[Elecraft] Take the plung!

[Jerry Muller]

Don't get me wrong on this one. I'm primarily a contester. I TRY to run 
rather than do S & P. When I'm running and there's a station calling me that 
I'm pulling out of noise on my run frequency and they're signing XXnXXX/QRP 
at 15 WPM, chances are there will be several stations calling QRL? on my 
frequency before they even finish sending their callsign. I know I have to 
immediately send R R R QRL PSE QSY or I'll find XY0LID calling CQ on my 
frequency before I know it. When you call with your callsign a few times, 
chances are better that I can pull your call out than if you send "/QRP" 
with every call. Great if there's enough signal margin, a waste of 
information bandwidth if there isn't enough margin.

It gives me great pleasure to work the QRP guys. In one of the more recent 
SSB contests, there was an Italian guy running 500 mW who worked me (I think 
it was 15 meters) who sent me a QSL card with a picture of his station (all 
home brew BTW). I sent him back by email a recording of our QSO. He had a 
good antenna and his signal was FB. I would never have guessed he was 
running less than 1W. With a good antenna, you can more than make up for the 
low power. When you're running a multi op contest station however QRP isn't 
an option. Low power isn't a good option but some guys do it. I've done QRP 
in the TBDC a few times but mostly I do low power in that contest. I've even 
gotten a partial call out of a JA on 160 when running low power (that's no 
mean feat from the East Coast). I envy the West Coast guys who run JAs on 
160. I guess I'll just have to be satisfied with running EU instead :-)

I hope not too many of you guys called me this last weekend on 160 and I 
couldn't hear you. I was using diversity RX with some pretty big beverages 
on the SUB. There were more than a few times when I could tell someone was 
calling but I couldn't pull out enough to get a QSO. Thanks to those who 
kept trying.

I know one guy who considers the 1500 watt limit to be a LOWER LIMIT. When 
he's running less than 1500 watts, he thinks of it as QRP. He's not a 
contester though. All the serious contesters are strictly legal. Those who 
aren't power legal aren't top tier guys even if they think they are.

Best 73,

Jerry - K0TV


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Guy Olinger K2AV" <olinger at bellsouth.net>
To: "wp4cw" <wp4cw at aol.com>
Cc: <elecraft at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Sunday, January 30, 2011 7:15 PM
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] Take the plung!


> That's until they are really weak and wasting precious QSB peaks with 
> /QRP,
> or they are really really weak and they are sending RP6AN/QRP and I'm
> copying P6NQ?/R.
>
> In a contest, I don't need the weak ones to tell me they are weak or why, 
> I
> already know they are weak. I always will try very hard to work them, even
> if the reason is awful, because maybe it's one that I work that the
> competition can't.
>
> Anyhow, if we are going to identify why someone is weak, shouldn't we
> identify the other reasons?
>
> R6ABC/WRONGANTENNA
> K2XYZ/SH*TANTENNA
> W2RST/NOODLEANTENNA
> DL2ZZ/NOANTENNAONTHISCOAX
> OK3QQQ/DUMMYLOAD
> G3PQR/FORGOTTOCHANGEBANDONAMPANDIMBURNINGITUP
>
> 73, Guy
>
> On Sun, Jan 30, 2011 at 2:14 PM, wp4cw <wp4cw at aol.com> wrote:
>
>> I like to hear /QRP after the callsign. As a ham with a nice hobby I make
>> special effort to work them.  Ted
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