[NLRS] Prelim manual logging SS score--long

[Dave Aho]

In addition to the Below score for SS, I want to thank
Charlie  N0AKC, for letting me experience a bit of EME
for that contest late Friday night early Saturday
morning.  Justin..K9MU sat in and operated for a bit
while I was there.  VERY interesting work involved in
that kind of contacting.  Now to get a bit of
land..*LOL*  Anyhow, TNX Charlie, and maybe by next
time around, I will know code better so I can go at it
for a bit also..*L*  So with the Ion filters in place
and taking no prisoners, here is my contribution the
the Maroon score:


November 2003 SS Score:

Station:        N9TTX
Team:           Maroon--MWA
Location:       Eau Claire, WI
Class:          SOLP

(Prelim score before dupe checking and submitting to
ARRL)

Band        QSO�s

160                  0
80                  52
40                  33
20                 123                 
15                  18
10                   4    

Total:             230 Q�s
                  X  2
                  =460 Points 
                 X  61 sections
Grand Total:    28,060 Points



I had a lot of the intentional Jamming on 40 and
80�particularly 80�One guy kept singing an
anti-contester song he apparently made up while using
what seemed like Double sideband and a very bad voice,
squealing and snorting like a farm animal.  He kept it
up for I think about � hour constant.  LOTS of
keying/tuning across the 20-80  meter bands.  @0
meters was the �net� syndrome.  Lots of stations
plopped on a freq w/o asking.  A Big gun decided to
plop his fanny about 1KHz away from me�so I shifted
halfway between  him and a net that bounced me back
toward him (never heard the net myself with the RIT). 
I ended up doing the #, Section, Check, Section all
separate, and did not give my report �til I had theirs
in had (on paper)�made a few stations mad, but
hey�guarantees I have and they have the info.  Lots of
IF shifting/attenuating/RF gain/filter adjustment�.I
LIKE the 101ZD.  The TS-120S had a hearing problem, so
because of that, It was helpful to use as a rig with a
built in attenuator/filter.  15 opened up decent
Sunday, but 10-20 were dead Saturday by the time I got
to them (I ran 40 and 80 at the outset�I had to try
the Homebrew 160 vertical)  I did get VI and PR on 10
meters�Loud Caribbean stations, but almost no-one but
South America was on the band.  It did seem very soupy
for propagation there.    The 160 meter vertical
seemed to work just fine.  I never got around to using
the shunt feed box from WB0WOT, but just tied center
conductor to a point just above the Rotor (bottom
mounted BTW), and the Coax braid to a ground rod and
both sides of my 160 meter wire dipole, and strung the
dipole around the yard and put up caution tape
everywhere.  It looked like a crime scene with razor
wire.  The Vertical was essentially about 15 feet of
mast sections connected to a 3 �� diameter loading
coil with about 135-140 (lost count while winding)
turns on the cardboard core, plus a 102� fiberglass
whip threaded into a mount at the top.  Everything
loaded well, and was not too awful mismatched on
160-40 (below a 4:1 SWR)  160 did not like loading up
well�I never did get it below a 2:1.  Reception on 160
was excellent, unfortunately all the stations on the
band were discussing weather, aches and pains, how
many bunions they have, electronic principles, and
having nets�no contesters.  I did try and do a
pre-contest 160 meter test via the reflector, but
realized what was wrong�after unfavorable reports on
40 meters, I realized the mast sections have�you
guessed it�PAINT on them, so the tower came down and
paint was scraped�..after that I had S9+40 signals on
40 and 80.  I did not get any MN stations, though I
heard them S&P�ing while I was doing the same.  Had a
great time, and a decent score I thought for the
limited effort I could put out from the home QTH.  See
you on the air for the 160 meter contest (the same
antenna or maybe a 5/8 wave version), and for sure for
the 10 meter contest.  73 all.


=====
73, and all that jazz,


                 Dave...N9TTX


Always remember:  "It could be worse.....it could be raining."
                             Marty Feldman from "Young Frankenstein"

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