[AK-VHF] January VHF Contest vs NFC Championship

Mon Jan 20 03:41:11 EST 2014

Shannon,

January often is the worst because winter wx is not conducive to 
rovering, though we have had good turn-out by rovers in January other 
years.  I do not blame anyone for not driving up to Chugach SP this 
weekend.  Probably need four wheels all chained up and a lot of luck 
to stay on that steep icy grade.

One of the reasons the Tuesday night net is successful is dedicated 
Net Controllers and good relay stations that enable check in from 
stations that are more marginal.  This year we were missing KL6M and 
KL4E in the contest who both assist a lot of contacts and drum up 
interest beforehand.  Many regular net participants to not work contests.

Maybe if the contest were held on Tuesday night rather than the 
weekend? :-)  Even in winter AK folks are busy on weekends either 
shopping or recreating on snowmobiles or skis or, or, etc.

But you are correct that no one turns out because no one else turns 
out.  So it takes some folks to get on no matter how many others 
do.  Also it helps interest a lot if there is a rare location to work 
instead of the "same old bunch".  I am torn between rovering and 
staying home to provide a good signal on the peninsula to work for 
folks in Anchorage.

The years KL7HJ drove down from Denali Park all the way to Homer and 
up to Fairbanks operating on three bands really offered something 
special for folks. But it is not a trivial thing in January.

And finally the propagation gods were not smiling Saturday 
morning.  144.200 signals took a huge dive at 10am after the 
net.  Interestingly 146.58 FM was a better path.  I only worked KL7XJ 
on 50.125, though I called for a couple hours.  Its a shame my 222 
xvtr died as I think I could have worked you.  My 432 antenna has 
high SWR and I need to climb the tower to investigate (the tower with 
5-foot snow drift at the base).

73, Ed - KL7UW

At 10:57 PM 1/19/2014, Shannon Methe wrote:
>The VHF contests in the Anchorage area have been steadily declining
>since I became a ham 3 years ago. This was positively the worst one
>I've seen. I made 5 QSO's with three unique call signs. I was working
>from the same height as KL6M usually works (literally right down the
>street from him.) I would have rovered over to BP4, but with only two
>participants, I didn't bother. I've never understood why the turnout
>is so light for the VHF contests and yet we have such a relatively
>good turnout for the Tuesday night nets on VHF. Winter is usually our
>best or participation because no one has the excuse of being out
>fishing, as in the summer. It's a self feeding downward spiral. As
>fewer folks participate, few folks participate because no one
>participates.
>
>-Shannon
>On Jan 19, 2014, at 10:38 PM, Edward R Cole wrote:
>
>>Paul,
>>
>>It was a light turn out which not a surprise in January.
>>
>>Wx for roving was terrible so none did that I am aware of.  We had
>>16-inches accumulation of snow Tu/we/th and rain all day Friday in
>>45F temps.  Janet could not drive all the way up the driveway Friday
>>afternoon due to the 5-inch snow pack that turned soft in the rain.
>>Saturday afternoon I spent shoveling the slushy ice off the lower
>>end of the drive so I could move the van back onto the road and get
>>a run up to the house (70-feet).  A neighbor took pity on me and
>>came over with his small john deer 4wd tractor with front bucket and
>>scraped the drive clean up to where we park in front of the garage.
>>Today temps dropped to 29 and everything is refreezing.
>>
>>I worked three stations on 2m FM and one on 6m ssb.  A couple of the
>>better stations in Anchorage were out of state or just leaving at
>>contest time so there were stations we could not hear in Anchorage
>>that were worked by others up there.  My main transmission line to
>>the 2m eme array is shorted so I could not transmit and had to use a
>>single 11-element 2m yagi, instead.  I could receive on the eme
>>array, though.
>>
>>The bad transmission line is shared by 2m-eme, 900, and 1296
>>antennas so was not QRV on any of them.  I had good reception on the
>>222 transverter on Friday by locking the tower-top TR relay into Tx
>>and bypassing the preamp on the tower.  But somehow blew up the
>>transverter Rx on Saturday using a TR relay in the shack.  So no
>>222.  I could have made at least two contacts in two grids on 222.
>>
>>432 has high SWR for a few months and tower base is covered with 5- 
>>foot of snow so big job to shovel out a 15-foot path thru that.
>>Then we have winds when it is warm making climbing dicey.
>>
>>I would consider 112 contacts super good for AK.  Most I have had is
>>about 30 or so with 6m Es opening in Junea few years ago.  I could
>>log about 20 on 2m eme if that was working, but I probably have to
>>remove a connector and shorten some bad hardline and reinstall the
>>connector in 30's temps (with 60-foot slog thru knee deep snow,
>>before).  That is all hardened after the rain onto snow and
>>refreezing so may give it a try tomorrow if wx permits (more snow
>>predicted).
>>
>>But I appreciate the folks who turned out for the contest up here.
>>Just not in the cards this year.
>>
>>73, Ed -KL7UW
>>
>>At 10:02 PM 1/19/2014, Paul Kiesel wrote:
>>>Howdy All,
>>>
>>>Yes, indeed. I did miss some hours of the contest watching the
>>>Seahawks-49ers game on TV. Wow, what a white-knuckle spectacle, eh?
>>>
>>>
>>>Actually, I missed other hours of the contest doing less
>>>interesting things, but I did spend a respectable amount of time in
>>>front of the rig, too. I scored only two (2) QSOs via sporadic E
>>>(both contacts with stations in Colorado), but I was pleased to
>>>have any E-skip at all this time around.  We did have a tight
>>>temperature inversion over the Puget Sound Depression down as far
>>>as Southern Oregon, so there was some decent tropospheric ducting
>>>enhancing signals even on 50 MHz.  Others did far better than I,
>>>but I finished with 112 QSOs in 25 grids for a score of 2800
>>>points. I operated on 50 MHz only.
>>>
>>>
>>>As usual, numbers of participants was low as compared to the June
>>>contest, but we had a reasonable turnout here along the Northwest
>>>Coast, from Campbell River, BC (VE7DAY in CO70) all the way to
>>>Ashland and Medford, OR (K7BWH/R in CN72 and WB6FFC in CN82).
>>>
>>>I hope there was a good turnout for the contest among the AVG
>>>Alaska members.  Don't forget to submit your log even if you made a
>>>single contact during the contest. All the contest info is on the
>>>AVG Contest page here:
>>>
>>>http://www.qsl.net/a/ak-vhf/Contests/
>>>
>>>73, Paul K7CW / VE7IB
>>>AVG Contest Guy
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>>
>>73, Ed - KL7UW
>>http://www.kl7uw.com
>>    "Kits made by KL7UW"
>>Dubus Mag business:
>>    dubususa at gmail.com
>>
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73, Ed - KL7UW
http://www.kl7uw.com
     "Kits made by KL7UW"
Dubus Mag business:
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