2013-2014 CQWW WPX SSB Results

I haven’t heard anything from anybody about this contest, but I sure hope that some of youse guys that prefer SSB are going to be on the air in this contest. After this one, the next contest in the CTRI Champions competition is the first weekend in May, so I will publish an updated howgozit spreadsheet after I get the results from this contest entered. Please post your results here by Replying to this posting.

73, Ken K3IU
Keeper of the CTRI Champions Leaderboard

Operating W100AW

CTRI CG members;

I went up to HQ in Newington this morning to archive some more QSL cards.  I didn’t have lots today, and I finished before 11:00 AM, so I decided to walk across the parking lot and give W1AW a try.

Joe set me up on 10-meter phone and turned me loose.  I spent about 30 minutes practicing managing a pile-up.  I started by calling CQ about 3 times, and that’s all it took, I had a good pile of operators calling me, and it was difficult to grab a call-sign.

At any rate, after about 30 minutes, I had about 30 stations in the log.  For my first attempt, that felt pretty good.

Now, here’s an opportunity to get some practice:  If you would like to operate W100AW, just show up.  It’s first-come, first-served, but the league would very much like to keep the station on the air as much as possible this year.  The rules they are using are just the same as the regular guest operations; mornings from 10:00 to 12:00, and afternoons from 13:00 to (I think) 15:30.  Joe will patch you from the transceiver of your choice to the appropriate antenna, show you how to turn the rotor, and then let you go to town.  They are using N1MM as the logging program, which most of us are familiar with.

I didn’t work anything exotic, but I sure had fun.  I plan on operating at least once per week between now and our time for the W1AW/1 event.  I might even figure out how to handle a phone pile-up by the end of April!

Give it a try.  You might just enjoy yourself!  73, Mike, K1DM  (if you want to share a ride – let me know, maybe we can work something).

MFJ 259B Analyzer Question

I know several of you also have the MFJ 259B Analyzer.  I have been keeping mine plugged into the charger wall-wart when not in use.  I now find that I get a LOW voltage reading a few seconds after unplugging it.  The voltage is 13+ as long as it is plugged in….but not conducive to field use.  I assume I need new re-chargeable batteries?  Should you leave it plugged in when not in use?  I found if I didn’t, the voltage would read LOW when I went to use it.  What is your experience on how to best have it ready for use?  How long do the batteries continue to take a charge? TNX & 73!

— John, W1XX 

2013-2014 Russian DX Contest Results

Good morning, all:

The little time that I have been able to participate was not too productive. Band conditions seemed to be pretty poor with few stations heard on 10 and 15 meters and not a lot of stations heard on 20 meters. However, there were still quite a few stations sending 4 digit serial numbers.

Please post your results here for this contest.

73, Ken K3IU
Keeper of the CTRI Champions Leaderboard

Antenna Take down

Those of you who were at the meeting.  Great to see some faces.  Sorry we had to be as brief as we were but I’m being pulled a few extra ways lately.  To restate I need help getting my larger antennas down so I can relocate them while I’m stuck in a rental for what I hope to be a short time.

The planned date is Saturday 3.15 8:30am.  But as I stated at the meeting I will take what help I can get when I can get it.  I’m not in the greatest of health and I have to focus my energies on the move.  So any help any time would be greatly appreciated.

My number 401-615-9976 Feel free to call at any time.  If I don’t get to the phone I will call back.

 

Thanks again for any help and I hope to be back on the air soon with brighter days ahead!!

 

73 deJohn ko1h

2013-2014 CTRI Champions Leaderboard thru ARRL DX SSB

Good afternoon to all:

Attached to this posting is the CTRI Champions Leaderboard that is current with information received through the ARRL DX SSB contest. It is a spreadsheet compatible with MS Excel 97-2007 and hopefully you will have no problems opening it. Clicking on the link below should work to open and download the spreadsheet. The next contest in the Champions Series is the Russian DX next weekend followed by the CQWW SSB WPX contest at the end of the month.

2013-2104_CTRI-Champions-Leaderboard

73,
Ken K3IU. Keeper of the Leaderboard

Meeting Notice, March 8, 2014

It’s that time again. If you are familiar with the interactive meeting notice skip down to “Topics“. This is an interactive meeting notice. What, you may ask, is an interactive meeting notice? As the phrase suggests, it is a meeting notice which requires interaction by the readers. For example: we need to have topics for presentation at the meeting; we need presenters; we need volunteers to provide lunch; we need to know who is coming to the meeting so the quantity of lunch portions may be determined, and so on. This post will be updated as interactions (comments) are appended.

Topics

  1. Contest Report
  2. W1AW/1 plans for CT and RI by K1DM/W1AN and W1XX.
  3. KO1H Antenna Party invitation
  4. Matters Arising

Lunch provider: None

Coffee and Drinks by: Coffee, Doughnuts: K1SD

Members who will attend: W1PN, K1SD, K3IU, KS1J, KO1H, W1XX, W1AN, NG1G

Venue: North Kingston Public Library, at 10:00AM

W1AW/1 Operating Tips

As a subscriber to the RTTY list on contesting.com I’ve seen some helpful operating tips I thought we might find useful. The points about sending “UP” frequently and Ed, W0YK’s caution about using digital call stacking are of particular note. I assume at least some of us will want to run RTTY, so these bear some thought. Of course, saying “UP” frequently is a good idea independent of mode. I would even suggest specifying the limits, such as “UP 5-15” or something, and then staying within the limits.

To me, having a TU…NOW…answered by silence is more frustrating than simply working stations one at a time. Most DXpeditions I’ve seen/worked operate this way, as most operators on RTTY are not contesters.

FWIW.

73,

Pat, NG1G

 

Message: 2

Date: Tue, 25 Feb 2014 19:44:41 -0800

From: Hank Garretson <w6sx@nullarrl.net>

To: “James C. Hall, MD” <heartdoc@nullnwtcc.com>

Cc: “rtty@nullcontesting.com” <rtty@nullcontesting.com>

Subject: Re: [RTTY] Being the fox – pileup running

Message-ID:

<CABD27U=3k3GqD+1UPwR4UFzZL6Mbym+gA1Xsdqf4qJ5CMAedGA@nullmail.gmail.com>

Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

 

Yee Haw! You are going to have a blast.

One tip gleaned from my operation as W1AW/6 and from listening to other W1AW/# operations.

When you work split, include UP at the end of every CQ and at the end of each end-of-contact acknowledgement.

Just this evening I was listening to a W1AW/# operator who sometime sent UP and sometime didn’t. It was chaos. Stations calling up, stations calling on his frequency. Even some frequency cops.

Send UP every turnover.

While I’m thinking of it. I tried stacking. It didn’t work well. While stacking works well for me in contests, many of the guys calling W1AW/# are not contesters and are thrown for a loop with w3xxx TU NOW w7abc 599 CA w7abc. I found it was better to work each station one station at a time.

More thinking. Often when running during contests, I send w8aaa 599 CA without a w8aaa at the end. For W1AW/#, I found it useful to always send the call at the end. Likewise during contests, I often send TU W6SX CQ to acknowledge a contact. For W1AW/#, I recommend w5xyz TU W1AW/# CQ (with UP if split).

Diddly Exuberantly,

Hank, W6SX

On Tue, Feb 25, 2014 at 7:29 PM, James C. Hall, MD <heartdoc@nullnwtcc.com>wrote:

 

> Hi All:

>

> I will be W1AW/4 during the 3rd week of March running RTTY. I need a

> little advice. I, like many, use N1MM with MMTTY and 2Tone for

> demodulation during contests. Being the ‘DX’ for this one means

> potentially split operation, something I do routinely to put DX in the

> log when I’m chasing – but not being the DX.

>

> On our DX club reflector, it was suggested that I consider MMVARI and

> use its multi-channel RX and browser. This sounded appealing to me as

> I could use my mouse and just click the QSO’s into the log (using DXpedition mode).

> I’m set up for FSK operation. With a waterfall type operation, I worry

> about not tight enough filters to effectively copy the signal. It

> looks good and I’m reading more on it such as using the Align button

> to get the target signal properly tuned. I’ll use either my Mark V or

> my K3. I do have a P3 panadapter, so that’s another option to line up and click signals.

>

> I plan on starting simplex and using stacking. If it gets too thick,

> I’ll run split. Stacking looked like a good idea for DX’ing until you

> realize that there’s a lot of jumping around on the frequencies in the

> split window

> – probably not practical. My macro responses will be designed for

> speed – probably as short as Ed W0YK’s !

>

> So, what do DXpeditioners et al do ?

>

> 73, Jamie

> WB4YDL

>

> Sent from my iPad

> _______________________________________________

> RTTY mailing list

> RTTY@nullcontesting.com

> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/rtty

>

——————————

 

Message: 3

Date: Tue, 25 Feb 2014 19:56:27 -0800

From: “Ed Muns” <ed@nullw0yk.com>

To: “‘James C. Hall, MD'” <heartdoc@nullnwtcc.com>

Cc: rtty@nullcontesting.com

Subject: Re: [RTTY] Being the fox – pileup running

Message-ID: <C215710444A0453EA2A4EA8DF9230F1F@h81420t>

Content-Type: text/plain;            charset=”us-ascii”

 

The DXpeditions I’m familiar with use a standard logger, usually N1MM Logger, with MMTTY or, lately, 2Tone.  I would stick to that basic setup.

Setting up multiple decoders will reduce the number of repeats required, but that may not be a big enough factor to worry about.  If two decoders, I’d use MMTTY Standard Profile and 2Tone Normal.  If 3, I’d add the DXP38 because it decodes off-frequency callers faster (or you’ll pick up calls faster as you tune through a pile-up).  Beyond 3 decoders, I’d do multiple instances of 2Tone with Flutter, Selective, etc. settings.

If you operate split and have the sub-RX in the K3, I would use that radio so you can have a DI window on both your TX and RX frequencies.  As you note, the P3 will be very helpful to monitor multiple stations calling.

Call stacking will speed things up a bit, so that’s very useful if you’re comfortable with it and adept at running it.  However, about 40% of the time I use it in contests, I get silence in return, or else the guy I just sent a report to simply sends his callsign 3-4 times again.  Outside a contest, this percentage may rise.  The general public of casual ops may not yet be ready for call stacking and therefore it could slow you down!

I can’t imagine the W1AW/4 pile-ups will be any greater than the P49X ones and the plan above has worked well there.

Ed W0YK

 

2014 ARRL DX SSB Contest Results

It is Saturday morning at 0630 local and already 10 meters is wide open and almost wall-to-wall. Checking 15 and 20 meter bands shows the same thing. My poor little K2 is having trouble discriminating between the signals. My ears are having the same problem. 🙂   Sounds like conditions are great for this contest and I hope that there are many of you out there who are participating.

Please post your results here so that I can include them in the CTRI Champions competition leaderboard.

73, Ken Wagner K3IU, Keeper of the Leaderboard