Texas QSO Party - 2023
Call: W5CT
Operator(s): K5PI W5MJ W9MC
Station: W5CT
Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP
QTH: TX
Operating Time (hrs): 18
Summary:
Band CW Qs Ph Qs Dig Qs
----------------------------
160:
80: 45
40: 586 6
20: 1153 19
15: 208 5
10:
6:
2:
UHF:
----------------------------
Total: 1992 30 0 Mults = 111 Total Score = 704,329
Club: Central Texas DX and Contest Club
Comments:
This was the 10th multi-op mobile entry for W5MJ and me. Thanks again to Mike
W9MC for an excellent job behind the wheel!
We got a pretty late start getting Madison's 2021 Chevy Traverse ready this year
and so had some mighty hot work days in the couple weeks leading up the event.
We decided to try the Hi-Q 3-80 that Madison picked up at Belton this year and
it was a champ! It was our 40M antenna. We use Madison's trusty Tarheel 100A
as the other antenna, and it also worked very well on 15, 20, and 80. We have
two TS-480HX (200W) rigs, but decided to run them at 100W this year to take it a
little easier on the alternator. We brought along a 100Ah LiPO4 battery (thanks
K5TR) as a backup but used it mostly to power the two laptops.
Activity seemed down a bit this year but built as the weekend wore on.
Conditions were significantly better on Sunday with some very nice pileups. It
was GREAT to have 15M this year. We were on 15 from all but 8 of our counties.
CW always seems like a better mode for mobile but we do try SSB for county mults
on 40 and to squeeze out a few more Qs from the larger counties.
Inter-station interference was not a big issue this year. The 40M transmitter
could always be heard on 20, but by running higher in the band on 40 and lower
on 20, it was not too bad.
We always seem to have RFI trouble of one sort or another, but Madison's back
seat 40M rig had very little this year! My front seat setup got me locked up
quite a few times. Sorry if I disappeared in mid-QSO. We've gotten away from
using paddles (hard to use on bumpy roads), but I sure wished I had them if only
to send a "TU" now and then!
Our new route was fun and our new Navigation system worked well. We got some
tips from AD4EB (thanks Jim!) and decided to use a Garmin dash GPS along with
the Garmin BaseCamp software to set up our route. The only snag was when we
"missed" our waypoints. The tolerance seemed pretty tight so if, for
example, the waypoint marker had been dropped on the access road and we were on
the freeway the GPS would tell us to make U-turns! We quickly found the
"skip waypoint" button and went on our merry way. Unfortunately, we
missed Tyler county (sorry, HA9RE). It was on a county line stop that didn't
get marked on our backup paper directions. For backup navigation, we ran our
old friend Microsoft Streets and Trips on one computer and it was handy a number
of times, especially on Sunday when we went back through the same counties a
couple times.
Thanks for all the Qs and for your patience. Sometimes we encounter local noise
or go down a hill that causes QSB. And sometimes, it's just danged hard to type
while bouncing down the road!
See you next year!
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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