What a week! This certainly was NOT a repeat of last years WPX
SSB endeavor. While the days prior to the contest went without a
hitch,the first day of the contest was full of
anxiety,despair,and sheer panic.Senor Murphy is alive and well.
The first wave of operators for the KP4XS M/M WPX SSB
Operation arrived a full week before the contest.This allowed us
plenty of time to set the station up at a casual pace,enjoy the
local
cuisine, get in a few days at the beach and do a little
sightseeing.
I met Bruce,AA6KX, in Miami and both of us met Terry,K3JT, and
Goran, S55OO in San Juan early Friday evening. This was an event
in itself since neither one of us had ever met the other and
had no idea what to look for. The only clue I had was on Goran
who had sent me a scanned photo over the Internet a few days
before
the trip.We all managed to find each other with little
difficulty.
The "minivan" we rented wasn't really a minivan at all but
turned out
to be a cross between a small station wagon and a Mini-Mini van.
Somehow we managed to fit a Clipperton L, an Alpha 87 plus
transformer
, an FT990, an Ic-740,and 4 or 5 suitcases loaded with clothes
and
other goodies into the back of this thing and we were off on our
cross
island drive to Cabo Rojo.We got most of the station assembled
inside
and got the elevated 40m ground plane,a 40m inverted vee,and an
80m USA
dipole up in the air on Saturday. On Sunday we raised the 15m
yagi,
another 80m dipole for Europe and the 160m dipole up and tested.
We kept in touch with Tyler,KF3P, on 80 meters SSB at night
just
in case we needed some forgotten items and to see if the
Force-12
3 element yagi had arrived. We had assembled the tribander for
20m
but didn't want to get it up in the air since we would have
preferred
a monobander on 20. All three of the others kept themselves
quite busy
on the bands throughout the weeknights on 40,80, and 160m CW.
We were getting great signal reports from all over and were
quite happy
with the setup at that time. The only problem that popped up was
the
Alpha 87 amp.It kept faulting out due to low line voltage. The
QTH only
has a 100 amp service panel and is fed by a 220 vac main that
extends
over the valley below us and feeds 5-10 houses before it dead
ends at
the site.Bruce restrapped the amp for 220 vac instead of 240vac
and
did not have a reocurrence of the problem the rest of the trip.
The local power company is in the process of upgrading
the A/C
lines and installing the stepdown transformer at the QTH.
Due to the Present A/C problem it was impossible to take hot
showers,
run legal power on all bands at once,turn on all the station
lights,
or even use the TV set upstairs during the contest. It was a
challenge
for sure.
Tyler,KF3P, arrived on Wednesday with his
Titan,Ft1000MP,
and the Force 12 20m, 3 element yagi!We were ready for Thursday!
Thursday was not a good day. While raising the 20m yagi
on its 30 foot pushup mast something went awry and we wound up
with
numerous bends in the mast. It took a good amount of tension on
the
guy ropes to get the yagi parallel to the ground but we finally
managed to get it done. While testing the yagi and Titan amp we
cooked the most important piece of equipment in the shack;the
20m
band pass filter! Panic set in as I envisioned massive
interstation
interference from the band that would be open the most. I
quickly
set off to Mayaguez in search of the correct value caps which
turned
out to be an effort in futility.We only had 30 hours to go
before the
start of the contest and desperately needed parts to fix the
filter.
I decided to call I.C.E. to explain our predicament and was
extremely
pleased when the I.C.E. sales guy said,"no problem". Not only
did they Overnight us the 4 caps. via U.P.S. but they sent them
to us
only for the cost of shipping. Now that's GREAT customer
service.
The 5 of us were very impressed with I.C.E's responsiveness and
will do businness with them in the future!
Friday was a better day but not by much. Terry,WD8ISK, and
Brian,
ND3F,arrived and so did the replacement caps. ISK replaced the
caps.,
rewound a new coil and used the MFJ antenna analyzer to tune the
thing
the best he could for use on 20 meters. Ahhh,those MFJ and Autek
SWR analyzers;the greatest thing since sliced bread! Don't leave
home without em'! We now had the 10m yagi, a pair of receiving
EWES, and all the station grounds done and we were ready to
contest.
Guess what happens next? Yep. We lost all A/C power as did all
the
surrounding area in Cabo Rojo. The winds had kicked up and
downed a
few power lines. My Mother told me they hadn't lost power in
months.
It figures that we would lose power 5 hours before the test.
I set off again for town to find out how long we would be
without
power but never got a straight answer. The time was now 3PM
local
and the contest started at 8PM. Five hours for them to get it
fixed.
At 6 PM AA6KX pointed out towards the window and Said
excitedly,"
Hey Look!" I looked but couldn't figure out what he wanted me to
look
at. I thought he was pointing at a Buzzard or a U.F.O. or
something
until the rest of the ops chimed in,"at the light dummy!" Power
had
been restored! What else could go wrong I wondered?
20 meters was the place to be at the start. Tyler had
a 206
hour that first hour on 20. Fifteen was dead an hour into the
contest
as was ten. WD8ISK and me decided to get a little shuteye and
left
around 10:30 pm. Little did we know what awaited us on Saturday
morning.
was
sitting on a bed and we were informed that it had quit
transmitting.
A rig swap was done during the night which cost about an
hours time on 80 meters. WD8ISK wasted no time in isolating an
open
power supply filter cap(100pf 500WVDC). I sat down at my 15m
position
waiting for the band to spring to life resigned to the fact that
I
would probably have to go to Mayaguez again during prime 15m
time to search for a filter cap. I decided to let S55OO take
over
so I could get to Mayaguez again and hopefully find the cap.
We got lucky! Very lucky! I found two German made caps with an
almost identical footprint as the originals and got them back to
ISK who installed them in the 830 and Bingo,power out!
I got back to 15 and still listened to a near dead band. Finally
at 1800 it sprang to life with strong USA Signals. 15 was good
for about the next 4 hours and then died a slow agonizing death.
The worst part of my 15m stint was listening to LU4FM and other
LU's,ZW0Y,and HC8A running Europe in the morning,and USA/ JApan
in the evening and into the night while I couldn't hear a thing.
It was that kind of contest on 10 and 15 meters. The
Argentinians
had it made on those bands. All I could do was listen as they
quickly
increased their numbers on those bands and cross my fingers that
something would happen for us on 10 and 15. It never did.
At some point during the USA run the Icom 740
got a little too hot and the thermal shutdown protection circuit
kicked in. Instead of waiting for the rig to cool down I grabbed
the
TS-830 and did another rig swap. In the process of tuning up the
830 we managed to burn up the 15m bandpass filter! Next time
I'll
make sure to remove the BPF before tuning up a tube type rig.
Another plus for solid state rigs. S55OO had another stint on
15m
while I got the 740 ready to go on 80 meters.
The low band guys had their share of problems with
inter-station interference and RF problems with the receive
antennas
due to their proximity to the transmit antennas. I had my share
of RF
burns this contest from picking up the ends of coax while
someone was
transmitting on another antenna. Tyler and ND3F spent a few
hours
on early Sunday morning moving the ewes to a "safer" location.
Now I want to tell to you about S55OO. This young
man
of 21 from Slovenia did yeoman's duty throughout the
contest.This
guy knows the ropes better than many that I have known. He is
persistent,has a good command of the English language,and knows
the Ins and outs of each band. Best of all, he had lots of
Multi Multi experience from S50C.He is the kind of op that you
can
leave alone knowing full well that the band he is on is in good
hands. He already knows that he has an open invitation to return
each
year to operate from KP4XS M/M.
The rest of the test went by uneventful except for the
persistent low A/C line voltage which,at times, would dip to
90 Volts A/C.
Here are some interesting notes from our M/M
effort:
1- AA4S was the only station in the world to work us on all 6
bands.
I knew it would be hard to do it especially on 10 and 160.
10 meters was difficult for us due to the interstation crud.
This
made it hard to hear the weak scatter signals. I have gotten
many reports of being heard on 10 but not hearing. Things will
be better next year!
2-The Force 12 3 element 20m yagi was a snap to assemble and
performed great! KF3P Loved the way it performed. It will
be a great addition to the KP4XS M/M WPX SSB effort.
3-My Mom always was,still is,and always will be, a good sport
and a
GREAT cook! Just ask the guys about the Octopus in Garlic she
makes.
4- If you ever get to Boqueron,Puerto Rico please stop by the
"Le Bistro" bar. It is owned by a German expat. named Hans. Tell
him
Ken sent you and order the margarita! You won't be sorry.
5- Conditions sucked for most of the contest. The QSO total was
down
over 1k compare to last year and the score was 7 meg less.
6- Apparently the place to be was anywhere South of the Equator.
7-We had to all stop transmitting when the photosensor that
turns the
street light kicked in and tried to jump start the light. When
that
thing came on every band had about 10 minutes of 20 over s9
noise.
With all the stations transmitting at the same time the voltage
was low enough that there wasn't enough to turn on the light.
At that rate the noise could have stayed forever.The only remedy
was to all stop transmitting and let the streetlight get the
juice
it needed to fully light.
8-Our antennas,supports,and feedlines had to be strung up high
enough
to keep the roaming cattle from pulling it down with their
horns.We spent much time shooing away those pains in a rump
roasts!
9- Don't ever invite me over to operate after I have eaten Rice
and Beans! Nuff Said!
Here is our operator and equipment list followed by
the score and breakdown.
10m-WD8ISK FT990/IC736 Homebrew 3cx800 600 watts, 3 el yagi at
25 feet.
15m-KP4XS IC740/TS830 SB220 800watts 3 el yagi at 30 feet
20m-KF3P FT1000mp,Titan 700 watts, 3 element Force 12 Yagi.
40m-AA6KX FT990,Alpha 87A 1kw, Ground plane,inv vee to EU.
80m-K3JT IC740/TS830 Clipperton L at 800 watts, dipole to USA
and EU
160m-ND3F FT990,AL811A Amp at 450 watts and dipole at 70 feet to
USA
On all bands ,all rigs,and all amps, Goran,S55OO to whom I
cannot
express enough thanks and appreciation for an excellent job!
Band QSOS MULTS
10 181 48
15 1638 215
20 2644 464
40 1039 225
80 541 101
160 125 31
------------------------
325 6168 1084
Claimed score- 19,611,728
Category M/M
Continent- North America
QTH Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico
Thanks for the QSO Points and prefixes and see you all
next year! 73 Ken and the gang at KP4XS M/M WPX SSB 96
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