation dependent.
Stations outside Vermont - We hope to hear you again this year and will
try to get more stations on the air for you to work!
Log submissions must be in Cabrillo format. We'll accept logs in most
any form, but please consider setting your software up properly. Logs in
other formats have to be converted by me and it takes a bunch of time to
do this. I strongly recommend the N1MM Contest Logger which is a free
download http://n1mm.hamdocs.com <http://n1mm.hamdocs.com/>
N1MM fully supports the VT QSO Party so it will work well. If you've
never used this before, be sure to leave a few hours available to play
with it and get familiar with some of the features (i.e. don't try it
out 5 minutes before the contest).
Be careful with other contest software - it may or may not give you what
is needed. I know some have had problems with the free version of
N3FJP's program as it doesn't include the Cabrillo conversion.
If you are a returning contestant, or are new to the VT QSO Party, we
hope you will join with us at this on-air event.
There are many ways to have fun in this. Not only will the VT QSO Party
be running, but also the Black Sea Contest, 10-10 QSO Party, CW Sprint
and MN, DE and BC QSO Parties will take place at various times during
the same weekend. Look up their rules and times so that you know what
contest information is needed. I have a lot of fun working stations and
submitting logs to many of these contests.
You got a week and a half and plenty of nice frigid weather to do last
minute antenna work. Hope to see you on the air!
Mitch W1SJ
VT QSO Party Manager
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