[Elecraft] APF suggestions

[Robert Harmon]

Al,

Trying to interpret your message.  
1.  You are a contester and don't think you will use the APF filter in a contest.  
2.  You believe FT-1000 contesters do not use APF during a contest.
3.  The discussion of APF for contesting is not relevant to you.
4.   You suspect APF is not relevant to many other contesters.

First lets remind ourselves that we are obviously talking about CW !   
I use APF all the time in a CW DX contest.  Here I am in the wee hours of the morning.
Have a nice run going, my last CQ got a weak response right at the 
noise level.  I send qrz and use the APF to peak him up and make a successful contact, and 
sweet it is a new multiplier !   If it wasn't for APF I would have missed many contacts !
I still have my FT-1000 along with my other new rigs and can switch it in any time, I worked the Stew Perry 160 CW contest 
last weekend and over half of the qso's were made using the APF on the FT1000.  The APF on the FT1000 really shines
when the signal is right at the noise level as is common on 160.  Not just on 160 though,  in any of the CW DX contests
the APF is a very valuable asset.   We discussed this topic at one of our past Northern Cal DX Club 
meetings and the topic was not whether everyone used APF but what is the best outboard APF 
to use in a contests for rigs that do not have one !  

73,
Bob
K6UJ





On Oct 27, 2010, at 4:00 PM, Al Lorona wrote:

> The APF discussion is awesome, and I'm blown away that the K3 will be upgraded 
> with it, and it's going to be a great tool, and I don't mean to rain on the 
> parade, but my use of it will be limited to DXing and maybe occasional general 
> use, but probably *not* contest use. 
> 
> 
> Why? Too many controls to remember, too fast a pace to turn it on and off and 
> tune it in the elapsed time of one contact. No way would I leave it on while 
> running. I'm good at using the existing controls to do what I have to do to dig 
> a signal out.
> 
> The trend in contesting is going *away* from having your hands on the radio. I 
> suspect that APF might be too much of a hands-intensive tool when you're at 80 
> Q's per hour or higher.
> 
> I would be willing to bet that if you polled FT-1000 contesters that a vast 
> majority of them do not use APF *during a contest*. Of course, now I'll get a 
> whole slew of responses to the contrary, but I'll stand by my comment about the 
> majority.
> 
> So I am reading with interest, although discussion of APF in the context of 
> contesting, stations calling off frequency, etc., is not relevant to me, nor, I 
> suspect, to many others.
> 
> Al  W6LX
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