[PaQSO] TIPS FOR OUT OF STATE OPERATION IN PAQP

[John's Travel and Cruises]

Tim:
I'll respond to some of your questions with my ideas.

1.  Do you find that calling CQ is effective or do you rely 
on S and P?

I think you have to do both as S & P will get you stations
that are calling CQ but you will miss the PA stations that
are also S & P ing.  You will need to maximize the contacts 
with the mobile stations and by doing a combination of 1/2 
CQing and 1/2 S & P ing you will accomplish that.

2.  Judging from last year's out-of-state standings, it seems 
like the top scoring stations run about 1/3 CW and 2/3 SSB.
Is this the norm?  Or have there been years when a station 
using only CW has placed in the top 5 out-of-state stations?

Looking at my log instate log from last year, I made 465
Q's on CW and 615 on SSB which is slightly better than
the 1/3 CW and 2/3 SSB that you mentioned.  I would
say that spending about 1/2 your time on CW and 1/2 on
SSB is about right.

3.  Is there much activity on 160 meters, SSB and CW?

My log for 160 shows 34 CW and 11 SSB Q's so there
is activity there mostly in the last two hours on Saturday.

The bottom line is that you have to keep changing bands,
modes, and CQ/S&P modes if you are going to maximize
your score.  At the same time you have to try to work the
mobiles in every county.  I've never had the luxury or having
two radios but that would be the way to go so you can
keep track of the mobiles while you are calling CQ.

Good luck and you better work me on all bands and modes!
I'm not sure if I'm going to be operating from home in
ALL or try a portable operation again.  Portable is fun
but I hate to give up my beams!

John Getz, AD8J



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