September 2005

Report

Score: 41,820! A new record for me.
236 QSO's! also a new record for me.
75 Microwave QSO's, another new record for me!
Band conditions: Normal. No I did not hear any Aurora or ducting.

This was the first contest I actually enjoyed this year! It started out with on the air testing with KJ1K the day before I left. I discovered my 3456 transverter had a problem. I found this problem and fixed it in only 3hours. I had not even properly tested it. I left for the contest minutes later only an hour late. I initially decided this was not going to be a good contest. On the bright side I discovered PA gas prices were $2.89! The Weather was also extremely good. Might as well enjoy my trip. FN10 was my first stop. Not a great view but I worked some great contacts. New stations like K3TUF to 3ghz surprised me. Yea 3ghz was working! Maybe things are looking good? I had 75 microwave QSO's! Normally I only work 25 but I did make 50 contacts once before when I tried to schedule every minute on microwaves. I didn't go crazy this time and I tripled my normal success rate on the microwaves. I had 236 total QSO's. I had no failures during the contest and I did not hurt myself. No flat tires. No problems at all. Conditions were consistent, in other words, 5g was weaker than 3g unlike June where 5g was much better than any other band. No enhancement for microwaves but they were pretty much the same all through the contest. Maybe just a little better Sunday Morning after dawn. This was a nice change for me. June and August were a mess. I also got 5 hours of sleep this time rather than just 4! I discovered that N2NK and K3EAR both have fantastic microwave abilities! I made a new record score of 41,820. Most distant microwave contacts: 5.7ghz: W2SZ 260miles, 3.4ghz: W2SZ 277 miles. A Couple more 200+ mile microwave contacts: 2.3ghz: K1TEO 257miles FN31 (FN01)and 2.3ghz: K3EAR 256miles FM19 (FN02).
For more details of my adventure including logs, pictures, gas mileage :-) and other tidbits see my web site  http://www.ke3ht.org/rover/sep2005.

9/20/05 addendum:

I found some notes I took during the contest that I omitted from my first report. They are worth telling. All Sunday Morning stuff.

One surprise at FN11 was hearing W2SZ calling CQ on 903.1 at 260miles! I was pointing south towards K8GP. Nice signals with W2SZ being East of me! I worked W2SZ on 903 and 1.2 but they called me on 2.4g on voice but my 2.4g amp was not warmed up yet and they went away in the 5 minutes it takes to heat a TWT. I already had a sched but I had so much activity I messed it up. When I was working W2SZ's 903 station I was supposed to be working W2SZ 2.4g. So I messed up. I was going to call W2SZ on 222 and re-sched but I heard K3EAR on 6m so I worked them up to and including 5ghz with record speed for me! They were great! At the end of my 5ghz contact with K3EAR I had an even bigger surprise!

MY biggest surprise this contest was hearing W2SZ call me on 5ghz after I got done working K3EAR on 5ghz! I was pointed at FM19 (south)! My dish was not pointing anywhere near W2SZ (east)! I had my 903-1.2-2.4 feed in the dish! Then I realized I just worked K3EAR on the wrong feed!

FN02 I was hearing W2SZ nice and clear at 249 miles. Better than most contests. Unfortunately they did not hear me on 5ghz. 11watts out into the correct feed and on frequency. I called W2SZ on 222 and told them we were on the same freq and all of a sudden the signal went up +3db! Pow! We made contact? Did W2SZ peak the dish? I wonder what changed? I had peaked the dish a few times minutes earlier but not after the 222 liaison.

In FN12 I heard KJ1K/R in SNJ talking to K1TEO in FN31 on 2m. Both sides of the conversation. They could not hear me though. Still it was pretty neat to hear such a conversation! I normally do not hear many rovers.

,,,Tim