2015 ARRL RTTY Roundup
ARRL RTTY Roundup Call: K5ZD Operator(s): K5ZD Station: K5ZD Class: Single Op HP QTH: W1 Operating Time (hrs): 15.7 Radios: SO2R Summary: Band QSOs ------------ 80: 232 40: 430 20: 293 15: 477 10: 224 ------------ Total: 1656 State/Prov = 57 Countries = 61 Total Score = 195,408 Club: Yankee Clipper Contest Club
Comments:
That was fun! Almost like playing a video game when running on two bands at the same time.
Running on two bands at the same time is a blast. When you get a good stream of callers on both radios that don’t send too long and can be copied on the first pass, it is a non-stop adventure. Saw the last 10 rate meter get to about 230 at one point. Hard to stay there.
Worked all USA states except HI and VT within the first 6 hours. Found HI, VT, and DC on Sunday. DX multipliers are just a matter of calling CQ as much as possible and tuning on the second radio.
Activity was lumpy. When it was good, it was great. But, during the football games it would slow a bit. Then on Sunday afternoon the Europeans seemed to pack up and disappear. But, the USA activity was good then. I was running on 15m and working very short skip (even into PA, VA, and OH). It sounded exactly like 40m, which I was tuning at the same time. All part of the variability that makes radiosport so endlessly fascinating.
Found a few problems in the station. SixPak seems to be out on 80m on the Radio B side. Also the relays to switch to the South TH7 have failed on Radio A.
No power line noise all weekend. We had cold at the start, then an inch of snow, then rain, then warm fog. That suppressed all the noises. Kept having to turn the volume up to make sure I was listening to a radio.
I think I have figured out how to get WriteLog and the MicroHam MK2R+ working for all modes. This was the test for RTTY. Had one problem on Sunday afternoon where CQing on 10m would crash the USB interface in the computer and require a reboot to get the keyboard working again. Never saw that before. Could be because the MK2R+ is connected by USB cable. Or could be something else…
Breakdown by Continent:
80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total %
NA 204 261 179 293 92 1029 62.1
OC 0 0 1 1 2 4 0.2
EU 28 168 104 136 129 565 34.1
AF 0 0 1 1 0 2 0.1
SA 0 1 4 5 1 11 0.7
AS 0 0 4 41 0 45 2.7
Rates:
QSO/Sta+Prov+Dx by hour and band Hour 80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total Cumm Off 1800Z - - - 32/13 22/15 54/28 54/28 1900Z - - 53/21 59/14 9/1 121/36 175/64 2000Z - - 66/4 46/5 - 112/9 287/73 2100Z - 77/8 19/1 4/0 - 100/9 387/82 2200Z - 50/4 - 65/2 - 115/6 502/88 2300Z - 14/0 - 11/0 - 25/0 527/88 50 0000Z --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- 0/0 527/88 60 0100Z 27/1 29/0 8/2 - - 64/3 591/91 14 0200Z 91/1 80/0 - - - 171/1 762/92 0300Z - 1/0 - - - 1/0 763/92 58 0400Z 19/0 26/2 - - - 45/2 808/94 34 0500Z 48/0 56/4 - - - 104/4 912/98 0600Z 23/0 12/1 - - - 35/1 947/99 23 0700Z - - - - - 0/0 947/99 60 0800Z --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- 0/0 947/99 60 0900Z - - - - - 0/0 947/99 60 1000Z - - - - - 0/0 947/99 60 1100Z - - - - - 0/0 947/99 60 1200Z 24/1 26/0 36/1 - - 86/2 1033/101 5 1300Z - 6/0 18/1 64/1 52/3 140/5 1173/106 1400Z - - - 68/1 73/0 141/1 1314/107 1500Z - - - 26/1 16/1 42/2 1356/109 37 1600Z --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- 0/0 1356/109 60 1700Z - - - - - 0/0 1356/109 60 1800Z - - - - - 0/0 1356/109 60 1900Z - - 32/2 24/3 2/0 58/5 1414/114 23 2000Z - - 24/1 12/0 26/1 62/2 1476/116 2100Z - 32/0 31/1 - 24/0 87/1 1563/117 2200Z - 21/0 6/1 66/0 - 93/1 1656/118 2300Z - - - - - 0/0 1656/118 60 Total: 232/3 430/19 293/35 477/40 224/21
New personal best 176 QSOs in 60 minutes.
Worked on 5 bands: AA5AU K6ND NT0F OL8M