2003 CQ WPX CW
24-25/05/2003
I made a serious effort with this contest, as it turned out conditions were not that great and various factors conspired to limit my operating time. I still had fun and added quite a few band countries to my totals.
I decided to try an all band QRP effort again, my initial station was setup as follows:
Since this was going to be a QRP entry and I knew that I had little chance of running a CQ frequency I did not even bother to use 2 radios. On the Friday before the contest the bands sounded OK so I thought QRP would be fine, little did I know....
Yaesu FT-817 was used for 10, 15, 20 and 40m connected to a Cushcraft A4S antenna for all the bands but 40m, on 40m I used an inverted V at 20m. This radio was set to 4W output using a Bird Wattmeter. This radio is now equipped with a 250Hz filter that makes it far better to use on a crowded band. The radio was keyed directly from the computer using the logging program but I did have a paddle connected for quick messages.
For logging I used Lux-Log running on a laptop (Compaq). I used a laptop since it produces less (no) interference on the low bands, unlike my normal computer. The fact that it can also run from a battery gives extra security in case of a power failure, less chance of lost QSO's !
I do sometimes use headphones during a contest but I must admit that I mostly prefer a good external speaker unless the signals are very weak.
The week before the contest I tried to get as much rest as possible since I was expecting to get little sleep during the weekend due to the all-band effort. I was VERY busy at work including 2 very late nights early in the week. The Friday night before the contest I went to bed at my normal time as I decided that the bands would not be open at the start of the contest so I planned on a later start at about 0230 UTC. As it turned out this was a good decision as even at that time all bands but 40m were completely dead and even 40m only produced a few contacts for the first few hours. It was so quiet that I checked my antennas to make sure they were plugged in !. This turned out to be a sign of things to come as on Saturday the conditions were extremely poor. During the SSB leg of the WPX contest I managed a few times to get my Q rate above 100 Q's per hour, even if just for a short time but during this leg of the contest the highest I managed was 31 Q's per hour and that was only late on Sunday afternoon.
Most of Saturday was spend working stations on 15 and 20m at no more than 10 to 15 Q's per hour, I must admit that at that stage I had serious doubts about my QRP strategy. Most signals I heard were under S1 so I suppose even with high power I would not have worked much more, you cannot work them if you cannot hear them !. I also had a few interruptions like friends visiting unannounced, a car I had to fix and an electric gate I had to fix during the day Saturday. Late Saturday afternoon conditions improved a bit and I started having fun. The whole of Saturday I only heard one or 2 stations on 10m and they did not even move the S meter !. The bands closed quite early on Saturday evening with just 40m producing a few contacts a hour. When the rate dropped below 7 Q's a hour I called it a day, not too happy with my total (about 195 !) at all !. Well, at least there was Sunday !
I got started at about the same time on Sunday and immediately things were better, on 40m at least. During the first few hours I did not really get the rate much above 10 per hour but at least I had fun adding new band/countries the my DXCC total on 40m, I ended up adding 7 new ones on 40m so that really made the whole effort worth while ! After 40m closed just after sunrise it was back to 20 and later 15m, conditions were not great but at least the total slowly went up. On many occasions I got to the point where I worked everyone I could hear on the band so I would then take a quick break for 30 minutes or so before looking again for a few new ones. Late Sunday afternoon conditions improved quite a bit with some stations now running S9 signals. For the first time the band got so crowded that I started using the narrow filter. Unfortunately most of these loud stations were ones I worked the day before when they were S1 signals ! I managed a few contacts on 10m late in the afternoon but for most of the day 15m was the band of choice.
Early Sunday evening conditions changed and it was back to 20m for a few short runs of about 30 Q's per hour, the best rate of the contest. This unfortunately did not last very long with 20m slowly dying quite early in the evening. 40m had some signals but there was a lot of QRN so, as I was rather tired I closed down the stations quite early. At that stage I knew that this was not exactly a world beating effort so I reluctantly called it a day.
Even if conditions were rather poor I still had fun and a few lessons were learned, that along with a few band/countries that were added made it all worth while. I am already making plans for next year !
My final totals were:
Total QSO's: 421
Multipliers: 291
Total claimed score: 403908
Compared to more than 1090 Q's and 1.5M total in the SSB leg of the contest running the same power this was not to great !
I was hoping that this contest would produce DXCC entity no. 300 but that was not to be, oh well, I do know no. 300 is out there and it is only a question of time :-)
So, what did I learn?, QRP is not always the best option ! (only joking :-). I also found that when I started making more use of the narrow filter it made copying easier and it reduced operator fatigue a lot. In the future I will make more use of my filters even if the band is not that crowded.
I only worked a few Japanese stations and even the normal USA stations were nowhere to be found. Most of my contacts were into Europe but my poor rotator got a good workout with me moving the antenna all the time trying to get the most out of very weak signals.
I must also thank all those great operators who managed to hear my little signal among all the big stations !, THANKS. I found very few bad operators and I never even go upset at anyone !. There were the normal few stations that would call CQ for hours with many stations coming back to them but the never work anyone !, I wonder what they use for receivers ?
My XYL, Katti - ZS6KVR kept me supplied with eats and drinks and a few word of encouragement when I started feeling discouraged ! THANKS !
See you in the contests !