[PaQSO] Request

[Goody K3NG]

 >I believe the QRP multiplier should go to the receiving station, not 
the QRP station! The receiver strains to pick out the weak station from 
the noise level or from the QRM. The QRP station has the easy job.

Have you ever operated QRP?  Ever held a frequency calling CQ while QRP, 
have some full gallon station do a "QRL?" and you QRL back five times 
and then they start up CQ TEST right on top of you anyway?  Ever operate 
QRP and have the QRO op who just gave you a 599 plus just about faint 
when you tell him you're running five watts?

 > A QRP station requires less mechanical work and electronic skills to 
manage than does a QRO station.

What if a QRP operator builds an Elecraft K2 kit and the QRO operator is 
running an out-of-the-box Yaeicowood Mega-Rig with an Auto-Tune 
Amplifier?  The QRO station required more credit card skills than the 
QRP station, and the QRP op did all the mechanical work and had all the 
electronic skills!  Sure, not all QRP stations are homebrew or kit 
built, but show me how many QRO stations have homebrew rigs and amps.  I 
can buy an amp on the Internet right now, install the 220V outlet, and 
be QRO by the weekend.  Likewise, you can turn off your amp and turn 
down your barefoot rig to 5 watts right now.

 > If desired, place the QRP stations in a separate class,but do not 
multiply a QRP score by 2!

Fine with me.  If it will stop the discussions we have each year over 
the QRP multiplier, please by all means DO IT.  While we're at it, let's 
eliminate the x1.5 CW point multiplier because everyone knows CW has a 
17dB advantage over phone and it's easier to make a run of CW contacts 
than phone.  Also, why the x2 point multiplier for 80/160 CW QSOs?  It 
requires more patience and skill to make a contact on 15 meters during 
the bottom of the sunspot cycle than it does on 80 meters at night.  
Don't even get me started on the x2 RTTY and PSK point multiplier.  
Digital was supposed to kill the PA QSO party and there was much 
gnashing of teeth and people were tearing their clothes over its 
introduction two or three years ago.  If anything we should deduct 
points for running digital!  It's evil, EVIL, I tell you!   Sorry...time 
for my meds.

 > I lost winning single op class for the PA QSO party a few years ago 
by that 2 X factor given to a QRP station in Washington County, PA. I 
had the highest raw score with out the massaging of the points. The PA 
QSO Party should be a capitalistic contest,not enforced socialism.

It's a "capitalist contest" as you put it; you had the freedom to run 
QRP and profit from the QRP multiplier.  And by your own admission, QRP 
doesn't require as much mechanical work or electronic skills, and 
everyone else is doing the work, so it should have been a no-brainer 
decision for you to run QRP.  Using your logic, it should be easy for 
superior QRO ops to do even better than the current crop of QRP ops 
simply by running QRP.

I assume you were running QRO that year.  What if you would have beaten 
a medium power class station?  Could they complain you held an unfair 
advantage by running QRO and thus netting more contacts due to the 
stronger signal?

 >The PA QSO Party should be a capitalistic contest, not enforced 
socialism.

No, it should be neither.

 >He was running 10 watts to a folded, shortened, compromised dipole on 
75 meters, in the basement of his high rise apartment house in the 
middle of a large English city. I should have gotten a bonus 100 X point 
for that one.

We have this tired argument nearly every year.  I should get bonus 
points for the old man from Florida who answers my CQ PA DE K3NG TEST  
and returns with his name, RST 599 (three times just to make sure I got 
it), location (twice), weather and his FISTS, QCWA, J-38 key serial 
numbers, and his 10-10 number even though we're on 20 meters.  I should 
get bonus points for sitting by 15 minutes trying to work a guy in a 
rare county who can't handle a pileup to save his life and works about 
one station every three minutes.  I should get bonus points for the dead 
receiver QRO station that stepped on my calling frequency and forced me 
off, even after I QRLed fifty times.  And then there's the guy I had to 
copy with the bug who's running a 1:9 dit to dah length ratio or the guy 
with the spark gap rig who's 3 khz away I finally had a QSO with after 
he called me six times.  We all have stories about the PITA contact we 
made and deserved a medal for.

If anything, the out-for-blood QRO contesters should see the QRP 
multiplier competition as a challenge just like fellow contesters, bad 
propagation, local QRM, a nagging XYL, and weddings that inevitably fall 
on PA QSO.  That's life, and it's what makes it interesting.

Goody
K3NG

-- 
Blog: http://thek3ngreport.blogspot.com/