[PVRCNC] Carolina Weekend - K3TD - Part Two

[Jim K4QPL]

                    North Carolina QSO Party

(As posted on 3830)

Call: K3TD

Operator(s): K4QPL

Station: K3TD

 

Class: Mobile SO Mixed LP

QTH: NC

Operating Time (hrs): 10

 

Summary:

Band  CW Qs  Ph Qs  Dig Qs

----------------------------

   80:  219     0       0

   40:  510     0       0

   20:   28     0       0

   15:    0     0       0

   10:    0     0       0

    6:    0     0       0

    2:    0     0       0

----------------------------

Total:  757     0       0  Mults = 59  Total Score = 134,039

 

Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club

 

Comments:

 

Coming off the great SC QSO Party on Saturday we didn't know if we'd be able
to keep riding for another 10+ hours in NC. But a good night in a hotel near
Charlotte and a good breakfast before heading up I-77 to be in Iredell
County (To get our "I" for Carolina and hopefully to have a pileup giving
them out) got us in the mood to do it again.

Other than a USB port in the laptop finally giving up from rough roads (We
had taped it in SC)and having to make a quick port install in another port,
Murphy left us alone.

20 was again a disappointment. During the EU opening we worked a few DX and
later some west coasties, but there really wasn't much point in spending
time there when 40 was acting like 20 for most of the day.

This weekend were the first mobile contests where we had great telnet from
beginning to end with Tad's wifi hotspot feeding my laptop. (Wait until his
company sees the data minutes!! Fortunately he's with a communications
company) Was great to see all the spots coming in and to see all the active
counties and where the other mobiles were. As with most contests the rate
boost was immediate when we were spotted. Thanks for all manual spots giving
out county activations.

As in SC, activity and rate started slower and picked up as the afternoon
and evening came and 80M came into its own again. Again it was hard to
believe how well we seemed to be getting out both DX and east of the
Rockies. I just wish there was some way to match up receiving quality. Tad
nixed the idea of dragging a 200' B.O.G. (Beverage On Ground) behind the
SUV! We get enough strange looks with the hulking 160-10M Tarheel
Screwdriver in the trailer hitch.

Anyhow, the score above is the raw score from N1MM without any bonus points
calculated. We'll leave that to the official scorers but our intention was
to host the party for all of our out of state and DX friends and our own
score was never really considered and we never took the time to S&P mults.

We activated 18 counties with extra time for Columbus County to give as many
opportunities for bonus points. The rest of the time we were trying to
manage our time in each county to match the pileups, trying to rush through
the big counties but also occasionally stopping short of a county line until
the pileup diminished. Unfortunately we couldn't do anything about time
running out for the contest in NASh county and we still had a pileup when
the clock hit 0100Z. The pileup was huge and by that time my concentration
was waning from 10 hours in the chair stoked by trail mix, Gatorade and
whatever other junk food Tad would throw back into my cage!

As with South Carolina we put all of our energies into CW as SSB is not very
productive in comparison. Tad did another great job of navigating and
meeting our target of ending the contest just before reaching well-served
WAKe county. In fact, we left NASh and rolled into WAKe just two minutes
after the contest ended.

Finally, congratulations to Marty and all the great organizing group for a
well-planned, publicized and managed QSO Party. Thanks to everyone in NC for
supporting it so well and activating so many counties with special thanks
for all the bonus stations.

And most of all, thanks to our wonderful North American and DX friends who
followed us around North Carolina and gave us those exciting pileups. We
hope you enjoyed the party as much as we enjoyed throwing it.

See you next year!

73,

Tad, K3TD

Jim, K4QPL