Jim,
I think you hit the nail on the head. It's the caliber/calibre of the
operator. Without a doubt, the pileups were the worst I've ever heard
them in a contest. There was endless calling with little listening. The
callees were guilty too, with very sparse IDing. For example, LT1F was
mis-spotted on packet as L1TF and had an instant pileup. You would
think the op would figure it out after 2 or 3 dupes in a row, but there was
no ID for a LONG time.
Bottom line, as in DXing, it has been said that the pileup is controlled by
the DX station. The better ops know how to do it.
73,
Barry W2UP
On 1 Dec 2002 Jim Martin wrote:
> I think for the first time last weekend I heard contest stations working
> split. They were not exactly exotic or rare prefixes so why the split
> operation? Others like XT2DX and HC8N had huge pile-ups but always managed
> to skilfully work their way through.
> Is this to do with the calibre of the operator or a ploy to spread out the
> callers and have an operator work the stations and another 'tee' up the next
> QSO? Muscle substituting for skill?
> Whatever the reason, many times over the weekend I heard chunks of the band
> rendered useless by this practice and felt sorry for the stations who had
> been running on the previously clear frequency and then being drowned under
> a sea of callsigns. I would rather take my 'little
> pistols' chances in the pile-up and if it's too busy try again later.
> That's what makes it fun!
> Jim MM0BQI
> (Originally posted on UK-Contest)
>
>
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--
Barry Kutner, W2UP Internet: w2up@mindspring.com
Newtown, PA Frankford Radio Club
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