Writeup | New England Scores | Scores from Outside New England | Breakdowns of Top Stations | Soapbox Comments
W/VE Stations Outside New England
AA5JG – Thank you for sponsoring the contest, I had fun in it.
AD4RE – Enjoyed the contest!! TU
AF9J – Had fun in the NEQP. Wish I’d had more time to work more bands and modes.
K3TW – Many thanks for another enjoyable New England QSO Party. Conditions on the lower bands were better this year with limited openings on 20m. Congratulations to the mobile stations for once again activating the rare counties.
K3WWP – All QSO’s were made with a power output of 930-990 milliwatts because I was working on the North American QRP CW Club (NAQCC) May challenge of making as many QSO’s as possible using milliwatt (QRPp) power. Curious about that? Visit http://www.usatek.net/~yoel/.
K4DZR – Good activity in the contest.
K4ECP – First time participating in contest this year! See you next year
K5PEW – I had fun that weekend working the 7th call area, Indiana, and NEQP!
K6CSL – Very poor conditions, almost nil on Saturday, a little better on Sunday. We could sure be better if we had a sunspot or two. 73’s to all.
K7HC – I only made contacts for two reasons. To give your guys some points – and to try to get a ME QSO confirmed on LoTW. I am trying to work WAS using ONLY LoTW QSLs, and needed Maine. i did get a confirmation during this event!
K7RFW – Noisy, but did get a few despite the KW stations and a wall of rock.
K8DD – Since I used the MARAC module in WriteLog, I used their county list for the county abbreviations, so they might be different from the ones that your QSO Party uses. [worked fine!]
K8VFR – Another great contest, so nice to see all the NE stations out!
K0FTC – I really enjoy those NE QSO’s I’ve made during the NEQP
K0RU – Hope the 50 or so I bagged will send a QSL or LOTW though that would be nice. Hahaha. I love working the QSO Parties but sometimes I just give out the station, I should next time work it to compete that would be fun.
KA3UOL – I operated single operator QRP from PA. Enjoyed working the contest from here. 73 to all.
KB7N – Thank you for a fun contest
KB8FZY – I had fun. thank you
KB9OWD – My first time in NEQP! Thanks for all the qso’s and several new counties! Score is a new claimed record for M/S from WI!
KC2MHU – Tons o’ fun!
KD2MX – Time was short for me this year.
KD5JHE – enjoyed working the qso party
KE5HMR – This was my first year, but looking forward to next year.
KE7DX – The 7QP/NEQP contests marked my re-entry into HF operation. I had been inactive since 1999. Enjoyed all the contests immensely!
KG4URP – Only found reasonable conditions on 40 and 80 meters this year. Found that VOAProp was a huge help in predicting when a band was worth working. Thanks again to everyone for yet another interesting QSO party.
KG4YNM – Seemed to be one of those weekends when everybody had to have me do something important to take me away from the radio. I’ll try to do better next year.
KI4VEU – Didn’t have much time to operate, but enjoyed it when I did. Hope to see everyone later this year for the Tennessee QSO Party.
KJ4AOM – Thanks for a great contest. Lots of fun and great practice!
KK5NA – Great Contest! Lots of nice Ops and good Ops.
KQ1X – I achieved my objective this year, which was to work the HAMCOW on Martha’s Vineyard!
N3TG – Too bad so many other QSO parties on the same weekend, it makes logging a bit difficult. Thanks for a fun time, however.
N4ARO – Thanks to all the mobiles helping to hand out new multis. Great contest.
N4PN – Another NEQP in the bag. Still great fun. Thanks to all of the mobiles with K1KI/m leading the way with 19 Qs. Missed two mults this year – Boo! ESSVT and NANMA
N5PO – Great Contest. Good ops.
N6QZS – Great event. Best on Sunday – not so much QRM. Goal was to work all NE states, which I did. Rig IC-718, ant is Inv-L. Backup – TenTec Scout.
N8II – Thanks for the Q’s. I was trying to work 4 QP’s Saturday, but trolled 40 CW a lot on Sunday. Activity on 40 died down to near zero early afternoon for 2-3 hours, but the band was still open.
N9HDE – I enjoyed the contest. There were a lot of good New England signals into Iowa
N0UY – I was working from my back yard with my field day antenna. Just working out the bugs I guess. I was logging on a piece of paper, then later entered my notes in N3FJP contest software.
NE8J – First Time In Your Contest!!! Loved It!!
NF4A – Only got to operate for a little over 11 hours.No 15 or 10 meter opening. Great job by the mobiles!! Tried it without packet this year… didn’t get a sweep.
NG7Z – Just like last year, I spent Saturday doing the 7QP and recording the NEQP exchanges by hand. Then spent Sunday roaming the bands looking for unworked stations and mobiles. They must have had really good ears because they were WAY down in the noise but heard me. Many thanks to the sponsors for their effort.
NO2D – Chose Low Power instead of QRP this year because bands not too good. But, lots of activity. Ran 7-Land QSO Party at the same time, but did that one QRP. Confusing, but very enjoyable. Thanks
NO5W – I had just returned from a long trip to run mobile in the FQP and sat down to the radio to see what was going on in the NEQP, 7QP, INQP, and MARAC. You know just to listen a little bit and hand out a few Qs. Well you know the rest of the story — after a few Qs I was hooked. Wound up logging on paper and sending by hand as the interface supporting all my automated stuff was still in the vehicle. Great fun as usual.
NT4XT – Lightning struck one house over the weekend before. Via the Cable TV and Ethernet, my shack computer was waxed, along with another Ether-card, Cable-Modem, Router. Somehow it also hosed the front-end of my trusty Corsair, I’m thinking the pulse from the hit — as the audible BANG of the strike was loud enough in our house to open the spice cabinet doors upstairs in the kitchen. I removed my Pegasus from it’s sealed, back from repair box Friday but it was dead. Who says lightning doesn’t strike twice. That was a bummer, certainly unusual coming from the Service I had used at least 3 other occasions. So I was left with no real rig. Many thanks to K4AQ for coming thru and rushing his FT-817 over to me.
In the mean time I was able to log several dozen Q’s on 40m CW with my K-1. When the 817 arrived it was a crash course in learning to operate a does it all whiz bang wunder-box that does everything with mostly 4 buttons and a multi-knob. But I did get it going on enough to get on 80m for a few. On Sunday had a bunch of key NEQP hours taken from a GSA Badge Clinic we were hosting. It was a good thing (the “Stress Less” badge). That brought me back to the final hour of the event in a nice mellow mind-frame. Highlights for me included any time I worked a mobile station. Especially I was impressed when K1KI in one of his many counties dug me out first try when he was difficult copy for me. Must have been ESP for him.
Also, busting W1AW pileup on 20 SSB. That was a kick. Topped it off with W1MX, M.I.T., when the contest clock still was reading 00:00 on 40m and THAT was a real kick. Thanks to that operator for hanging in there in the final minute trying to get my unusual callsign. As usual, I much enjoyed this contest. Seems like it’s the only one I have time for these days! I appreciated the actual RS report from AA1KS on Moose Island. Once I was surprised at how difficult it was for one of those super stations to hear me, dah dah dah— (But then I realized I was on the 2 – 2.5 W setting, no wonder, LOL– it’s hard to learn the 817 on the fly). So it’s a good thing, that prompted me to go searching for a problem and discover the 5W setting.
Looking forward to next year. Since I got a new faster shack computer, I might actually delve into simultaneous triple event mode (7 land, InQP, plus NEQP, I see many people ran 3 logs concurrently and did just that). Thanks again New England for a very classy party!
VE4EAR – Thanks. Not much time this year. A snow/ice storm destroyed my antennas a few days before the contest so using just a makeshift dipole. See you next year hopefully!
VE5BCS – Sorry I missed the 25 minimum [for a certificate] but conditions not great and had to spend time with family. I enjoyed the test. I heard more stations than heard me. [We sent him a certificate]
VA1MM – I only had a few hours to spend this year, hope to be back next year.
VA7ST – Worked 38 Qs and 24 counties. Had a good time mixing in NEQP with 7QP. Thanks for the fun!
W1RH – Much better conditions this year from W6. 7QP wall of RF somewhat of a problem on Saturday but not a problem on sunday since 7QP is a one day test. K1EP mobile and K1KI mobile both had good sigs. Thanks to K1KI for letting me know he was about to cross over into another county.
W2UDT – Spent most of Saturday chasing Indiana Counties (sorry). Saturday 80m CW was not bad. Got on Sunday and 40m was long as was 80m. Between chores worked two 20m stations on backscatter. Sunday afternoon was better on 80m both SSB and CW. 40m was a bust because the band was long all day. From NJ it was hard to work NE most of the time due to propagation. Fortunately, the lower bands cooperated a bit for a few hours both nights. Anyway, had fun and see you all again next year! Keep up the good work on turning out stations.
W3CQB – Pennsylvania is too close for 20 meters. I have no qrp equipment for 80 meters, so I stayed on 40 CW the entire contest. Had a ball!
W4KKY – Contest was fun. Just wish I could operate on both Saturday and Sunday, but due to work, I am unable to operate both days. Conditions were not that good on 20 meters.
W4PB – this was the the first time i used a computer for logging
W5JNP – This contest was fun. It was hard trying to run the band during the 7th Area QP & Indiana. I had three logging programs running at the same time. Challenging and fun! This was my first time to work this contest. I can’t wait until next year.
W6RKC – Looks like the word got out this year about NEQP – lots of Left Coast stations on!
W7DRA – too many contest all at once!! usual stuff SX71, ARC5 vfo, three 805s in parallel
W7GVE – A nice QSO Party!
W9QL – Thank you for a fun contest. I did not have as much time to participate as I would have liked, with several other QSO parties going on at the same time. But, I still had a good time and worked some new counties along the way. Hope to see you next year.
W0BR – Line noise was constant S9 (sometimes +20) – thanks to all who stuck around long enough for me to pull you out of the noise.
W0PQ – Skilled & courteous ops, my favorite QSO Party. Best year in 3.
W0TLE – Glad to send the log in to you. Had a good time operating the QSO Party.
WA1FCN – I always give this QSO PARTY a serious effort. It is one of my favorites. This year I was trying to get back my first place finish from 2 years ago. Thanks to all the mobiles especially N1FJ who seemed to hunt me out.
WA0KDS – Great contest and interesting band condtions.
WB4ZPF – Another great NEQP. Congrats to all on NEQP committee for their efforts in making it work.
WM9DX – I enjoyed my self that weekend!
DX Stations
CU2JT – As usual, lot of patience needed to get a decent score. Not many different stations worked (where were the Litchfields and Providences? It was nice to be able get some 80M contacts for a change. A special thanks to Tom, K1KI and his crew who stood for 20 percent of my worked counties. Nice going, Tom, with today’s gas price, you certainly deserve a BIG bottle of champagne! After this, conditions could only improve. Will be back next year for sure.
HK3Q – Thanks for a nice contest
VK4TT – G’day to all those I worked. Used SD programme by EI5DI. It worked very FB
New England Stations
AD1L – NE stations should be able to work NE counties as multipliers to promote 10-15-80m regional contacts and encourage participation of smaller stations/Single band categories needed/Separate formal CW-RTTY-PSK modes perhaps?/Same weekend as 7th area QP not so cool/tnx to all
AE1P – Had fun,wish bands were better,73 all
AF1T – I couldn’t participate for the first several hours, but did get on late Saturday and most of Sunday. Conditions outside the US and to the North were not good – I did not hear much from Europe and nothing from Alaska or Canadian territories. I was glas to help represent Merrimack County.
AK1W (K5ZD) -Wow! The most fun in this contest ever. Conditions were not great, but that actually helped scores because it was easy to find a clear frequency. The 7QP and Indiana Parties generated lots of activity and QSOs on day 1. Day 2 seemed to have an infinite number of people willing to help out with contacts – especially on SSB! Had many SSB runs that were well over 100/hour. Operated a lot of Saturday (7 hours) and not so much on Sunday (3 hours). Did do some DXing to build up the multiplier. Missed a lot of easy countries in the ARI contest, but conditions weren’t the best for working Europe. Worked all 50 states (had 48 after day 1 and just needed SD/ND). Personal best score ever in NEQP. Can’t imagine how much more fun this will be when we have some sunspots.
K1BV – Despite poor conditions, it is always enjoyable to be the hunted station.
K1EP/m -Well, Murphy almost got the better of us at the start this year. Everything was checked out before we set off on our journey. We pull up up to our first county about 15 minutes before the start to turn everything on and do the final check out. The computer logging program started to complain and go nuts. It took about a half hour of debugging and screaming to realize that somehow the PCMCIA serial card was either damaged or something happened to cause Windows to mess it up. A quick switch to a USB-serial cable solved the problem and we were on the air. The serial link was necessary for both computer control and CW keying. Don’t try using a paddle at 60mph on some of these New England roads!
The weather was lousy this year, damp, wet, and cold. It had to be the worst. But on the bright side, I spent some time cleaning up the inverter noise so that it wasn’t a factor in receiving this year, as it was last year. Once the serial problem was fixed, we didn’t have anything technical go wrong.
Another big factor was using the K3 mobile. The radio was great! I set up the mobile so that the operator was in the rear seat. The rear seats are split so the radio was on the folded down part of the other seat. The passenger front seat was pushed all the way up. There was plenty of leg room and it was very comfortable to operate. We almost always were running so even though the radio was handy, it wasn’t necessary to be turning knobs too often. This realization came in handy on Sunday, when I had to go out single op because W1VE had family obligations. I switched the arrangement because I didn’t feel like getting out at every new stop and running around the car in the rain! I folded the passenger seat down and put the radio facing forward but on the rear seat deck. I could turn around to check the radio during operation (always parked!) but I wasn’t staring at the radio most of the time. This also worked well from the driver’s seat.
As far as operating goes, it seemed a little down. It was tough to get some runs going. On the other hand, we were running, the short term rates were as high as around 150 or almost 200. But we quickly ran out of callers. We were going to stick with just 20 and 40, but late Saturday, we decided to try 80. Somewhere in CT, we switched to 80 and found that the car electronics didn’t really like that. So, we had to turn down the power to about 50 watts so that we could drive! But even at reduced power, we had some good runs on 80. We also had some intentional jamming. As if it isn’t hard enough to deal with road noise, ignition noise, low signal levels, potholes, and being cramped in a car, some yahoo decides to jam us with a RTTY signal. This was intentional jamming, not a RTTY op, we could tell that. Luckily, the K3 has a great receiver and didn’t stop us from making Qs.
We did 14 counties the first day. We could have done as many the second, but as I said before, I was single op. The strategy is different then. You drive to a new county, park, operate, then move on. In multi op, you drive at a leisurely pace because you want to have some time in each county. You can switch off to take food and bio breaks. Very efficient operating. Speaking of breaks, Sunday about 1PM, I decided to stop and get a sub sandwich for lunch. I parked at my favorite rest stop with the sub (YORME), got on the air and broke out the sub. Normally, there is a short delay when you start a new county before people find you. Not here. Sub in one hand, keyboard in the other, I started probably one of the best runs of Sunday. The meter was in the mid 100’s as I tried to keep the sub from dripping on the keyboard! Coincidentally, when I had the sub finished, the pileup disappeared.
Even though the weather was the worst of any NEQP I can remember, we had a good time because the radio and setup were working well. We didn’t get too lost (well we did miss a couple of turns) and made a decent showing. Since there are a fixed number of mults for US/VE, it is tough to run up a big score without working DX. And we didn’t seem to find too many. Except for a consistent CU2JT who worked us multiple times. We had a few others, but not enough to really impact the score. We also stuck to CW, as both of us are good CW ops. As the FQP people can tell you, CW gets out better mobile. Plus, I had a sore throat and didn’t feel like shouting in the mike.
Thanks to all who called us. Signal reports would be nice. We felt that we were getting out most of the time. If we didn’t come back to you right away, it probably wasn’t that we didn’t hear you, there are a lot of things that happen while you are in a temporary mobile setup that don’t happen when you are at home. It was difficult sometimes to see the keyboard at night. I tried to find a decent night light, but didn’t get one. For a while, I had a 4D-cell maglite balanced on my shoulder to light up the keyboard. Try doing that at 65mph on some New England road! Anyway, thanks again for the Qs and see you next year.
K1ESE – Great fun! Highlights – Good runs on 80m on Saturday night, CU2JT on 3 bands booming in, 3 QSOs in a row that were new multipliers late Sunday afternoon. Lowlights – RTTY on 40m, 20m propagation (for a while on Sunday worked a bunch of Italian stations on 20m as they were about all I heard), slow going Sunday 10am to 5 pm. Thanks to all.
K1JB – I usually spend a few hours at home on Saturday and then operate /p on Sunday by flying to relatively rare counties in Maine and set up to operate at the airports. But between the weather and the plane being in for maintenance I stayed home this year. It’s seductive. It was warm and dry with plenty of food and drink available, not to mention bathroom facilities. It may be hard to pry me out of the house again next year! Yet I admire those who braved the elements and Murphy to get out this year and cover so many counties. Conditions were not great, but as others have noted that meant it was easier to find a run frequency and there was almost an endless supply of non-contest callers on 20 SSB. Some of them wanted to ragchew, and a bunch worked me several times (forget dupes; I had some trupes and one quadrupe). But it’s great that they do call, so all is forgiven. I ran 99% of the time and only did S&P for a minute or two when coming onto a new band/mode. Worked all states except DE. Very little DX. Only a few Europeans called on Saturday, and I had to be out from 0930 — 1300 (local) on Sunday so missed whatever morning opening there was. I checked 15 several times. Never heard anything on SSB, but worked six stations on CW. Nothing on 10. All in all I put in about 15 hours and they went quickly.
K1KI/m – Another fun drive on northern New England roads before the tourists arrive. Started out at the Cabot Creamery (good cheese!)in Vermont. Weather wasn’t great but it wasn’t a washout – and actually had an hour of partial sunshine at the end. Usually see some interesting wildlife but this time the list was just one turkey (and a roadkill moose). Added some extra grounding and the antennas behaved better than last year. Conditions seemed better also with more west coast QSOs this time. Even squeezed in a couple on 15m. Never worked a New York station and never heard a DL… I know I missed a few other states also. Worked 332 different stations overall. Nice to get some repeat customers as the counties changed. Had the most QSOs with K1GU/4(20), followed by N4PN(19) NF4A(15) CU2JT(14) VE1RGB(12) N4UC(11) K0JPL(10) N4CW(10) and W4SVO(10). Had at least five QSOs with 35 stations (and at least two with 145 stations). Only 54 QSOs with New England stations – most were way too weak when in northern NE. Hit 22 counties overall – all but one in VT, and some in NH MA and CT. Planned to go to two more but missed a turn in the twilight late Saturday… The last 2.5 hours was a lot of fun with six counties and new people to work in each one!
K1PUB – I just got back into ham radio in January, after 40 years QRT (yes, I got my old call back), so I didn’t really intend to enter. I really need to get some logging software!
K1RO – Lots of activity, great way to spend a rainy and cool Spring weekend.
K1RX – Family activity on Saturday so very limited operation but Sunday, spent a good part of the day on the few bands that were open. Nice activity all around. 20 SSB seemed to be the bottomless pit. Thanks for all the multi band Q’s with so many.
K1TTT – WOW! Averaged over 100/hr for the 20 hours, got WAS when Alaska called us on 20m cw Sunday. Only 250 dx contacts, a few less than last year, mostly in the ARI contest out of Europe. Having both 40m beams in the air and a female voice running sure made a difference, last year we only had 240 qso’s on 40m, this year was 847. I never did hear anyone on 10m, and only went to 15m to work an LU and CE multiplier who were running in the ARI contest.
K1WCC – It was great to sit in a dry and warm shack after NEARFEST! Got on Saturday afternoon and had little luck S&P on 20. Then went to 40 and ran contacts until it was time to hit the hay after a looong day! 40 was in great shape, very little noise. Didn’t get on again until after 4 PM Sunday and stuck with it to the end, despite a defective sodium vapor streetlight next door that wipes out the bands when it ramps up and stutters on! This is a great little contest. The fan in my rig rarely comes on but it sure did this weekend!
K2KQ/1 – Low power and low wet strings for antennas do not add up to big runs. Add that to my allergy to microphones and you have the result. A side effect of being away from high terrain is the absence of local scatter centers…meaning that, in the absence of help from the ionosphere, most of New England is simply inaudible for most of the day here. It’s difficult to know whether there’s another station on one’s frequency.
KA1VGM – Equipment and antenna failure. Lost out on most of the contest.
KB1MU – What if we had some real propagation?
KB1NH – Mary (NE1F) and I (WB1EDI) tried a Multi-op in a fairly serious attempt. She did most of the SSB and I did all of the CW. I am very happy with our results. about 95%+ was running which we have not done much of before. I set the win key at 17WPM to make sure I didn’t need many repeats and that was good speed. maybe next time ill go for 20. A few of those types of events ought to help get my speed up. I was logging for Mary so she could concentrate on working the rare ones. (Not many) I did give K1TTT the wrong call on SSB in one of my short stints as SSB op. i caught it quick though and gave him the KB1NH call for the log. The more SSB i do the more i like CW. I have been trying to get the members of my other club GSARA to give some contesting a try so I am giving my Score to them for this contest.
KB1OIQ – First ham radio contest — ever!
KC1V – Another great QSO party! I was happy just to have 80 meters this year – there really are Hams in RI and ME
KN1H – A very fun contest, I’ll set aside more time for next year.
KK1X – Thanks for a fun contest. Walk For Hunger took a large chunk out of my operating time as it does every year, but I managed to make a fair showing. 75 meters was working quite well for me.
KX1D – great time
N1ABY – Another personal best…I couldn’t believe how looong 40 was on Satudray night! See ya next year!
N1API – Since 10 and 15 were closed, I decided to do a single op 20 SSB mono. I had alot of fun this year with this and it’s the first time that I’ve done a single band operation in a multi band contest. Loooking forward to next year!
N1BAA – Well….what a time…. !!! My NINE year old son decided he wanted to “help” this weekend…so how could I say no!!! <smiling> He did very well…about 80 QSO on SSB for him..and thanks to everyone for being SOOOO very patient with him!!! I am a proud daddy.
N1DC – Great fun again. Thanks to all the organizers for another fine event. Listened many times to both 10 + 15M hoping against hope that I could build my score with a nice run on 15. . Heard K1GU/4 calling CQ on 15 and worked him. He was the only station I heard on 15M all weekend. Figured there would be a few ground wave QSO’s with mobiles but no results. 10 was 100% dead right from the start. So it was 20, 40, and 80 only from here. My Omni 7 worked flawlessly and the noise reduction circuitry works very well to kill the persistent QRM and QRN on 40 and 80. I exceeded my QSO count from last year 471 vs. 463, but only found 56 multipliers, down from 65 last year. Didn’t hear much DX even with the ARI contest running. I put the beam on EU several times but heard very little. Probably spent about 30 minutes calling CQ beaming EU with no results. However, I was pleasantly surprised by calls from DX stations while running stateside stations. I do not understand why this contest doesn’t generate more DX activity. Very surprised to hear nothing from the Caribbean. I hope my score holds up in the Single Op low power category. Trying to defend my MA low power title for the past 2 years. Thanks to all that answered my CQ. It was a blast again! Statistics: States = 44 Missed DE, ID, MT, AK, SD, NDProvinces = 4 DX = 8
N1EP – Had a great time. Missed my goal by 3 QSO’s! Hi
N1FJ/m – Conditions from VT were not so hot!
N1NN – 1st New England QSO Party
N1SV/m – I almost forgot how much fun this contest is mobile at the bottom of the sunspot cycle from the mobile! Please bring back the sunspots! Started the contest in Brookline, NH (HILNH) in the high school parking lot about 5-10 minutes from my house and just over the MA / NH line. I operated for a couple of hours but was unable to run and as such was relegated to S+P on 20m. With multiple contests on I was l happy to find an intermittent supply of stations to work. After dinner I sat in my driveway (MIDMA) and worked 20, 40, and 80m. I was able to run on 80m in small spurts for a while. Early Sunday afternoon I drove out on Rte 119 just over the NH line into New Ipswith (CHENH) and struggled on 20m to work anyone. QRN was S8-9 and it was tough going for the couple of hours I spent there. After driving back over the state line to Ashburnham I operated in WORMA. Again high QRN and very tough going but was happy to give out WORMA to the deserving few.
N1URA – Another fun contest. Got to use my brand new CW Touch Key (thanks to those who were patient, the key needs a soft touch!). I set out to beat my personal score from last year and achieved it. A fun weekend in all… Near-fest & NEQP!
N1ZN – Great contest as always. It’s always fun to be the station everyone is trying to work.
N8WXQ – Great fun. Better conditions than last year.
NE1RD – I worked the contest with a pair of Elecraft K2s at 5 watts with one on phone and the other on CW. I just wanted to get used to the idea of two radios here as I work towards SO2R. QRP continues to amaze. I worked a fellow in Colorado who was amazed 5 watts was enough. I was right above the noise level on his end. We talked about it for a minute and then he lowered his power down to 5 watts, too. “Can you hear me?”, he asked. “Of course!”, I replied. Sure, you lose a couple of S-units, but everything still works. I was able to do some running on 75m Saturday. I tried running on 20m Sunday with little success. This was my first NEQP mixed (both CW and phone) and that was fun. The relaxed atmosphere in a contest like this one also meant I could stop and work a couple of special event stations, too. That was a nice bonus! Thanks to all for having the patience to pull me out of the mud–and for putting up with my 7 thumbs on the paddles.
W1ACT (KE1LI) -Thanks to all that worked W1ACT. We did our best ever with +700 q’s. The final totals were not in when I left the station yesterday to catch the ferry home. 20M & 40M were the bands to be on. Not much DX was worked.
W1ACT (W2DAN) – This was the 15th year for W!ACT’s Annual Martha’s Vineyard Trip. This year was extra special with the new HAMCOW. HAMCOW.NET documents the building and maiden voyage to Martha’s Vineyard for this years NEQP. This year was a great success and we will be back again next year.
W1HIS – My sense this year was that participation by US hams both inside and outside New England has increased, although DX participation was low. Scores seem higher this year than they were last year, despite worse propagation this year (IMO). I look forward to seeing how the results come out (next April, I expect). I wasn’t able to organize a mini-DXpedition to a rare county or counties for NEQP this year, but I’ll start earlier next year.
W1JQ – Wow… best score ever, despite condx It was a long slog. I worked much more of the contest than I thought I’d be able to, and got my best score yet, in fairly punk conditions. Wish I had broken 100K points, but what the heck. That’s what I got for going to bed at midnight Saturday. Surprised at the number of DX multipliers–24 or so (would have to check). Nice to have a number of Europeans call me on 40 Sunday afternoon–particularly since my 40M yagi was aimed W. Spent almost the whole time running (er, walking–there were a few sprints, but that was it). One frustration with running is that you have a LOT more dupes. Never found DE, HI, or AK. Didn’t work lots of NE mobiles, like I did last year. But probably worked more NE counties than in the past.
W1KQ – Can’t wait to get the tower and X9 up for next year’s ops.
W1NG – Great contest for poor conditions. Didn’t make a single contact on 15 or 10 meters this year but the stations never stopped coming on 20 SSB. Thanks to all the stations outside of New England for their participation and QSOs. Already have a stack of QSLs to answer in less than a week!
W1OH – Good to get on a bit on Saturday and again on Sunday. Rig here is Elecraft K2 @ 5w to a doublet in my condo attic. Conditions seemed to be pretty bad (especially on 20M on Sunday) but had fun anyway!
W1TO – Great contest as always.
W1TR – Made just a few QSOs to help the local guys
W1WIU – Not many multi’s this year. Worked lots of stations in the Indiana and 7 call area contests. Always have fun meeting old friends. Used Icom 746 Pro at 100 watts with a G5RV and MA5B. Manual loging sure is a chalange (only 1 dupe!). See you next year.
W1XX – This was the first year I ran high power and had my full compliment of antennas available to me in the NEQP. I also noted a significant switch in activity from what used to be mainly a CW contest to much more use of phone. This time around 20 Meter SSB was an absolute endless pit of QSOs. No matter that I would try another band and then come back to 20 thinking it was all worked out, another endless stream of callers would appear. I simply could not work that band out no matter how much I tried. Although I checked 15 many times Sunday aftenoon for signs of life, it never materialized for me. No QSOs on either 15 or 10. Worked a ton of mobiles across the country, but few in New England since I was on 20 so much. Interesting that two bicycle mobiles called in with good signals. Had two Alaska’s and two Hawaii’s call in with North and South Dakota being the last two states worked. NEQP continues to be one of my favoritecontests.
W1ZPB – Sorry for such brief participation in NEQP, but just back from three weeks in Hong Kong visiting son and family, so just made it. Thanks for organizing it.
WA1VIL – Great activity! Aptly named as a QSO party rather than a contest. Its an opportunity to do more than exchange a signal report and QTH for credit and it was fun to talk with ops who used to live in New England even if it was 85 in Florida and 50 here! Would it be possible to break out the data on digital contacts? I didn’t run PSK and it would be interesting to know how much activity there was beyond CW and SSB-maybe next year, I’ll run all digital all the time.
WA1Z/m – Plans were running flawlessly until 1600z on Sunday when the laptop I used for logging failed to boot. As I was traveling down Route 1 in Maine between county runs I had noticed that the laptop had mysteriously shutoff. I suspected that perhaps the battery had been drained somehow (I power the laptop with a few jump-starter style batteries) or that the thing somehow got into hibernation mode. When I got to my operating spot in Lincoln ME I tried troubleshooting the problem for about an hour. After trying every trick in the book I know it appeared there was no way to recover the log. I couldn’t get into Safe Mode or a command prompt; the thing just failed to boot each time. I’ve never seen a computer fail this hard. Once I realized that it was possible that the log was lost, and with the deluge of rain coming down, I figured I had two choices. I could log by paper and continue on my planned route of 12 counties (which would require a 2+ hour ride home after the contest) or change routes and head towards home and just work guys doing head copy. I elected to do the latter. I ran guys from Lincoln ME, down route RT95 into NH and Northeast Massachusetts. I ended up activating 14 counties and missed only one planned county, Androscoggin. I talked to N4PN just before I made my final decision and I heard that all ME counties had been activated by mid-day on Sunday thanks to the efforts of WW1M/N0HF (nice job, Bruce) and others. Despite the problem I still had a blast. I was approaching 400 QSOs when the failure occurred and I think I ran another 100 QSOs on the way home. Also ran about 100 guys on 40 and 80 last night from home in ROC NH. Ed mentioned the lack of DX. I’ve found that the best strategy for grabbing some DX mults as a mobile is to pick off the stations right away on Saturday at the start of the contest. The ARI contest starts at 2000z and ends on Sunday at the same time. With the local springtime conditions and given where we are in the solar cycle, getting them right away on Saturday at 2000z seems to be the best time if condx allow. The NEQP tends to start slow on Saturday anyway. However, this year, all I could work on 20 were I, IS0 and ZC4LI. It was 40 Meters that saved it around 2300z when I picked up about 10 DX mults. I worked about 10 more Sunday morning on 20.
WB1HGA – Missed part of Saturday and Sunday morning, but still had fun with me K1, a Windom antenna and all battery power (except the laptop).
WB1Z (KK1W) – I announced at the HCRA meeting on Friday I would open my station to a multi-op effort and had one taker. Eric, KB1JVI came over Saturday afternoon and worked well into the evening banging them away on 20 phone. I spent the remainder of Saturday as well as a lot of time Sunday on the air. Conditions were minimal on 10 and 15, but 20, 40 & 80 made up for it. As always a fun contest and something to look forward to again next year.
WN1GIV (N4BP) – We visited my wife’s daughter and grandson in Burlington, VT (CHIVT), so I brought along some wire and my Elecraft K3. This was a part time effort due to other activities (grandson’s 5th birthday!). The antenna was a dipole, about 30ft on each side, strung out in a V-shape in the back yard from an upstairs window. This antenna was a major handicap, but I was able to work a few stations and had a good time with my fifty plus year old Novice call.
WO1N – Sorry, limited time this year
WW1M/m – I drove 929.9 miles and did all 16 counties in Maine. Dan N0HF sat in the back and made 280 Qs – mults to be determined. Writelog lets you change counties along the way; it seems to recognize dupes correctly but not mults, especially DX. Despite the wx, it was fun.