[Elecraft] Contest Settings

[John K3TN]

Hi, Tim - From an AGC perspective, I use the same approach K6LL does, seems
to work well for all cases except when I am running, get spotted and get hit
with a dozen stations all calling zero beat on the exact same frequency.
That is the scenario where I occasionally back off the RF gain or adjust the
Shift control off of my 600 hz pitch frequency a bit. As a fairly rare DX
station in a contest, you will probably hit that condition more often.

On pre-amp/attenuator, for conditions here on the East Coast, I have the
pre-amp on for 10 and 15m, usually off for 20, always off for 40 and 80.
During a 160M contest, I will turn on the attenuator on 160M but for most
multi-band contests I find it is usually not necessary there. But,
conditions where you are will likely be very different.

I leave all NB/NR off for contests, with lots of loud signals on bands they
seem to add more noise than they remove. Since the notch filter is manual
for CW, I never use it and certainly never in contests.

On  the PVRC mailing list we had an interesting discussion about filter
bandwidth and CW pitch - generally  pitch or center frequency between 400
and 600 hz was preferred, much feeling that lower meant that when adjusting
RIT you would be causing a larger % frequency change in the signals and thus
differentiating more. I usually run my 500 hz filter, rarely going lower
unless there is some multiple snuggled between two loud running stations!

Of course, there is always the Fred K3ZO data point, though he isn't a K3
user: he believes in leaving his filters wide open for CW contests and does
the filtering between his ears... That only works if you have a similar CPU
between your ears!

73 John K3TN



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