ARRL 10-Meter Contest - 2023
Call: W6YX
Operator(s): N7MH
Station: W6YX
Class: SO Mixed Unlimited HP
QTH: Stanford
Operating Time (hrs): 25
OpMode: SO2R
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
CW: 1376 135
SSB: 1064 105
-------------------
Total: 2440 240 Total Score = 1,831,680
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Comments:
This year almost everything was in working order and I didn't have any
interruptions from family matters or power outages.
On Friday evening the band closed to Asia after just over an hour. It remained
open to Oceania but I'd worked everyone spotted on CW and tried moving to SSB. I
found my headset mike wasn't working. After replacing the headset with no change
I realized that the SO2R box cabling to that K3 was damaged. I switched to the
other K3 and used it as my Run radio for both modes, with the second K3 used for
working spots on CW.
After switching back and forth between CW and SSB, working the dwindling locals,
the rate slowed to single digits and I decided to head for home just after
0430. Most years I stay until after 0600 but was disappointed this year that
the common evening Es openings, usually first to CO/NM/AZ, then often to include
much of the US, didn't happen.
Arriving back at 1400Z to an empty band it started showing life and KY7M was
worked at 1409 but nothing more until W2RQ at 1433. Signals were fading in and
out and many were working a stream of EU callers and ignoring my calls. Finally
just before 1500 signals across the band were strong and I began running while
trying to work DX mults on the second radio. MM2N was the first EU caller but
the only other EU worked on Saturday were G, CT and EA.
By the time I QSYed to SSB there were no workable EU. I checked on all the
spotted mults before and after switching modes but avoided pileups and
occasionally could hear the needed mult underneath a much stronger signal on the
same frequency. I never worked 4U1UN because they either couldn't be heard or
were being covered up by a loud station.
The first JA was worked at 2200 on CW and after 10 minutes I switched to SSB but
the rate to Asia was slow so I split power between one Yagi beaming Asia and
another beaming the US. Asia closed Saturday just before 0100 but I worked one
more JA at almost 0200 while beaming ZL, likely on a skew path. After 0200 rates
dropped to single digits so I went home at 0230. I checked the W6YX skimmer from
home but nothing new appeared.
I arrived Sunday morning at 1400 and was surprised to see one persistent signal
on the panadapter which was W2RQ. In his report he mentions his antenna was
stuck pointing west. He was the strongest signal on the band until some of the
locals appeared and began CQing.
After pouncing on a few spots in the Americas I began running through the spots
of Europeans, beaming different directions in the southeast. As happened last
year I was rewarded by working LN8W at 1450, beaming 150 degrees. I then moved
up to a clear spot high in the band where I would hopefully be heard and CQed in
that direction. I worked an OK, then YT3X called but could not complete the QSO.
I clicked on a few more EU spots but couldn't be heard over east coast callers.
Then I returned to my run frequency and had several eastern EU call, including
YT3X. Several repeats of numbers were needed as the signals had a noisy auroral
distortion. Hopefully I copied them correctly in the end.
I knew the EU opening was likely to be short so I began calling EU mults and
eventually signals were much cleaner and stronger on the direct path. After
working those I could hear I switched to SSB to try to pick up EU mults there.
The band had already closed to eastern EU so I was only able to work a few
western EU mults.
When I'd worked the workable EU mults I went back to running, alternating CW and
SSB. I still needed several states, roughly following the Rocky Mountains: NM,
CO, WY, ID on both modes and MT and AZ on SSB. I had a few call me and others
were finally hearable and workable, but in the end I never worked WY on CW and
missed CO, NM and MT on SSB. I also missed DC on SSB, NU and NT on both modes,
and LB and NF on SSB.
In the early afternoon I power-split between the US and South America and as on
Saturday when the band opened to Asia it was between the US and Asia. Sometime
in the mid-afternoon signals from one part of the US became very loud, S9+40 or
more. It may have been parts of W9 and W4. My AGC settings weren't enough to
deal with this and I had to turn down the gain when someone from this area
called.
Thanks for all the Qs.
73,
-Mike, N7MH
Cabrillo Statistics (Version 10g) by K5KA & N6TV
http://bit.ly/cabstat [Extract modified to show CW/SSB breakdown]
The best 60 minute rate was 205/hour from 1734 to 1833
The best 30 minute rate was 228/hour from 2008 to 2037
The best 10 minute rate was 258/hour from 1740 to 1749
The best 1 minute rates were:
6 QSOs/minute 5 times.
5 QSOs/minute 34 times.
4 QSOs/minute 126 times.
3 QSOs/minute 235 times.
2 QSOs/minute 330 times.
1 QSOs/minute 371 times.
--- C o n t i n e n t S u m m a r y ---
-----------------------------------------
CW SSB Total Pct
-----------------------------------------
North America 1003 930 1933 79.2
South America 35 45 80 3.3
Europe 37 18 55 2.3
Asia 271 55 326 13.4
Africa 7 3 10 0.4
Oceania 23 13 36 1.5
-----------------------------------------
Total 1376 1064 2440
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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