Off With a Bang

As promised, KL2R is starting 2018 with great gusto. Several contests have helped the count, but so has the International Grid Chase and a quest for Worked All States on 80 meters, which will also give us 5BWAS. That means we're reasonably active shooting grey line to DX in the morning and evening. Europe, JA, VK, and North/South America are proving to be very workable on FT-8, when openings can be very brief (minutes), but long enough for the new mode. As of this date, we have 40 LoTW QSLs on 80 WAS, and 21 DXCC. A highlight was working Francesco IK0XBX after trying for about three weeks.

This brings me to WPX RTTY last weekend, which was a big blast. Saturday was busy in the shack. Dan KL1JP stopped by late morning and proceeded to spend several hours running on 20 meters, picking up on an early opening that really didn't abate until mid-afternoon. At that time John AL7ID, Paul KL4ET, and Pete KL4IT arrived for a demonstration and tutorial. It was a good time to give the latter two an intro to the shack, as we switched to 40 and 80 meters and the rates slowed down. Pete is a newbie to contesting, but Paul had some experience with WL7F/KL4SD SK running low power. In the end, 900 QSOs and 907k points was more than double the previous best from KL2R.

KL1JP in the middle of a six-hour 20m run for WPX RTTY.

NAQP RTTY from February

NAQP RTTY proved to be interesting.  I started off solo, and then Dan KL1JP stopped by to make it more fun as a multi-op contest (although we only used one radio).  Ten meters was a complete bust, and for some reason 15m never opened the way it usually does.  It's odd to see twice as many QSOs on 40 as on 15.  Twenty turned out to be the band we focused upon, mostly running, and not enough S&P time on the other bands for some better multiplier counts.

Many Canadian provinces were lacking, but VY0ERC called all the way from Ellesmere Island for a nice surprise.  Also, Andy VE9DX was able to reach out to us on 20 and 40m.  He is running 50 watts on  RTTY.  It is always a pleasure to work him!  Europeans and JAs called mightily at times, which is always very frustrating when trying to eek out a few new sections and states in a pileup

The boys at WL7CXP, about 40 miles west of KL2R, made a great effort and beat us handily with more multipliers on 15 and several on 80.  Here's what WL7F had to say about it, echoing several sentiments Dan and I had:

Well another RTTY Multi contest using the Skinny Dick’s club call WL7CXP.  This time we had Wes (WL7F), Carl (WL7BDO), and Paul (KL4ET) in the shack working the contest.  We started the contest out on 20M with KE1DS the fist contact from WA and ended the contest with W4MPB on 40M.

15M did not seem to open all day long really and did not hear a single signal on 10M throughout the day. This contest it seemed 20M was the go to band  for contacts which is a slight change from previous ones where 15M was the go-to band. The pace was a bit slower also which leads to good training time and time to hone skills on other aspects of operating. 40M was a good band for getting more multipliers and usually it is not as good so the solar cycle is definitely shifting. A few 80M stations from NVand CA made the log.

Paul worked VY0ERC, a weather station up in NU Canada, and Carl hauled in Japan even though someone came on the frequency and sent No JA. People really need to read rules and understand them. Guantanamo Bay was also on, but the pileup was too big. They were heard on 20 and 40 meters here.

Some of the statistics from WL7CXP:

Band   QSOs Sec

     3.5       3   2

7        73  28

     14      192  46

     21       52  52

 Total       320 100

Score: 32,320

CQ WPX RTTY from WL7CXP

Well, this contest is in the bag. Had WL7BDO Carl and WL7F myself Wes as operators for this one and broke the 1 million point mark. Of course, this was 100W max so it was under Multi Operator Low Power Radio Teletype. Radio used was a FT 857D with a Microham USBIII interface and laptop. Antennas were a HyGain TH6 up 50 feet for the high bands and Phased ground mounted verticals on 40 meters.

This was the first time using the callsign for the club and seemed to work well for RTTY. Had just gotten the callsign on Thursday and decided to use this one. I started the contest out on 15 meters and Carl ended it on 20 meters. We used the OPON feature in N1MM+ and it was very successful as it one saves the window layout for each operator and is good for statistics and a bit of friendly competition during the contest and after.

The info from N1MM+ and some of the information that can be gleaned this way:

Band     QSOs     Pts       WPX

     7     86      408       32

    14    260      663      176

    21    525     1293      219

    28      8       17        2

 Total    879     2381      429

Score: 1,021,449

1 Mult = 2.0 Q's

Total Time Off 02:44  (164 mins)

Total Time On 45:16  (2716 mins)

65 Countries

Max Rates:

2016-02-14 2131Z - 3.0 per minute  (1 minute(s)), 180 per hour by WL7BDO

2016-02-14 0132Z - 1.6 per minute  (10 minute(s)), 96 per hour by WL7BDO

2016-02-14 0134Z - 1.3 per minute  (60 minute(s)), 75 per hour by WL7F

WPX RTTY - 2016-02-13 0000Z to 2016-02-15 0000Z - 886 QSOs

WL7CXP Runs >10 QSOs:

2016-02-13 0033 - 0113Z,   21116 kHz, 43 Qs, 64.1/hr WL7F

2016-02-13 0130 - 0154Z,   21097 kHz, 27 Qs, 65.4/hr WL7F

2016-02-13 0242 - 0309Z,   14100 kHz, 16 Qs, 34.7/hr WL7F

2016-02-13 1927 - 2113Z,   21100 kHz, 73 Qs, 41.6/hr WL7BDO

2016-02-13 2150 - 2217Z,   21108 kHz, 14 Qs, 30.6/hr WL7BDO

2016-02-13 2232 - 2339Z,   14106 kHz, 57 Qs, 51.5/hr WL7BDO

2016-02-14 0005 - 0146Z,   21104 kHz, 111 Qs, 66.0/hr WL7BDO

2016-02-14 1958 - 2020Z,   21117 kHz, 11 Qs, 29.6/hr WL7BDO

2016-02-14 2114 - 2139Z,   21105 kHz, 34 Qs, 80.1/hr WL7BDO

2016-02-14 2147 - 2220Z,   21096 kHz, 41 Qs, 73.2/hr WL7BDO

2016-02-14 2228 - 2301Z,   21114 kHz, 33 Qs, 61.1/hr WL7BDO

Early on the gremlins showed their face as the radio was just not putting out the power as noticed the power down to 9V coming into the radio on transmit but was showing 12v on receive and the power out was a lot lower. Figured the batteries were low so went out and started the generator and then looked at the power and same thing happening. I grabbed the power cord going into the radio and it was hot so wiggled the wires and walla full power once again. Swapped the power cable out with the backup one and inspected the cord and noticed the solder had melted arggggggg least it is a quick fix and shows the duty cycle of RTTY. New cable went the rest of the contest without a hitch, and much cooler.

I woke up for the early morning shift on Sunday to see Carl in his coat and saying the fire went out.  Started a fire and warmed the place up and Carl went to get his sleep in after working both 20 meter Europe opening and some Japan on 40 meters.

Good runs both Friday and Saturday into Japan and great openings into Africa and Europe. 15 meters opened into Europe sometime in the am on Sunday as when I checked it at 0600 local time it was already going hot and heavy, now this was not over the pole but rather pointed at the lower 48 was hoping to work some east coast and was quite surprised. S9 signals from Europe. Now toward the end of the contest it was a nail biter to reach 1 million point mark and bantering between Carl and I was non stop along with the math flying as to how many more q’s were needed. 20 minutes left in the contest and we hit that mark.

Upgrades that are simple is a movable base for the faceplate to the FT857. As Carl liked to have it in one position and I liked it in another. Making the base for it so that it is semi-mounted would make life easier. 

RTTY Roundup 2016

We Alaskans appear to whine about extremely fickle propagation in virtually every contest.  "I had no idea" is the usual response when a guest op from mid-latitudes completes an hour or a weekend at the operating console under the aurora. They almost invariably come up here thinking they can teach us "bush people" rubes a thing or two about contesting. The visitors go back home shaking their heads. Ham radio is hard in the Far North.

This year's RU played out with some decent results, all things considered.  With radio blackouts, geomagnetic storms, and green lights overhead, this game proved to be more tactical than anything else.  That is, if a band or operating technique started to gain traction, Mother Nature soon concocted another obstacle to force a change.  Just to survive the weekend in the chair of frustration was a major accomplishment.  That said, there were a handful of good (and sometimes strange), brief openings across HF.  At least I didn't get skunked on any band.

Band     QSOs     Pts  Sec   DXC

   3.5       8       8    0    0

     7      21      21    1    1

    14     163     163   10   18

    21     355     355   37    9

    28      14      14    2    3

 Total     561     561

 Score: 45,441  (Op: N1TX Class: SOHP)

Special mention goes to N7XCZ, who provided a little insight into his excitement about Star Wars. Thanks for the chuckle!

Let the Fun Begin Again!

Contest         : CQ World Wide DX Contest

Callsign        : KL2R

Mode            : RTTY

Category        : Multi-2 (M2)

Operators       : N1TX, KL1JP, AL7ID

Band(s)         : All bands (AB)

Class           : High Power (HP)

Zone/State/...  : 01

Locator         : BP64KU

Operating time  : 25h53

 BAND   QSO  CQ DXC DUP S/P  POINTS   AVG 

------------------------------------------

   80     7   3   3   0   5      15  2.14 

   40    76  12  18   2  28     174  2.29 

   20   592  23  63   6  38    1701  2.87 

   15   531  29  72   3  48    1376  2.59 

   10    60  14  16   1  20     143  2.38 

------------------------------------------

TOTAL  1266  81 172  12 139    3409  2.69 

==========================================

         TOTAL SCORE : 1 336 328

This was the first trial run of our full-up M2 configuration.  Although N1TX lost half Friday night troubleshooting a network problem with one of the PCs, and we only had two ops here briefly on Saturday, it was a resounding success. Conditions were phenomenal, and all systems were stable throughout.  Loads of fun.  Welcome to new op John AL7ID!

SO2R and Multi-Two that Much Closer

What little time I spent in the shack recently was centered on getting the second operating position, KL2R-B, ready for a chance to try M2 in WPX RTTY.  Alas, a last-minute PC failure on KL2R-A and repair delayed operation in earnest until Saturday morning.  Dan KL1JP did much search-and-pouncing and rode the 15m opening pretty hard.  While he did that, I managed to get KL2R-B on line and Win-Test viewing the spots and the log.  After Dan left, I cleaned up a few and enjoyed working into Europe on 20m around 0600-0800Z.  Aurora and fluctuating Kp caused some declining conditions commencing Saturday night.  Conditions were never great on Sunday to the Lower 48.

Contest         : CQ World Wide WPX Contest
Callsign        : KL2R
Mode            : RTTY
Category        : Multi Operator - Single Transmitter (MS)
Overlay         : ---
Band(s)         : All bands (AB)
Class           : Low Power (LP)
Zone/State/...  :
Locator         : BP64KU
Operating time  : 14h31

BAND   QSO DUP  PFX  POINTS   AVG
-----------------------------------
  80     8   0    1      34  4.25
  40    14   0   11      60  4.29
  20   293   0  181     654  2.23
  15    61   0   39     141  2.31
  10     0   0    0       0  0.00
-----------------------------------
TOTAL   376   0  232     889  2.36
===================================
      TOTAL SCORE : 206 248

Dupes are not included in QSO counts neither avg calculations

Operators       : N1TX, KL1JP

July NAQP RTTY

Yeah, well, THAT sucked. 98 QSOs in six hours of operating. My objective was 100. 40m never really opened. I was happy to make a few Q's on 15m. The rest were, of course, on 20m. The Kp and aurora were giving KL2R fits. On the DMU-2000, I could watch the signals peak and dip in a rhythm almost sea-sickness-inducing. Bang, bang: make four or five Q's in a spurt, then nothing for 15 minutes. Typical for Fairbanks.

I can understand why all the real contesters beat feet south as soon as they could.