Great question Pete, I thought I would offer my experience as a 'cannon
fodder' part time contester. (100w to some low wires in the centre of
Edinburgh).
I had my Mk5 (With Inrad's) and K3 side by side for almost a year and for me
the K3 wins hands down as a contest radio.
I love the Mk5 and I was really comfortable with it, under usual DXing type
operation I found very little difference.
However when it comes to contesting on crowded bands, like the recent RTTY
and CW contests, the K3 allowed me to work stations I could not decode/copy
with the MK5. The K3 seems to be able to filter out so much more of the
unwanted signal and that for me meant more Qs.
There is nothing I can do about antenna's at this location so the K3 has
been a means of improving my QSO count.
If I had the money and space I would have both in the shack but sadly the
Mk5 has now been sold.
73
Jim, MM0BQI
----- Original Message -----
From: "Pete Smith" <n4zr@contesting.com>
To: "CQ Contest" <cq-contest@contesting.com>
Sent: Thursday, February 25, 2010 1:46 PM
Subject: [CQ-Contest] RX Heresy?
>I have watched with some amazement as the Elecraft K3 has seemingly
> taken over the top dog's spot among contest radios, both among the top
> ops and the rest of us.
>
> This impels me to wonder, though - how much does improved RX strong
> signal performance really improve your ability to score in contests? My
> suspicion (showing my going-in bias) is that most of us have long since
> developed responses to our receiving problems that tend to minimize the
> damage they do. Knowing when to abandon a run frequency, QSYing just a
> bit ("skootching"), riding the gain instead of using AGC, all of these
> devices have been useful since the dawn of time.
>
> And so the question - how much do serious, full-time, top-ten contesters
> feel that improve RX hardware has really improved their scoring ability,
> compared to other improvements in their stations over the years?
>
> --
> 73, Pete N4ZR
>
> The World Contest Station Database, updated daily at
> www.conteststations.com
> The Reverse Beacon Network at http://reversebeacon.net, blog at
> reversebeacon.blogspot.com
>
> _______________________________________________
> CQ-Contest mailing list
> CQ-Contest@contesting.com
> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/cq-contest
>
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