[PVRC] K4TMC 2025 IOTA Contest - SOLP SSB Island NA112

[Henry Pollock - K4TMC]

Dave,

Great job with your setup! Yeah, I don't know why that happened. Anyhow, I
probably made other mistakes to make that small change not significant. :-)

73,
Henry - K4TMC

On Mon, Jul 28, 2025 at 2:13 PM K3ZJ David Siddall <davek3zj at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Henry,
>
> Wait a minute ... you mean your score is now more than mine? Not fair!
>
> Just kidding -- it will be decided by the UBN either way.  And probably
> some ahead of us not on 3830.
>
> BTW, my station also was assembled from scratch the day before, but
> simpler: a Buckmaster OCF at 15-feet hung on a tree fed by an FTdx10 that
> travels in my suitcase quite well.
>
> High temperatures here are about 72 degrees every day, I don't envy your
> antenna work. Be careful about that, or come over here next year where the
> weather is tolerable.
>
> *SO24SSB LP*
> Call OpMode Remote CW Qs CW Mults Ph Qs Ph Mults Op Time Score Club
> OZ/K3ZJ <https://www.3830scores.com/showrumor.php?arg=RvYizV77LDLu0U>
> 0 0 246 73 13.5 169,725 PVRC
> K4TMC <https://www.3830scores.com/showrumor.php?arg=RvYizV77LxY0JU>     0
> 0 392 57 15 167,865 PVRC
> 73, Dave OZ/K3ZJ
>
> On Mon, Jul 28, 2025 at 12:40 PM Henry Pollock - K4TMC <kilo4tmc at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Call: *K4TMC <https://www.3830scores.com/findcall.php?call=K4TMC>*
>> Operator(s): K4TMC <https://www.3830scores.com/findcall.php?call=K4TMC>
>> Station: K4TMC
>>
>> Class: *SO24SSB LP*
>> QTH: NA112
>> Operating Time (hrs): 15
>> Location: Island-Fixed
>> Summary:   Compare Scores
>> <https://www.3830scores.com/comparescores.php?arg=RveLizV7YDnnU&call=K4TMC>
>> Band CW Qs CW Mults Ph Qs Ph Mults
>> 80: 0 0 0 0
>> 40: 0 0 6 6
>> 20: 0 0 353 43
>> 15: 0 0 32 7
>> 10: 0 0 1 1
>> Total: *0* *0* *392* *57* Total Score *170,430 **
>>
>> This was my first return to the Atlantic Beach, NC ‘Sand Dune’ contest
>> site since August 2024, post XYL fall recovery. There was a lot of hot air
>> and high humidity both day and night with only minimal wind (being 200
>> yards from the crashing waves at the waters edge).
>>
>> This was an unassisted with no self spotting Field Day-style
>> Fixed/DXpedition hybrid IOTA Island Station category effort. I met all of
>> the DXpedition rules except I was able to drive to the island (Bogue
>> Banks), thus forcing me to the Fixed Category. In 2023 I operated with a
>> BuddiHex beam (only 2 elements on 10, 15 & 20) and endfed halfwave
>> verticals on 20 & 40. For this 2025 effort I upgraded to 2 of the BuddiHex
>> beams with only the 10, 15 & 20M elements installed. After reading Ed,
>> N1EK’s May PVRC Newsletter article about EFHW antennas, I decided to try
>> using a single Inverted-L wire to provide 10 through 80 coverage instead of
>> separate band EFHW verticals. As luck would have it, I failed to get the
>> EFHW vertical installed, primarily due to only having one day to get the
>> antennas erected, and the awfully hot and humid conditions. The first
>> BuddiHex on the Mastwerks 10M mast did not tune well after installation, so
>> I had to lower it back down, found a broken wire on the balun lead, add
>> spare balun, raise back up. After getting the second BuddiHex erected on a
>> BlueSky Mast AL1 system I almost fainted before getting inside to the cool
>> air conditioning. The family said “enough!”; even Zoe the dog barked a lot.
>>
>> Some might consider the need for the second hexbeam versus rotating the
>> one. I wanted to switch instantly when the weaker callers were not in the
>> beam of the other antenna. This worked well when being called by Westerly
>> stations. Plus, I wanted to be prepared for possible JA, VK, ZL, etc.
>> callers.
>>
>> Just before the 1200Z contest start I went outside to walk Zoe and do a
>> last check on the antenna mast guying. It was still awfully hot and humid,
>> and no breeze. In front of the rig as things started to warm up on the
>> bands, except 10M, which stayed dead for the entire contest. 15M was OK but
>> not nearly as productive as 20. Picked a quiet spot around 14.257 and
>> started running. First hour was slow with a rate of only 25; however,
>> things picked up later in the morning. Still, the rates were never great
>> anytime during the contest. I assume that since they allowed self-spotting
>> for the contest, most ops were just clicking on spots versus turning the
>> main VFO knob. Some of us still believe that self-spotting is a form of
>> Assistance! I spent about 90% of my time just running, and only did S&P
>> when the rate slowed significantly.
>>
>> I worked fellow PVRCer IOTA teams N4OV (Harkers Island) and N4C (Core
>> Banks) on multiple bands. N4OV was a 3-man effort and N4C was a 2-man
>> effort. Looking forward to seeing their reports as a comparison to my 1-man
>> effort. Most other island stations were European (EU) or North American,
>> although I did find 3 African and 2 South American. Still, most contacts
>> were with non-island (World category) stations. Recently inducted CQ
>> Contest Hall of Famer K4BAI also called in from GA. I was really surprised
>> to get calls from a BG0 and UA9! Interesting, as I write this Monday
>> morning, I received an email note directly from UA9YJO requesting that I
>> put my log into LoTW. He wants to add NA112 to his 1000+ confirmed island
>> QSOs.
>>
>> As a result of not getting the EFHW vertical installed, I had given up on
>> working 40M. However, at one point Saturday evening 20 seemed to have dried
>> up, so I went to 40 to see how things were going there. I noted a number of
>> EU island stations booming in. So, I tried to see if the K3 tuner could
>> make itself happy driving the triband hexbeam on 40. It worked and I picked
>> up 6 new 15-point contacts. My apologies to N4C for not knowing this
>> earlier in the day when we could have added 40 to our multiband contacts.
>> After 13 hrs BIC I finished Saturday night with 377 QSOs and 55 Island
>> Mults.
>>
>> Band noise was S2 to 3, during the day making it hard to work the weakest
>> signals. The noise was much lower in the evening.
>>
>> I was back at the rig Sunday morning at 1000Z for the last 2 hours of the
>> contest on 20M and only picked up a handful of more contacts and only 2 new
>> island stations. I lost 2 contacts just before the end due to bad audio
>> from the callers or my fatigue. I spent 2 minutes trying make out one guy’s
>> call. And then it was over…the band was quite, except for the AL QSO Party
>> and POTA operations. Relative to my 2023 effort, there was a 17% increase
>> in QSOs and 50% score increase.
>>
>> As it was still early in the morning, and temperature and humidity were
>> rapidly rising, I had to immediately start taking down and packaging the 2
>> BuddiHex antennas for their next adventures, maybe the NAQP SSB and US
>> Islands QSO Party in August.
>>
>> Overall, I am very pleased with the results of my effort at a ripe old
>> age of 73. As a bonus from the extreme physical and mental conditions
>> experienced I lost a desirable 4 lbs; my doctor will be happy! Oh, did I
>> say it was very hot and humid…
>>
>> Station: Facility is family beach house on top of a 15 -18 ft ancient
>> sand dune approximately 200 yards from ocean to the South, and 50 yards
>> from saltwater marsh and sound to the East – West; Elecraft K3+ with Heil
>> HC-4 mic element; two Buddipole BuddiHex, oriented to Europe at 25 ft and
>> West at 30 ft.
>>
>> 73,
>>
>> Henry – K4TMC
>>
>> * N1MM rescore tool resulted in another 2565 points than what I reported
>> to 3830.
>>
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>
>