[PaQSO] N8LXR/M preliminary score

[MORSENUT at aol.com]

Everything was going great until my screwdriver antenna developed a problem 
Saturday
night.

When I was in motion at highway speed, the SWR went nuts and this after I 
tested the whole set up several times before the test at highway speeds!

Thinking it was probably something loose in the base and/or mount, I took the 
base apart, cleaned the contacts on the antenna and its base, and retightened 
everything....at night....at a rest stop in LEB.   LOL!

Antenna tuned up OK....but when in motion....same problem!

Stopped again and this time I replaced the feedline......and all was well 
except that my computer's keying interface would get RF into it and lock up on 20 
meters when it never did that with the old feedline in place!

Anyway, I came just shy of my goal of 1000 Qs and here is the run down:


80 METER CW:                   147
OTHER CW:                        602
SSB:                                   212

TOTAL QSOs:                     961


COUNTIES WORKED:         63  (Missed CRA, CUM, FOR, and JEF)
SECTIONS:                         45

TOTAL MULTS:                    108


TOTAL QTHS:                     17 PA counties x 500 bonus points = 8500 
points

# QSOs with W3UU:            8 X 200 bonus points = 1600 points

SCORE:

1409 QSO POINTS X 108 MULTS = 152, 172
BONUS POINTS:                             10, 100

TOTAL SCORE:                                162, 272

A big improvement over my last (and first)  mobile effort in 2001, which was 
just over 100,000 points.


Since I could not operate on 20 meter CW with the keying interface locking 
up, the out-of-PA mults suffered....but I kick myself now when I realize that I 
should have tried to work some 20 meter SSB and I never bothered with 15 
meters.....big mistakes both!

Lessons:

Screwdriver is too unwieldy to tune....need to check out some sort of 
automatic tuner feeding a wip antenna.

In the mobile class, you DO have to work SSB to get the mults and access new 
stations to work after CW is depleted.

CW QSOs get fished out sooner than I expected.  

When I would open up as a totally new station in a new QTH....the pile up 
would be good for 30 to 35 Qs at the most and after I searched and pounced on CW, 
Qs were hard to come by...hence the need to work SSB for both points and 
mults.

The 500 bonus points for mobiles when they activate a new county is sometimes 
not worth the effort getting there...sometimes just staying put and looking 
for mults is better, I did that this year (in my last mobile effort, I did 30 
counties).   Better to choose a no-more-than-20 county well laid out route and 
sit stationary to concentrate more on the contest instead of "pushing on to 
the next county."  Did this too and was happy with that strategy.

Learned a lot about the ins and outs of "where to go and how to get there" in 
the MIF, SNY, JUN, PER UNI, MTR area of the state.

All in all, and despite the technical problems I had which I am sure cost me 
at least 150 Qs
and maybe more, it was a GREAT PAQP and I am happy that I greatly improved my 
score
over the last one.

KUDOS:

Many thanks to the W3UU station coordinators and operators and the Nittany 
ARC for doing all the work to sponsor our great contest!

Many thanks to my non-ham driver Lee for getting me through the route...in 
one piece!

73 to all and hope you had a great time in the test!

Tim
N8LXR/M