25-26 November 2023
Update 14/2/2024:
The results of this contest has now been released.
As expected it did not go as well as I hoped. The extreme QRM that I had on
the second day just as the bands started to open really hurt my results.
Anyway, that is now history, here are the Results:
31'st Place in the world (As an indication of how
bad things were, I won this contest in the past)
First in Africa
First in South Africa
First Zone 38
New South African, African and Zone 38 records.
Certificate received
Well, hopefully things will be better next time, it
was still fun!
CQWW CQ 2023 is history,
did not turn out as planned at all....
The
day before CQWW CW I had not made a final decision on if I am going to compete
or just try to work some nice DX stations. I think the final decision will
only be made tomorrow morning after I have made some contacts. After the first
hour or so I was quite
keen to make this as serious effort, my first since 2015 but a few things have
not worked out as planned. I wanted to compete in the "all band"
category, more stressful due to the long hours and less chance of being
competitive but my motivation is to make it possible to work some new DXCC
band slots.
In the past I have mostly chosen a single band as it allows
you to rest a bit when the band is closed. I was planning on putting up a 80m
antenna, I have none at the moment, as well as to raise my 2 40m "phased"
dipoles, they are only about 8m high at the moment. My hex beam also needs
attention as the retaining screw that prevents rotation relative to the
rotator is loose/stripped (stupid design!) so the antenna moves around in the
wind and you cannot trust your direction indictor in the rotator controller.
Well, due to various reasons, mostly the extremely hot weather and
high winds we have had recently, non of these things happened, so no 80m,
terrible 40m antenna and a hex beam that points where ever the wind pushes it.
Report on CQWW CW 2023, the contest that was not supposed to be and was not!
Day 1, Saturday 25 November 2023
I started the contest at about
03h00 UTC, a bit later than ideal but at this stage my plan was simply to work
some DX. A quick scan across the bands showed a bit of activity on 20m but 40m
seemed like the place to be. This was perfect as I really wanted to add to my
40m CW QRP totals.
The going was slow, signals were not strong with
the strongest signals on the band at around S4. This is not ideal for a QRP
station as the S4 station is most likely running 1.5KW as most top contest
stations do! So if they are S4 with 1500W imagine how weak my 5W signal will be
on their side! But we do not give up that easily. I called a few stations and
I soon found I could make contacts even though the rate was very low. I also
started a bit late as soon after i started the signals started to drop.
By 04h00 the stations had become so weak I gave up on 40m with 23 stations
in the log, around 1 QSO every 3 minutes, not great at all but I reminded
myself this was 40m and QRP, not the easiest band to work QRP!
Notable
stations worked on 40m in the first hour include:
D4C - Cape Verde
5Z4VJ - Kenya, a new QRP DXCC for me!
Most of the other stations worked
were US stations with a few South American stations in-between.
The
first hour was slow and hard work but I was having fun! Next band to open was
20m, it was still a bit early so the going was really slow but I did manage to
work a few stations. The higher HF bands normally only open after lunch this
time of the year so at around 06h45 I gave up having worked 35 stations on 20m
up to that point.
Stations worked were mostly in the USA and Europe
with a few notable exceptions like Morocco, Mauritius and Rodriquez island,
nothing new but fun! At this point I was having so much fun I was starting to
consider making this an actual contest entry.
There was one problem,
since I was not expecting to actually enter I was just using my normal "DX
hunting" logbook, AALog, so my log did not only contain the contest entries
but also QSO's before the contest. Even worse was the fact that the log did
not have my correct "Info sent" entry, it should be "599 38", with 38 being my
CQ zone, it actually contained "599" and a sequential number that I use to
just track the number of contacts made. Well, I decided to rather than attempt
to change logbooks to my normal N1MM+ contest log to just use the log I
started and to later sort out the issue even if I had to write a Linux script
to batch process the log. As it turned out it was not really an issue and easy
to fix!
The rest of the morning I popped into the shack every now and then to scan the
bands, I did make a few contacts on 20m, then 15m and eventually 10m but
conditions were bad.
At this stage I was still using my IC-7600 turned
down to 5W, simply because that was the radio that had the key and antenna
plugged in when I started! I decided to change to my normal QRP rig, the
R928+ at this point. In the past I had mostly used my now ancient FT-817 for
contesting so this was the first time the R928+ was going to be used for a
contest!
ZS2M
in front of the very inconvenient radio "stack"! Using headphones to listen to
the weak stations.
Still running the IC-7600 at this stage.
Changing to the R928+ also allowed me to have a slightly more convenient setup without having to rearrange the shack as the radio is small and I could put it on the desk in front of the other equipment. Far more convenient that having to lift my arm to access the radio!
The
little R928+ doing it's thing, it was a pleasure to use and it behaved
perfectly!
The one thing I did not have setup on the R928+ was CAT control, I only use
this to sent the frequency to the logbook program via Omnirig so it was just a
matter of convenience, I just had to remember to manually change the band in
the logbook software when I change bands!
The morning's "check
the bands every now and then" produced only 18 contacts but by 11h00, 1pm
local time, I went back into the shack and 10m was good enough to produce
regular contacts.
The QSO rate was still low but at least I was working
stations at a regular pace. Working up the band and then gong back to the
bottom to repeat produced results. As always there are the stations who do not
sent their call for long periods, a real pain as just sometimes wait 5 or more
minute till he sends his call and then you see you have worked him already!
The rules actually state you are not allowed to work more than 3 stations in a
row, while calling CQ, without identifying, the penalty is disqualification
but many stations do not seem to care!
There were also the usual very
loud stations calling CQ without really leaving a gap, or calling CQ but not
hearing the many stations replying to them! I made a note of these stations
and it is interesting that they are mostly from 2 countries.....
But
there were also the superb operators with great ears, picking up your weak
signal in the noise, at high speed, the first time you send it! It was nice to
recognize some of the members of the CWOps groups as well as contest regulars I
have not worked since 2015! A few guys recognized me as well with a quick note
added to the QSO, always nice!
With 10m slowly closing after sunset I
started dropping down in frequency again, 15m, 20m and eventually 40m produced
a few more contacts. But the time the bands were quiet or at least the only
stations I could hear were the large contest stations that were already in the
log I had 192 QSO's in the log. Not much but I remembered that I had won
"country, Continent and World" before with a total of only 425 QSO's before so
I set my target for the whole weekend at 400 QSO. Not easy as I did not make
200 the first day and the second day you find that you have worked all the
loud stations already!
I shut down for the day at 17h54. I could have
worked a few more stations but at this point I had decided to enter the "24
hour only" category so my total time for the weekend should not add up to more
than 24 hours with breaks of no shorter than 60 minutes to count. Having made
this decision I knew I would have to be off the air more on the second day as
the few QSO's made on Saturday morning were close enough in time that the morning
would not count as "off" time.
Day 2, Sunday 26 November 2023
This morning I was on the air a bit earlier at 02h00, well later than planned
but still about an hour earlier. I did not set an alarm, I HATE alarms and
have never used one, as I though I would be awake early as usual. It turns out
that the busy day before combined with watching the F1 GP qualifying the night
before made me sleep a bit later than usual. Oh well glad this is a casual
contest entry only!
When I switched on 40m was already busy!
Unfortunately many of the stations I could hear were already in the log but by
the time 40m closed at around 04h16 I had 29 more 40m QSO's in the log. Again
it was mostly US stations with a few European stations added, I also had a
short opening to Japan that was nice.
The log also included a few
South American stations with CX5UA, Uruguay being a nice QRP DXCC addition.
After 40m closed I did work 10 stations on 20m but the signals were very
low and not easy to work, by 05h42 I shut down for the morning, the last 90
minutes were not very productive with most of the stations I could hear
already in the log. One strange this that happened was a Japanese station I
called, he said "QSO before" but I had definitely not worked him or any
Japanese station before! I sent him "not in log" but he ignore me and
continued calling CQ, I wonder who he worked and logged as ZS2M? Well, his
loss. Since he won't be in my log his QSO will be deleted and he will be
penalized double the points for the QSO. When that happens I normally try to
sort out the issue but he was not interested.
Due to the self
imposed 24 hour constraint I decide to not even switch on a radio till after
lunch so that I would not be tempted to make even one QSO!
I started
again at 10h50. 10m was showing signs of life and I had high hopes for the
afternoon as I could see the band picking up with more stations every minute
and getting stronger. By 11h10 I had about 10 more stations in the log when
all hell broke loose, sudden S9+40 QRM right across the band, a sharp rasping
kind of noise! I changed from the R928+ to the IC-7600 and then the IC-7610 to
see if any of the DSP noise reduction could help but it did not really help. I could only
hear the very loudest stations but those I had already worked.
Terrible
QRM on 10m, this is with the antenna pointing away from the noise, almost
impossible to make contacts!
Turning my antenna the noise was the worst from North East, turning South
West it was down to S9+10 on peaks but there were no strong stations in that
direction. By 11h30 I had enough and switched off, there was nothing I could
do. I decided I will wait 1 hour and look again, if it was still like that I
will call it a day and it will be the end of my contest. At this point I
do not really have enough QSO's in the log to warrant an entry, at least I
still have some new DXCC entities.
This is really disconcerting, if
this noise becomes a regular thing amateur radio from this QTH will become
impossible, time to move to a farm! Or maybe change hobbies? No, not really,
but sometimes it can be a bit discouraging when things like these happen.
Early
evening the interference was still there, worst on 10m but a bit better, by
turning my antenna west and using all the DSP filtering I could (now running
the IC-7610) I did manage to work a few more stations on 10m before it closed.
After that I worked a few more stations on 20m, again pointing west but
eventually I gave up as I could only hear the strongest stations and by then I
had worked all of them.
So my contest came to an early halt, I was
aiming for at least 400 contacts and 24 hours of operating (to allow me to
enter the "Classic" class that only allows 24 hours). I ended up with 307
contacts (296 after eliminating duplicates) and 18 hours of airtime. I think
the 400 contacts would have been doable if it was not for the QRM.
Below you can see some of the statistics I extracted from N1MM+ contest log. I
had to export the contest QSO's from AAlog and import it into N1MM+ to allow
me to generate the Cabrillo file that I need to submit. I am still in two
minds if I will actually submit the log, I am not exactly proud of my effort!
Here are the basics:
Totals contacts (de-duped): 307 (296)
DXCC
countries worked: 68
Zones worked: 25
Peak QSO rate: 122/h (Saturday
afternoon on 10m)
Total hours: 18
Claimed score: 143310
Log Summary from the Cabrillo file
Hourly QSO
rate, best was Saturday afternoon, the session I missed on Sunday due to the
QRM.
Band
QSO statistics: 52 on 40m,, 70 on 20m, 12 on 15m and 162 on 10m
Graphical band statistics
Off
times and total hours worked. The last almost 6 hour session is not accurate,
don't know how the software figured that out!