[NLRS] "Contest" report EN37

Mon Feb 1 15:50:01 EST 2016

Hello, all. I'm glad that at least some of you were able to get on the air
for at least a small dose of RF last weekend.

<Warning: L O N G  description!>

Although  I have been out as a rover many times, I never went out in
January in MN. I guess I was just too thin-skinned. Most Januaries I simply
watched the snow and/or cold develop and reveled at how nice and warm and
dry I was in my indoor shack. There was one year when I started putting
antennas on the roof of my van, but when I was standing there struggling to
assemble the antennas to the mast in a -20 degree wind chill, I said to
myself, "You are doing this because it's fun, right? Is this fun?" Then I
put away the antennas that had not yet been attached, and went back indoors
to my warm, cozy shack.

Fast forward to a few years ago when I started living winters in Texas, and
January VHF SS was a perfect venue for me to go out roving, what with the
absence of severe cold or snow-covered icy roads, and because the
homeowners association in my daughter's neighborhood forbade the erection
of outdoor antennas. So, roving in January is now my norm.

Fast forward again to last July. By then, the house in Apple Valley was
sold, and we were living full-time in Texas. My wife and I were taking a
road trip through New Mexico headed for a week in Colorado, when I
contracted an unusual neurologic condition known as Guillain-Barre
Syndrome, which caused near-total paralysis initially. A couple of months
of hospitalization and rehabilitation (plus some expensive drugs) in
Albuquerque got me back on my feet, though barely walking and unable to do
much with my (normally dominant) right hand, and also in considerable,
relentless pain. Recovery, even with ongoing physical therapy, has been
slow, and remains incomplete, but I am extremely grateful to have recovered
what strength and mobility I have. Needless to say, however, I am still in
no shape to climb up ladders to mount antennas onto the roof of my car. So
this year, I joined up with Jim, K0MHC, to be his roving partner. He did
nearly all of the rover preparation work, I mostly went along for the ride
and the privilege of operating his equipment in our first grid square,
EM00. But when we got to our second spot, EM01, we were joined by an
uninvited guest by the name of Murphy. Dang it, the rules say a classic
rover station has either 1 or 2 operators, but no more. I guess Murphy
broke that rule, because he sure was more than a ride-along observer. Jim
has (had?) a very complex antenna array for roving, with one stressed Moxon
for 6M and a total of 8 antennas for the next 3 bands up. In the operating
position, this array tops out at over 28 feet, far too tall to drive around
with. So the array gets lowered into a more compact arrangement under 12
feet for driving, and only sees its full extension once he has pulled into
a good operating location. At our second stop, while raising the antenna
array, the telescoping mast came apart at about 14-15 feet up, causing
hundreds of dollars worth of antennas to come crashing down. Without a
bucket truck or a 20 foot ladder (neither of which we had tucked in our
back pockets), our only option was to succumb to gravity, and try to lower
everything to the ground as gently as possible. Re-assembly in the field
was not an option. Fortunately, it happened in a safe location (not
immediately adjacent to a busy highway) and in daylight hours, and no one
was injured. But as of Saturday, we did not qualify to submit a rover entry
because we had only activated a single grid. Jim planned to go out with
what equipment he could on Sunday, including his tripod-mounted 5.7/10 GHz
dish system, to a different grid, to get as many Q's as he could. I didn't
hear how he fared, probably because we are planning to present our
experience at next week's monthly meeting of the Roadrunners Microwave
Group. Not quite the victorious experience we were planning to talk about,
but worth discussing nevertheless, if only to point out where we went wrong
so others don't fall into the same trap.

<Short summary:> My team rove with K0MHC started out plenty fun in our
first grid, but turned into a total shambles before we could activate a
second grid. He went out alone on Sunday with 5.7/10 GHz to try to at least
qualify for the rover category by activating a second grid.

73 from the Texas Hill Country Rovers, K0MHC/R and W0JT/R
John

On Mon, Feb 1, 2016 at 11:54 AM, Bill Davis via NLRS <nlrs at mailman.qth.net>
wrote:

>
>
>   I was on and so were a few others. Conditions were poor and score
> followed suit. Lowest score since 2002 when I had 2 fewer bands. Thanks for
> those that appeared in my log and were heard in my speaker or more often my
> headphones.
>
> 64 QSOs 39 multipliers  Score 4,095
> 73  Bill  K0AWU
>
>
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