[NLRS] ARRL UHF Contest 2016 cancelled

Tue Mar 15 15:03:55 EDT 2016

Personally, if the August UHF contest is brought back in a different month,
I would vote for July. There are 2 big events in June (June VHF and Field
Day), none in July, 2 in August (August UHF and first weekend of 10G&Up),
and 2 in September (September VHF and second weekend of 10G&Up). I'd just
prefer to spread things out a bit. July should still allow mountaintop
operation for those endowed with such things.

I don't see how the 3-band or limited rover categories impair
participation. The whole idea was to allow people who were so inclined to
be competitive in a category that did not require a mega investment in
station equipment. Sure, the 3-band category works better for the VHF
contests because of the availability of radios with 6M, 2M, and 70cm.
Unfortunately, finding an all-mode 222 MHz radio is like finding the pot of
gold at the end of the rainbow, so a transverter is almost guaranteed there
for a 3-band UHF contester. Likewise for 902 & 1296. But a typical radio
that works well for a 3-band VHF contest can make an excellent IF radio for
a 3-band UHF contest. Use the built-in 70cm band, then your choice of using
either the HF portion as a 10M IF for 222 or the 2M portion as the IF for
902 &/or 1296. Sure, it's at least 2 transverters, but it doesn't have to
cost a megabuck. If you work it right, you might not even need a lot of RF
switching for band selection. If the radio is like the IC-706MkIIg or the
Yaesu FT-817, there is one port for HF (send that to the 222 transverter)
and one port for 2M/70cm. Get a 2M/70cm diplexer, route the 2M port to the
902 or 1296 transverter, and route the 70cm port to the antenna (or perhaps
a 70cm PA first). Then just tune the radio to 28 MHz for 222, 144 MHz for
902 or 1296, and 432 MHz for 423 MHz. No extra coax relays for
bandswitching.

Making the UHF contest resemble the 10G&Up contest is another idea that has
been kicked around. If done, it would further support moving the contest
away from August to (my preferred month of) July. By resemble, I mean
6-digit grid squares, distance scoring, and even the 10Km move rule instead
of a move to a new 4-digit grid. Kinda like the SBMS 2G&Up contest but
222M&Up instead.

Anyway, those are just a few of my thoughts. And I  agree that if the
intent was revitalization, the ARRL should not have cancelled the August
2016 UHF contest unless they had firm plans to move it to a different date
in 2016. Cancelling contests lowers interest it does not stimulate interest.

On Mon, Mar 14, 2016 at 9:44 PM, Matt Holden <mtholde at gmail.com> wrote:

>
>
> I had a good discussion with many of you at the Buffalo hamfest about
> how to make this contest better. I was the driver for AE0EE/R, last
> year, and wasn't happy with the 2016 cancel notice either.  As a brand
> new member of the ARRL board, I wasn't party to the discussions
> leading up to the decision made last week.  Thank you for not beating
> me up about that.  I've spoken to VHF Contest Revitalization Committee
> members and learned they would like to bring the contest back in 2017.
> Many ideas are being kicked around the contest duration, time of the
> year and the entry categories.  Maybe we lump January, August and
> September contests, into one, similar to 10GHz?  Adding a weekend in
> April may not be a bad idea for call district 4 and 5 rovers?  Are the
> FM and tri band categories helping or hindering participation?  About
> 145 logs were submitted for the 2015 contest.  How can we double that
> number in 2017?  I'm just kicking around ideas and would be interested
> in your opinion.  Please share your ideas on or off reflector or, in
> person, at Aurora or Central states.  I'll share your ideas with the
> VHF Contest Revitalization Committee and hope they help form the ideas
> presented during the "member comments" period later this year.
> 73,
> Matt Holden K0BBC
> Vice Director Dakota Division
>
> On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Dr. Gerald N. Johnson
> <geraldj at netins.net> wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On 3/11/2016 3:15 PM, Gregg Lind wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> *"The Committee will solicit member comments in the near future, as it
> >> weighs several alternatives." *
> >>
> >> In trying to keep this positive - and try to keep the sport going and
> >> encourage growth and participation in the contest... I think this is a
> >> good
> >> action for NLRS to submit a recommendation to the ARRL.  There is good
> >> information in this email thread and lets collect it and make a
> >> suggestion...
> >>
> >>
> >> On another idea ---  I think we need a solution that make UHF more
> >> affordable and attainable to amatuer radio community.  I have a
> >> suggest proposal
> >> / solutions is finding a solution for transverter in a single package
> that
> >> will cover -- 222 MHz, 432 MHz, 903 MHz and 1296 MHz. Since I have
> started
> >> to do roving and getting involved I have run across a number of people
> >> that
> >> do not have the money or ability to setup transverters, but may enjoy
> the
> >> rover aspects or even fix site operation if a simple cost effective
> >> solution. This is a bigger technical commitment that most people this is
> >> a stretch to put 4 DEMI transverters etc together and relays, and
> multiple
> >> IF etc.... I have great Engineers and local VHF/UHF people to tap and
> get
> >> help form so I have access to people that can help me...  I have had the
> >> ability to purchase my equipment mostly DEMI used or some new. But for
> >> someone to buy into this your almost 600-900$ per band or build this it
> is
> >> a task..  Or even finding the equipment on the used market is not easy.
> >>
> >> I was thinking to promote this contest and get more people on the radio
> is
> >> there someone or a group may be interested in building or designing a
> >> solution for a single transverter and PA on these bands...  I think if
> we
> >> had a 4 band solution this would promote more contest involvement...
> >
> >
> > Paul Wade W1GHZ has published such a design collection and sells board
> for
> > them.
> >
> > It takes a lot of space to control 4 bands of DEMI transverters. The
> FT-736R
> > gave four bands, of which 3 could be UHF, 220, 432, and 1296 but not
> > especially cheaper or than the stack of DEMI transverters, and mine when
> I
> > last turned it on had about 30 dB from MDS to AGC threshold so "local"
> > signals at 100 miles were hard on the ears when the gains were turned up
> for
> > weaker signals. Then its hard to maintain with the control cables to the
> > modules useing a few strands of about 36 gauge wire to odd crimped
> > connectors that break easily.
> >
> > An ideal solution would use a simple HF single band SSB/CW rig for the IF
> > (neglecting the potential for UHF FM contacts) with a slightly
> sophisticated
> > LO synthesizer to develop the injection frequencies for up and down
> > convertors. Gain stages and mixers can easily cover 50 to 2300 MHz,
> filters
> > would need switching. However the gain stage and mixer MMICs are cheaper
> > than good RF switches so its often easier to switch only the antenna and
> the
> > IF from transverter to transverter than to switch the filters in the
> > transverter. There are MMICs like the PGA-103+ that have really great
> noise
> > figures from a few MHz to at least 1.3 GHz that are not expensive.
> >
> > Electronically it would be simpler to create a filter turret that
> cleaned up
> > mixer products for both transmit and receive than to have a gaggle of
> > individual transverters though the gaggle of transverters seems easier to
> > accomplish, no bandswitching of RF other than the antennas if antennas
> > shared bands. The higher the IF the easier it is to do the filtering. For
> > that it might be advantageous to consider multiple conversions to move
> the
> > image and LO further from the RF frequency to make for easier filtering.
> The
> > limit is that mixers are the least linear part of the transverter being
> > noisy on receive and most critical about too much drive on transmit.
> >
> > 73, Jerry, K0CQ
> >
> >>
> >> On Fri, Mar 11, 2016 at 9:25 AM, Chris Cox<chrisc at chris.org>  wrote:
> >>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> This is rather disappointing news:-
> >>> http://www.arrl.org/news/view/arrl-2016-august-uhf-contest-cancelled
> >>>
> >>> Chris Cox, N0UK
> >>> chrisc at chris.org or chrisc at britishcaranddriver.com
> >>>
> >>> Next June join me in beating Multiple Sclerosis!
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> http://main.nationalmssociety.org/site/TR?px=6901434&pg=personal&fr_id=27006&s_src=BF_emailbadge
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
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>
> --
> 73,
> Matt Holden KØBBC
> ARRL Vice Director Dakota Division
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