2015 CQ WW CW Contest, K5ZD
Summary
Call: K5ZD Class: SOAB(A) HP Operating Time (hrs): 45 Band QSOs Zones Countries ------------------------------ 160: 136 17 65 80: 731 29 99 40: 1199 38 130 20: 1308 38 138 15: 1173 34 136 10: 234 24 88 ------------------------------ Total: 4781 180 656 Total Score = 11,607,024 Club: Yankee Clipper Contest Club
Operation
I appreciate (and envy) everyone who made the choice to spend time with family over the holiday weekend. My family has learned that it is better for all of us to let me spend time locked in the radio room.
Station hardware was ready. Op was mostly ready. Decided on doing Assisted again because it was so much fun before and I love chasing mults.
40m was definitely the band to start on. I didn’t even try to find a run frequency – just tuned up the band calling people.
Low bands were awesome both nights – able to work Europe on 160 the first night. Some good runs on 80m when I could find a clear spot.
Amazing how late 40m stays open after European sunrise – was working stations more than 3 hours after their sunrise time.
Took a 1 hour nap the first night from 1000-1115. Figured if I didn’t sleep then I was going to be loopy later in the day. 20m was already open when I woke up. Moved to 15m at 1236z and stayed on 21012 for the next 5 hours straight! Never had that much run time on one frequency before. Best 60 minutes was 216 QSOs. I was able to pick up lots of mults on 10m, but it never sounded good enough to abandon the rate on 15m.
Had a moment of panic around 2130z when it appeared I lost my antenna switching. Was running on 40m and trying to diagnose the problem. Finally decided it was in the relays that gave access to the Tribander. Swapped some coax to go around the relays and everything was working again — but no more quick switching to the South antenna.
By now I was totally locked into the contest. Had about 5.8 million at the halfway point (around 2800 QSOs). No run time on 10 meters so was really hoping it would open the second day.
Came out to see what my family had for dinner. Ate some Thanksgiving left overs and then was back at it. Finally decided on a quick nap from 0350-0445z while rates were slow. Feels weird when you try to wake up in the middle of a sleep cycle.
Good runs on 80 meters. Band was super quiet and open very well. Was even able to get a few answers to CQs on 160m.
Took another sleep from 0940-1115z. Rest of the contest was a blur. Since I had spent so much time on 15m on Saturday, I stayed on 20m and worked lots of deep Russians. This also gave me a chance to chase mults on 15m (I only had 75 countries on 15m). Really struggled to find a good run frequency on 15m. The band was packed!
Around 1530z, the Europeans on 10m started to get loud. I did a slow run there. Band was actually quite good, but not much activity. Was able to CQ and get answers until 1630z. It was nice to get one last bit out of 10 meters before it just becomes a memory.
Things started to get really slow around 1800z. Nothing to do but keep CQing on 20m while tuning 10 and 15. Went to 40m at 2030z and was able to work VK6LW and AH0K on LP! 40m was great all the way to the end.
Spent last hour tuning around on 80m. Busted the SU90IARU split pileup on the first call. I didn’t really expect to have a chance. Then one called 3V8SS and minute later. Got a “?” out of 4L5P, but no QSO. Just couldn’t find country 100 on 80m.
Comments
My station does not feel loud on 40 or 160m. I seemed to spend a lot of time waiting my turn on those bands. Same when calling stations to the South on 10 and 15. There were a few pileups I could never get through – like HR2J on 10m.
SH5 reports 275 second radio QSOs. I think it was more than that.
I was spotted on Sunday as KH8B. It is amazing how many people who should know better (and know how to copy CW) were calling me. Even with the cluster you have to LISTEN!!
Wide signals are a real problem. If one of the real loud and real wide stations sits down next to you, it is impossible to copy through the clicks. I love having a panadapter to see the band, but it pains me to see how many signals are 1-5 Khz wide. This and excess power are ruining CW contesting.
I did record the entire contest. May try to get the recordings up on the web site when I find time.
Yes, Skimmer and the RBN have changed contesting. It sure is fun to have that much information about what is happening across all bands. Becomes an information management challenge. I struggled to get a good spot filter set up. Thanks to W1VE and WC2L for use of their clusters.
Thanks to everyone who makes this the best contest of the year. It takes two to make a QSO so wouldn’t be the same without so much activity and DXpeditions from all parts of the world. Thank you all!
Station
K3 + Alpha 76CA K3 + AL-1500 160m: Ground plane, Shunt fed tower 80m: 4 square 40m: 40-2CD @ 33m 20m: 205CA/205CA @ 30m/15m 15m: 155CA/155CA @ 20m/10m 10m: 6/4/4 @ 30m/20m/10m Mult: TH7DXX @ 10m (mostly south)
Numbers
By Continent
160M 80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total %
SA 5 16 32 31 36 48 168 3.5
AF 6 14 20 23 22 21 106 2.2
OC 1 4 20 18 16 4 63 1.3
AS 1 11 40 128 52 1 233 4.9
EU 92 622 1012 1045 984 117 3872 81.0
NA 31 64 75 63 63 43 339 7.1
Rates (QSO/ZN+DX)
Hour 160M 80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total Cumm Off 0000Z --+-- --+-- 68/59 48/56 --+-- --+-- 116/115 116/115 0100Z - 3/4 100/14 19/13 - - 122/31 238/146 0200Z - 109/44 14/9 - - - 123/53 361/199 0300Z - 106/17 16/14 - - - 122/31 483/230 0400Z 41/33 25/1 34/10 - - - 100/44 583/274 0500Z 15/14 82/6 32/5 - - - 129/25 712/299 0600Z 11/7 75/23 9/3 3/2 - - 98/35 810/334 0700Z 2/2 12/1 81/12 - - - 95/15 905/349 0800Z 3/1 10/11 79/2 1/0 --+-- --+-- 93/14 998/363 0900Z - 4/1 62/14 1/1 - - 67/16 1065/379 1000Z - - - - - - 0/0 1065/379 60 1100Z - 1/0 8/0 70/28 - - 79/28 1144/407 23 1200Z - - - 109/15 79/28 - 188/43 1332/450 1300Z - - - 8/9 191/18 14/18 213/45 1545/495 1400Z - - - - 169/7 28/24 197/31 1742/526 1500Z - - - - 142/2 19/12 161/14 1903/540 1600Z --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- 130/2 19/18 149/20 2052/560 1700Z - - - 39/14 75/10 13/9 127/33 2179/593 1800Z - - - 150/3 28/27 - 178/30 2357/623 1900Z - - - 83/5 25/18 - 108/23 2465/646 2000Z - - 95/2 5/1 8/7 12/9 120/19 2585/665 2100Z - - 98/1 3/3 7/4 - 108/8 2693/673 2200Z - - 83/1 - 26/5 - 109/6 2802/679 2300Z - 3/6 39/4 11/7 8/1 - 61/18 2863/697 0000Z --+-- 44/7 19/4 --+-- --+-- --+-- 63/11 2926/708 0100Z 12/7 5/0 - 1/0 - - 18/7 2944/715 20 0200Z 3/1 15/0 1/0 30/2 - - 49/3 2993/718 0300Z - 29/1 4/0 18/3 - - 51/4 3044/722 0400Z - - - 6/4 - - 6/4 3050/726 0500Z 45/13 - 2/0 3/1 - - 50/14 3100/740 0600Z - 95/0 8/0 - - - 103/0 3203/740 0700Z - 80/2 9/0 - - - 89/2 3292/742 0800Z 2/3 7/0 54/0 46/0 --+-- --+-- 109/3 3401/745 0900Z - 2/0 7/4 39/1 - - 48/5 3449/750 21 1000Z - - - - - - 0/0 3449/750 60 1100Z - - 1/0 98/0 - - 99/0 3548/750 22 1200Z - - 3/5 128/2 10/9 - 141/16 3689/766 1300Z - - - 93/0 30/12 - 123/12 3812/778 1400Z - - - 34/1 90/0 2/1 126/2 3938/780 1500Z - - - - 46/10 44/8 90/18 4028/798 1600Z --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- 48/2 47/12 95/14 4123/812 1700Z - - - 96/1 17/2 - 113/3 4236/815 1800Z - - - 93/1 1/1 21/0 115/2 4351/817 1900Z - - - 58/2 5/2 13/0 76/4 4427/821 2000Z - - 29/2 15/1 19/1 - 63/4 4490/825 2100Z - - 96/0 - 5/1 2/1 103/2 4593/827 2200Z - 4/4 67/3 - 14/1 - 85/8 4678/835 2300Z 2/1 20/0 81/0 - - - 103/1 4781/836 Total:136/82 731/128 1199/168 1308/176 1173/170 234/112
36 Stations worked on 6 bands
4O3A 9A1A CN2AA CR2X CR3L D4C DF0HQ DL0CS DL0GL DL0UM E7DX EI7M G5O II9P KP3Z LZ9W OL3Z OL4A OM7M OP4K P33W P40L PI4CC PJ2T PJ4A PJ4Q PZ5W TF2CW TI5W TM6M V26K V47T VE2IM VE9AA ZD8W ZF2MJ
54 worked on 5 bands