[ILQSO] Nostalgia

Wed Nov 8 13:01:05 EST 2017

I have them.

Sent from my iPhone
"He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." -- Jim Elliot

On Nov 8, 2017, at 10:40 AM, John Geiger <af5cc2 at gmail.com<mailto:af5cc2 at gmail.com>> wrote:

Hi Jim,

Thanks for the walk down memory lane.  I was thinking about that same time
period while doing the ILQP this year.  The date of this year's contest,
October 22, was my late Grandmother's birthday, and the first time I ever
operated in the ILQP, I missed the first or 2/3 of the contest since we had
a birthday party for her at White Pines State Park, and I didn't get back
to Dekalb, where I was in graduate school at the time, until pretty late in
the afternoon.  That was 1994 I believe, or possibly 1993.  I was using an
Icom 720A barefoot in my apartment with an indoor dipole for 20 and above,
and a random wire that went out the window and attached to a metal grate
that ran under the eves of the apartment, which I used on 30 and below.  I
am sure I made a few QSOs in the contest, but have no idea how many.

Would anyone happen to have the results for the 1993-1996 ILQPs?  I would
love to know how I did in each one.  In 1996 I was doing my first stint at
Cameron University so I had the same 720A but a longer dipole hidden inside
the apartment.  I would have been signing NE0P/9 or NE0P/5 for those time
periods

73 John now AF5CC

On Sat, Nov 4, 2017 at 8:56 PM, Jim Funk <jfunk at fossna.com<mailto:jfunk at fossna.com>> wrote:

ILQP QUARTER-CENTURY NOSTALGIA  de N9JF...
I'm not sure what it says about my aging process, lack of concentration,
lowered testosterone, distractibility, waning killer instinct....
It's ARRL CW SS contest weekend (always one of my favorites)  I find
myself spending time cleaning the shack.  Say what?  There's a contest to
operate!  But..but...the shack needs cleaning!  There are piles of papers
that haven't been examined in years.  It's like digging into a Native
American burial ground...though legal. One of the envelopes I opened
contained a bunch of ILQP results and commentary from the early 1990's.
One in particular I found interesting because of a letter I'd received from
WB9GOJ/K9LY (s.k.).  Joe and I exchanged some thoughts about the history of
the contest and where it might go.
So....what characterized the ILQP 25 years ago (1992)?
The RAMS group in Chicago had picked up a dropped event and run with it,
ably administering the event for several years.  Let's compare the results
of that year's event with 2017.  In 1992, there were 31 logs submitted from
IL Fixed stations and 5 IL Mobile Stations, and 12 entries from
out-of-state.   The winning IL Fixed station made a total of 107 CW and 140
SSB contacts.  Two IL Mobile stations put on a total of 45 counties.  Some
things seldom change: KF9D was the winning mobile.  He made 353 CW
contacts.  The winning out-of-state station (K4BAI), with 3591 points, made
65 CW and 3 SSB contacts in 27 counties. The winning IL club (Elgin ARS)
had an aggregate score of 97,000 points.
Twenty-five years later, yes, things have changed a bit.
With 2 weeks to go before the log submission deadline, we are just short
of 250 logs received.  Most of those, thankfully, were electronic
submissions!  Last year, we received 283 logs, and I'm confident we will
pass that for 2017. The top scoring IL Fixed station in 2017 will be over
180,000 points with over 800 QSOs.  The top mobiles have over 600 QSOs. The
top out-of-state station will be over 50,000 points with at least 90
counties worked.  The top club will have an aggregate of over a million
points.
So...what changed?
It can't be "conditions".  The early 90's saw great sunspot numbers and
lots of band activity. Maybe everyone was working DX instead of QSO
parties?  Maybe the whole idea of QSO parties got more popular due to the
ARRL's "Year of the QSO Party" a few years back?  Are awards better?  Gas
prices aren't that much better (though they're not as bad as they were a
couple of years ago).  Did moving away from the PAQP weekend help?
Certainly the massive interest in the event shown by a few IL clubs during
the past couple of decades has made a big difference.  Cheerleading by
PRIME, FRRL, KARS, GRVARS, WIARC and others has had an effect, partly in
getting teams into the field and in spurring activity from home and in
submitting logs.  Maybe more stations are antenna-limited and finding that
domestic contests can be a blast without towers and lots of aluminum.
Others are discovering what a rush it can be to operate from a portable
location and be "DX" for eight hours!
I'd like your thoughts....and your log, if you haven't sent it yet to
n9jf at arrl.net<mailto:n9jf at arrl.net>!  73, Jim N9JF

Best regards,

Jim Funk
Customer Service Engineer

FOSS

800/547-6275
option 1 for parts, option 3 for service
jfunk at fossna.com<mailto:jfunk at fossna.com>

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FOSS Analytical A/S - FOSS North America 6509 Flying Cloud Dr. Suite 130,
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