[NLRS] NLRS response to proposed changes to VHF+ contests
W0ZQ at aol.com
W0ZQ at aol.com
Sun Oct 17 11:58:47 EDT 2004
TO: John Baumgarten, N0IJ, ARRL Dakota Division Contest Advisory
Rep.
CC: Northern Lights Radio Society (NLRS), Open Letter
FROM: Jon Platt, W0ZQ, President Northern Lights Radio Society
DATE: October 17, 2004
SUBJECT: NLRS feedback on “Final Report of the VHF-UHF Contest/Awards
Subcommittee” dated 14 July 2004.
John, I have divided our club response into two parts. The first part
provides you with a summary of our response to the twenty-two proposed changes.
The second part provides you with the NLRS thoughts and vision regarding how
we can increase the level of interest in VHF and VHF contesting.
Regarding our club, the NLRS does participate in ARRL VHF contests as an
affiliated club. In the recent September VHF contest we may be the only ARRL
affiliated club to enter into the unlimited club competition category. During
this years August UHF contest, the NLRS ran "Rovermania" in parallel with
the ARRL's UHF contest and we saw a new, all time, national record set in both
the SOHP and SOLP class. However we are much more than a VHF contesting
club. Our club preamble states: “It shall be our purpose to further the
exchange of information and cooperation between members, to promote radio
knowledge, fraternalism, and individual operating efficiency, and to so conduct club
programs and activities as to advance the general interest and welfare of
Amateur Radio in the Community.” It is in the spirit of our clubs preamble
that I present you with the following information and discussion.
Part One: Response To Proposed Changes.
As of October 10, 2004, I have received input from fifteen NLRS members. I
had asked club members to vote YES, NO, or NO OPINION on each of the 22
proposed changes. Of 330 possible votes, 235 were YES, 53 were NO OPINION, and 42
were NO. As such, those who responded are generally in favor of the report
and its proposals with a few exceptions. 18 of the proposed changes are
supported by the NLRS while four are not.
First, here are the 18 proposed changes that ARE supported by the NLRS. I’ve
ranked the list so it starts with the strongest “Yes” response and ends
with the weakest. The numbering system below is based on the sequence by which
they appeared in the report (the report did not number them).
9. Establish a new Limited Single Operator category designed with the
newcomer in mind. Operate on no more than four bands with low power only.
14. Make sure the rules indicate certificates are awarded for low power
entries in January, and for top DX entries.
17. Work harder to support and encourage smaller VHF+ contests sponsored by
other organizations
19. Continue the work to report on contest results by region. Find ways to
showcase existing VHF+ stations and VHF+ contesting operating techniques.
16. As changes are made to the Contest and Awards sections of the ARRL
website, give more visibility to VHF+. The number of HF contests and awards
tends to overwhelm the VHF+ offerings.
18. Provide more information on which contests logging programs fully
support ARRL contests.
20. Work to make sure that administration and promotion of VHF+ contesting
events are given equal status with HF contests
10. Simplify the limit for low power operation to 150 watts for
50-144-222-432 MHz
15. Promote suggested times and frequencies for "activity hours" on each
band
4. Create a new award or awards to appeal to entry level or rover/portable
operations, such as a grids activation or miles per watt award. Consider
GCR certification rather than card checking.
13. Offer plaques for the January and September contests, in addition to
June. Work to find individual, club or corporate sponsors. Otherwise offer
plaques to national and regional leaders at their own cost.
5. For VUCC awards on 50 through 1296 MHz and Satellite, all contacts must
be made from a location or locations within the same grid locator or
locations in different grid locators no more than 200 km apart (currently they have
to be made from the same grid).
8. Stop requiring that stations operating outside of their traditional
call area sign portable.
12. Strengthen the rules to minimize the rover practices known as grid
circling and captive rovers
3. Establish a VUCC challenge type award similar to the one used by DXCC
21. Explore ways to offer "trinkets" for VHF+ contests. Pins have not been
successful, plaques work for top scores, perhaps something like mugs or
T-shirts would be attractive.
7. Change the multiplier to include US states and Canadian provinces
instead of call areas.
6. The Contest department should work to establish dates for the EME
contest as early as possible and include them with the contest calendar as the
yearly summary is released.
The above proposals were either very strongly, or strongly, approved.
Proposal 6, the weakest, had six YES, no NO’s, and nine NO OPINION votes. Overall
the EME proposals had the weakest voting response, as EME is somewhat of a
specialized area within VHFing.
Here are the four proposed changes that are NOT supported by the NLRS.
These are ranked starting with the strongest NO response and ending with the
weakest.
1. Change the entry level steps for VHF+ awards so more people will be
able to get started in VUCC, WAS, and DXCC using VHF+ frequencies.
2. Consider changing the steps for different level awards to a smaller
increment.
22. Utilize the email address from those submitting contest entries to alert
them to the availability of online contest results.
11. Eliminate the rules that allow Multi-Operator stations to work their own
operators on 2.3 GHz and up.
Proposal 1 and 2 generated the same basic response from the NO voters who
provided feedback. Club members are concerned that the change would cheapen
the current awards program and that the change would actually decrease activity
as once the goal is met, people tend to operate less. The NO voters also
pointed out that the current VUCC goals are attainable.
Proposal 11 was the most polarizing of all the proposals with seven YES and
eight NO votes. On the NO side, the comments were that the current rule
generates activity and provides emphasis to get on those more difficult bands;
2304 and up. By one vote we are against the proposed change.
John, the voting data is available for you to review if you would like to
see the details.
Part Two: Additional Ideas for Boosting Activity.
It has been a challenge for me to consolidate the input that I have received
from my fellow NLRS club members. I hope I do this justice. I have
organized our input into two general areas; “Contests” and “Collaboration
Between Local Clubs & the ARRL”.
Contests:
I did receive feedback that stated that the current rules for VHF+
contesting are basically “OK”, and not to “fix them”. NLRS members have stated
that they operate in contests because they are fun, they provide an opportunity
to use the equipment that they have built and/or assembled (especially on the
microwaves), they find VHF contesting to be more of a challenge than HF
operating, and that roving (or hilltopping) provides its own unique challenges
and an opportunity to travel (see our country). They also use contesting as a
way to find and work new (rare) grids that are often activated only by rovers
(a significant opportunity here in the upper Midwest with lots of grids and
where most Op’s are concentrated in EN34/35).
Here is a consolidated list of ideas for how we may be able to increase VHF
contesting activity based on changes/modifications to contest rules. They
are not in any particular order. I kept the "discussion" as short and as
condensed as possible to keep the length of this letter short.
1. Add a club based contest award based on promotional activity.
Perhaps a traveling trophy for club promotion activities to be awarded annually
based on points for VHF expeditions, information booths, presentations to other
clubs, percentage turnout in club competition contests, technical support
opportunities, membership growth, and VE participation.. This could also be
linked to entries in the ARRL’s soapbox; ie; who is promoting contests.
2. Roving. Its fun, but the 1996 rule change has taken away some of
that. It is not a trivial effort to equip a rover for multiple bands and to
activate many grids, an activity that ABSOLUTELY DOES generate activity, but the
current rover rules have removed the incentive to cover more than a few
grids. Several rovers have quit over the 1996 rule change and have not
returned. Roving is so much fun that despite the lack of support at the contest
rule level, the number of entries in the Rover class has grown since 1996.
We can increase this growth rate, not fight it, with good rover rules.
Rovers are a key part of generating activity in VHF contests and we need to find a
scoring system that encourages them to move to new grids. The current rules
do not.
3. VHF Field Day.
a. Europe has had success in running a separate VHF Field Day, perhaps
there is something to learn from them. A VHF field day would expose more
clubs and newbies to VHF.
b. One variation to this would be to have a VHF FD contest within and
parallel to the current ARRL June HF Field Day event.
c. Another variation would be to restructure the current HF Field Day to
more strongly encourage VHF participation (ex: increase the points for VHF
QSOs).
4. Add a FM only category to one or all contests. Many weak signal VHF
operators have come through the FM club ranks. There are many more VHFers
with FM only equipment than there are VHFers with SSB/CW capability. At times
the NLRS has had success in connecting with our local FM clubs and when we
have, 146.55 and .58 have had good activity. Allowing a FM only station to
compete in their own class would increase that activity.
5. Add a single band, or perhaps a dual band, contest category. This
would encourage a small station to compete. Right now, an HF/6m station
cannot compete in a VHF contest.
6. Make it easier for local clubs to sponsor specific ARRL contest
plaques. Right now the process is “call Dan”. For two years in a row the NLRS
has had money for this, has “called Dan”, but were unable to successfully
work with the League to specifically identify plaques that need sponsorship.
7. Contest based on distance points. The 160m Stew Perry and the 10 GHz
and Above contests have shown how much fun a distance based contest can be.
VHFers are Dxers and we need to appeal to that. Having a variety in
scoring formats may encourage renewed participation. Not all major contests have
to use the same basic scoring format of QSOs X grids as HF contests see a
wide variety of scoring formats.
8. Bring back line scores. We lost activity when we lost line scores.
Some operators did operate (and submit their scores) in order to get their
calls listed in QST. We understand the likelihood of this happening is low,
but this is what the club membership is saying.
9. It would be more effective if awards would arrive in parallel, or soon
after, the contest results were formally released rather than months later.
In addition the club has noted an increase in the error rate in awards (ex:
calls wrong) when they do arrive.
10. More information about how to work with the Contest Robot. The local
NLRS reflect has numerous threads each contest about how to get a log to
stick. We need to make both logging AND submitting a VHF contest log easier
and part of that may mean explaining it better; not everyone knows how to use
NotePad to make corrections, etc.
11. Providing stickers based on contest participation (log received) that
could be placed on a Master Certificate. Many Ops take great pride in
participating, but never “win”. To them, being there is winning so lets support
that.
Collaboration Between Local Clubs & ARRL to Foster VHF:
The NLRS believes that there are activities outside of contesting that we
can work on to foster VHF & above activity. Many of our ideas fall into the
area of collaboration between the ARRL at the national level and clubs like
the NLRS at the local level.
1. Desire to see the League become more of a vocal proponent for VHFing.
For example, list upcoming VHF contests on the front cover of QST. (Club
members have noticed that the front cover does not announce major VHF contests
dates (June, Sept, Jan) nor results .... there is nothing).
2. Provide individual awards (certificates) for significant VHF+
promotional activities based on local club nomination.
3. Create a database of best practices based on what works well for
promoting VHF+ participation. For example, downloadable professional quality
promotional packages (DVD) for use during presentation at various clubs,
hamfest, and other events.
4. Need more QST/QEX articles about VHF and up. The addition of the
bimonthly Microwave column is good. We need to encourage dialog between
QEX/NCJ/QST, etc. Editors and local VHF clubs who can help to drum up articles.
5. At the local level, promotion of upcoming contests that includes FM
clubs. At the League level, more support for the use of FM in contests.
6. Improved communications between affiliated clubs and their ARRL
Section Affiliated Club Coordinator in order to increase cross pollination. For
example, a quarterly or yearly “breakfast meeting” between club officer(s)
and the Affiliated Club Coordinator. Another example is a pooling of
presentation material (ie; exposing other clubs to VHF weak signal and contesting).
7. Promote a Per-Band activity hour discussion forum on arrl.org or
encourage someone like eham.net to do it for them.
Conclusion:
John, Northern Lights Radio Society through you, our Dakota Division CAC
Representative, support 18 of these 22 suggested changes to VHF+ contesting, and
reject four.
The NLRS also has a list of ideas that could boost VHF activity that
includes both contesting and non-contesting activities. Within contesting, we
strongly believe that one key to boosting activity is to find rover rules that
encourage rovers to rove (go to new grids). Our recent NLRS Rovermania event
during the ARRL’s August UHF contest demonstrates what roving can do to
contest activity (ex: all time new SOLP and SOHP scores). A second key is to
make adjustments to contest rules that encourage the newbie’s to participate.
Our current contesters generally like the current rules (with an exception to
the rover rules). Our suggestions here include adding a FM only category
as well as a single band, or perhaps dual band, category that allows for these
new Op’s to be introduced to VHF contesting and to compete. There are
also opportunities to engage newbie’s during Field Day activities, whether this
is a parallel part of the existing ARRL HF Field Day or under the banner of a
separate VHF Field Day event.
Outside of contesting the NLRS feels that a stronger collaboration between
the ARRL at the national level and local VHF clubs can improve VHF activity.
Perhaps we need some type of liaison efforts between clubs at the local
level and the ARRL at the national level to organize and support this
non-contest type of activity fostering. Right now there is a feeling that the League
points its finger at the individual Op’s and clubs and says “where is the
activity?”, while the individual Op’s and local clubs point their finger at
the League and say “where is the support?” (line scores have been dropped,
rover rules changed, the feeling that QST isn't supporting VHF or VHF
contesting, etc.).
Again, thanks for your support and work within the CAC John. If you make it
to Hamfest Minnesota please stop by and check out our club table in the club
corral area. Check out our website at _www.nlrs.org_ (http://www.nlrs.org)
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