Writeup | New England Scores | Scores Outside New England | Breakdowns of Top Stations | Soapbox Comments
W/VE Stations Outside New England
AA0CL – Using indoor mag-loop antennas
AA8TA – GREAT PARTICIPATION IN THE NEQP. WORKED MANY 7QP ON 20M AND 40M. LESS ACTIVITY IN THE STATE NEXT DOOR — IN — AND JUST TWO QSOs
AB1A – OPERATED PORTABLE IN OHIO FOREST AT POTA K-5439 WITH BATTERY AND SOLAR POWER WITH A HOME BUILT 133FT ENDFED WIRE STRUNG HIGH IN A TREETOP W SLINGSHOT. ALSO OPERATED A SPECIAL EVENT STATION W3S STAR WAR FANS “MAY THE 4TH BE WITH YOU” THANKS FOR ALL THE CONTACTS ALONG WITH ALL THE VOLUNTEERS WHO DO ALL THE WORK TO PUT QSO PARTY ON. MAY THE 4TH BE WITH YOU ALWAYS.
AC2YD – THANKS FOR ALL THE GOOD EARS AND ANTENNAS COPYING MY 2W QRP SIGNAL FROM NJ! RIG: SOFTROCK RXTX ENSEMBLE, QUISK S/W XCVR, 1/4-WAVE FAN VERTICAL, 32 RADIALS.
AD6AD – MY FIRST NEW HAMPSHIRE
K0GEO – YET ANOTHER ENJOYABLE NEQP! WISH I’D HAD MORE TIME TO OPERATE!
K4BAI – Thanks for the QSOs. Another FB QSO party. Wish my beam were working! Had to use wire antennas on all bands.
K7NJ – Very high winds messed up the rotator on the 4 element SteppIR. I thought the antenna was pointing to W1 and Europe when in fact it was pointing out to the Pacific. The direction of the antenna was wrong for most of the contest. I was thinking that California is sure strong – must be excellent conditions (hi). After discovering that it was not possible to sufficiently rotate the antenna, I put the SteppIR into reverse mode and worked for at least 3 or 4 hours off the back of the antenna while reversing its pattern.
K8LF – MEGA QSO PARTY WEEKEND. ITS SO GOOD THAT N1MM SUPPORTS ONE LOG FOR ALL THE STATES THIS WEEKEND. IT WAS AT TIMES ALMOST LIKE ARRL SS CW WEEKEND WITH ALL THE STATES ON AT THE SAME TIME. NEVER HEARD A PEEP ON 15M OR 10M.
K9UIY – The NEQP is one of my favorite QSO Party events each year. I did QRP CW only again this year and had an opportunity to break my own record for IL QRP stations, but I was visited by family with my youngest grandson whom I had not seen (or hugged) since Christmas of 2019. What a joy that was to have them be able to safely visit! Time off the air was well spent indeed !! Thanks for all the Q’s and for copying my little 5W signals. 73, Vic
KA0PQW – FUN CONTEST THANKS FOR HAVING IT.
KE0TT – K3/10 RUNNING 5 WATTS TO A 60′ DIPOLE UP ABOUT 45′ BROADSIDE TO NEQP STATIONS. THANKS FOR THE Q’S, AND YOUR COPY OF MY QRP SIGS! C U NEXT TIME
N4RWH – FUN CONTEST. THANKS TO THOSE WHO WORKED TO MAKE THIS A SUCCESSFUL CONTEST.
NO2D – 7 LAND, NEQP, AND INDIANA QSO PARTIES ALL TOGETHER MAKES FOR AN MIX OF CONTACTS. NEVER HEARD DELAWARE, AND ONLY ONE INDIANA STATION. HEARD ALL SIX NE STATES BUT DID NOT GET THE RI STATION DESPITE MY REPEATED CALLS. ALWAYS FUN.
VA2EBI(W1EBI) – Feels odd being an outsider. Short propagation wasn’t great between Quebec and New England.
VA3AMX – FIRST TIME ON THE IN7QPNE QSO PARTY – A LITTLE CONFUSING AT THE BEGINNING BUT GRADUALLY MADE MY WAY. I STARTED LATE (2200Z) ON 20M QRP AND AFTER A FEW CALLS AND NO RETURNS I GAVE UP. I CHANGED TO LOW POWER CATEGORY WITH 80W. STILL TERRIBLE ON 20M – I WAS DISCOURAGED. LATE NIGHT ON 40 AND 80M THE BANDS WERE FANTASTIC AND HAD A LOT OF FUN. I STOPPED AT 0600Z WHEN I WAS NOT HEARING ANYTHING NEW. ON SUNDAY I WAS ON AND OFF DUE TO FAMILY CHORES. BUT STILL HAD A GREAT TIME ON THE RADIO. 20M WAS DEFINITELY DEAD FOR ME, SO 40 AND 80 WERE THE KING. RIG: IC-7300 @80W ANTENNA HY-GAIN DX-88.
W3SA – IT WAS FUN WHILE IT LASTED UNTIL SOLID STATE AMP BLEW ITS FINALS
W9PA – At age 80 I mainly do assisted S&P these days. In the good old days I was only a SSB operator but now find CW more “calm” and requiring less energy. I mostly do CW although I don’t copy it any better than I did when I was a 14 year-old Novice in 1954 but the RBN lets me give out QSO. Skip really limits making a lot of in-state Indiana QSO’s. We have some active Rovers but many are only workable when 80 opens. Rather than sitting on my hands I work the 7QP & NEQP. There was really good activity in the NEQP this year.
W9TCV – WOW, WHAT A GREAT TIME – MULTIPLE STATES IN ONE LOG! THIS WAS A GREAT OPPORTUNITY TO WORK ACROSS THE COUNRY. EVEN THOUGH THE BANDS DIDN’T ALWAYS COOPERATE IT WAS FUN! TKS FOR THE Q’S!
WA6URY – OPERATED REMOTE FROM TOKYO, JAPAN
WB2NVR – This had to be the worst propagation ever! Trying to work NE on 20 M from NY is not fun.
WN7Y – BETTER THAN EXPECTED BAND CONDITIONS, AND LOTS OF HAMS ON-THE-AIR TO COMMUNICATE WITH – HAD A GREAT TIME.
WQ6X – BEING BUSY RUNNING AS ONE OF THE OP’S AT NX6T, I HAD LITTLE TIME FOR A SERIOUS NEQP EFFORT. HOWEVER, DURING THE HOURS I DID HAVE, I ENJOYED THE PLETHORA OF NEW ENGLAND STATIONS ALL OVER THE PLACE. AS USUAL, I WOULD’VE LIKED MORE ACTUAL COUNTIES ACTIVATED. IT DOESN’T NECESSARILY TAKE ROVER STATIONS TO DO THAT. WHAT IT TAKES IS STATIONS GETTING ON THE AIR FROM THEIR HOME QTH AND THEIR CLUB LOCATIONS. READ MORE ABOUT THIS AT: HTTP://WQ6X.BLOGSPOT.COM.
DX stations
DH1TT – HARD FOR A DX STATION. MANY NEVER HEARD ABT 5LETTER CODE. SOME DON`T KNOW THEIR OWN COUNTY NE STATIONS HAVE ANTENNAS TO W/SW WITH EU ON THE BACK – A CHALLENGE! IT`S A FUN ADVENTURE FOR A EU OP. SORRY FOR CONFUSING SOME OF YOU GUYS.
DL3DXX – NO SERIOUS COMPETITION THIS YEAR BUT JUST A FEW QSOS ON 80/40M.
JO7WXN – I enjoyed the contest.
SP6JQJ – STRAIGHT KEY,NO COMPUTER,WORKED FROM MY SUMMER HOUSE
New England Stations
AB1WQ – BUSY WEEKEND– WISH I’D HAD MORE TIME FOR NEQP FUN!
AC1EV – This is the first contest with a new Spiderbeam antenna properly tuned and installed at 35 feet above the ground. The antenna is on a hill around 80feet above the surrounding terrain. I operated solely SSB in mediocre conditions and was very satisfied with the performance. 40M and 80M were handled by 2 EFHW antennas with overlapping capabilities. One was better on40 and the other on 80, but having diversity did help me with certain QSOs.Happy to have 80m QSOs with both California and Switzerland. At 7:50PM Sunday I was at 790 QSOs and had an exciting sprint to the finish to break 800 QSOs. I learned a lot and there are plenty of areas for improvement for the next one. Thanks to all who made this possible.
AK1W (K5ZD) – New personal best score for me in this contest. Conditions weren’t great, but not bad either. Thanks to the sporadic E on Sunday that kept the skip zone short on 20 and opened 15.
Started the contest 20 minutes late. Took an hour off for dinner. Went for a walk on Sunday afternoon and wasn’t feeling well so took a long nap. Back on for the end. NV9L was very loud on 15m SSB Sunday morning. He commented that he had worked some NE stations on 10 so we moved to 10 CW. He was loud. Then we moved up to 28350. Made the QSO, but he was not loud. So the MUF was somewhere in between.
The short skip also helped me work more NE counties than ever. Missed 1 in CT, 3 in ME, 1 in MA, 1 in NH, and 6 in VT. K2UA/M was the mobile I heard the most, but they never sent their county in the CQ so often had to wait to see if they were in a new one. Fun chasing DX between runs. Amazing how much stuff is on the air over the course of a weekend. WriteLog was doubling my SSB QSOs when it posted to the scoreboard. I know that had K1ZZ scratching his head over where I was finding all the extra QSOs! Sure a lot of activity in the 7QP. Thanks to all that called in.
Full breakdown at https://www.3830scores.com/showrumor.php?arg=90akzJqvcfcgT
K1ESE – Thanks for the use to the great station to Paul, W1IMD. Too many breaks, too few mults. Great fun.
K1GQ – ONE RADIO (K3S + KPA1500), TRIBANDER AND 2-EL 40 ON 60′ TOWER, 80M DIPOLE AT 60′, MACINTOSH LOGGING AND STATION CONTROL SOFTWARE. APOLOGIES TO W1KM; I THINK I WAS CQING ON HIS FREQUENCY AND LISTENING ELSEWHERE AFTER WORKING HIM ON 40M SUNDAY. EXCUSE: BRAIN FOG. MISSED ND VO2 VE8 VY0 VY1 AND PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING OUTSIDE K AND VE. EXCUSE: MY RECEIVING SITUATION TOWARDS EU IS CURRENTLY DISMAL. GREAT FUN TO HAVE 20 40 80 OPEN COAST-TO-COAST AND QUIET IN THE SATURDAY LEG. ALMOST 1000 QSOS IN THAT SESSION. CONDITIONS WERE NOT AS GOOD SUNDAY, BUT I WAS AMAZED TO ADD ANOTHER 700.
NET RATE 98.8, WORST FULL-HOUR RATE 51.0 IN THE 19Z HOUR, BEST 60-MINUTE RATE 180 ON 40M SATURDAY. SILLY STATS: 2580 CQS, 39 DUPES, 40 BAND CHANGES, 5 BANDS WITH K8MR W9PA NV9L, 4 BANDS WITH 8 OTHERS, 998 DIFFERENT CALLS (THAT’S GOING TO BE A LOT OF CERTIFICATES 🙂
K1JB – Conditions were not great for DXing, but were otherwise very goodup here. All QSO’s except two were running. All states and provinces except the three in the northern tier (NU, NT, YT) called in along with a few EU, one PY and two JA. There seemed to be a never-ending stream of callers right up to the last minute which seems unusual. At one point on 20SSB, someone spotted me as K1J, so of course I spent a few minutes working many dupes. Later someone spotted me on 20 SSB when I was operating on 40CW. That should be interesting for the log checkers to deal with.All in all, it was an interesting and enjoyable weekend.As always, thanks to the organizers who do the hard work so we get to enjoy the activity they have inspired.
K1KI – Last year my main computer failed after the first day and that was it. This year, everything worked fine! Seemed like conditions were better on Saturday. The last two hours of the contest featured light rain but loud rain static on the antennas. Even so, it was a lot of fun! Had my best score ever and it looks like a photo finish with K1ZZ. Only heard a few W1 mobiles and had a tough time working VT. Still, managed to work 40 NE counties. Missed ND VO2 VE8 and VY1. No VK or ZL.
Thanks for the QSOs
K1MTD – IT WAS A CASUAL CONTESTING WEEKEND, AND I ALWAYS ENJOY THE NEQP. I’M HAPPY TO HAND OUT TOLCT TO WHOEVER NEEDS IT!
K1NKR – OPERATING GOT OUT-PRIORITIZED (I’VE GOT TO STOP USING THAT AS A REPEATED EXCUSE), SO JUST A LITTLE 20M SSB SUNDAY LATE AFTERNOON. NEQP-WISE, THE BAND WAS QUIET BY THAT TIME. TOTAL: 2 QSOS, 2 STATES. NOT MUCH TO BE PROUD OF, BUT AT LEAST I PARTICIPATED.
K1RX – Limited time unfortunately but still a blast as usual. Thanks to all that called and made it through the pileup!
K1VWQ – I HAD A GOOD TIME. THANKS TO THE NEQP STAFF… I WILL SOAPBOX TO SAY, IT SEEMS THERE ARE TOO MANY QP CONTESTS SCHEDULED ON THE SAME WEEKEND AS NEQP, CAUSING EXTREME BAND OVERCROWDING… I WOULD LOVE TO SEE NEQP MOVED TO A WEEKEND WHERE THERE IS LESS QP’S GOING ON. THUS, MORE FOLKS MIGHT HAVE A BETTER CHANCE FOR WORKING THE NEW ENGLAND STATES DURING THIS TIME. AND THE AM WINDOW GUYS WON’T COMPLAIN AS MUCH, AND PERHAPS THERE WON’T BE AS MANY “NETS” COMING ON THE AIR, EVERYTIME I REQUEST A FREQUENCY. JUST MY .02 CENTS. DIT DIT
K1WHS – My plan was to try and enter the NEQP in hopes of making some contacts. In the past, my only antennas available were 160M, 10M, and VHF arrays. This year, I was “loaded for bear”. I had a doublet wire antenna and a manual tuner! This fantastic HF array, coupled with 90 watts from my HF rig, and I was ready to rumble. Really, I had no idea what to expect, and my expectations were not very high, given the assembled hardware in place. I figured I would be S&Ping all weekend. Not so! My first CQ brought an answer, and after the next call, I had a sizable pileup. I could not believe the numbers of stations in there playing with the NEQP! There were so many callers that “Dave’s Law” kicked in. Dave’s Law states that if you are working scads and scads of stations, there comes a time when a little voice in the back of your head says..” Dave!….What are you doing this for? Shouldn’t you be doing something a bit more productive?” I had this big dis assembled power supply downstairs and the transformer was big & heavy and it blocked my path in the workshop for the last year or two! My plan was to re build it in a proper metal housing and put it back under the 222 MHz 8877 amplifier. After about a hundred pileup Qs in the NEQP on 20 meters, that little voice started calling me. “Oh Dave… Dave, Build me!” I came up with a plan. I would split my time between serious metal work, and running stations in the NEQP. Whenever the pile slowed, I was off to cut, drill, and grind aluminum. Then I would go back and check the bands and make a few more calls. It worked out well. I got in some really good CW practice. I operated un assisted, and used my K3 barefoot with the manual Dementron tuner. I got pretty good at band switching The doublet antenna with ladder line covers all the HF bands. How well it does, I have no idea, but it is a wire up maybe 50 or 60 ft and arrayed N-S. With 90 watts, I could tell that I was near the bottom of the food chain when I was S&Ping. But I could call CQ and have pretty good pileups calling me as well. This was my big surprise. I had no idea that the NEQP was such a big deal! I also noted a number of calls that kept turning up on the different bands. NEQP has a dedicated group of followers both stateside and DX!
So I plan to be in more NEQPs in the future. The activity levels are fantastic. I had a lot of fun
K1XM – This was another 100% CW operation. Low power phone isn’t nearly as nice as low power CW.
I turned on the radio a few minutes before the contest and checked 15. A ZL was coming through and I got him as my first QSO. Although the band was open there weren’t many people on it. This was a theme for 15 and 10 during the contest. Both bands were open with E skip to the midwest and South. I also worked a few Europeans on 15 including an LZ at about 2000Z. I hope we have that opening in the WPX CW! I didn’t feel like I was running as well as last year so I decided to try harder to work multipliers. I called just about anything that was spotted that I could hear, which resulted in a few unexpected QSOs such as a VU on 40. RST 449? I’ll take it! I was busy Sunday night and had to stop early. My last QSO was at 22:15.I was finishing up running on 40 and a PE station called me for a multiplier. A nice way to end the contest. Last year I had 122 more QSOs but 32 fewer multipliers. My score is up 60K and will probably break the low power record. Chasing mults is a good strategy for a 100W station.
K1ZZ – Started 17 minutes late after repairing a lawn tractor but stayed in the chair for the rest of the time except for short breaks. 80 meters was good to the West Coast. Rain static was a problem for the last couple of hours but on balance it was a great weekend!
KA1AMR – Well, that was interesting! Got to get on 10, 15, 20, 40 and 80 meters, and worked a handful (14 stations) in 8 hours. Don’t know what antenna I used or even if it was connected.. Nobody could hear me, or the southern stations were overpowering. Ran into several stations with booming signals but they couldn’t hear me. Much like the ARRL 10 meter ‘screaming’ contest. The 5 digit exchange was a bit overtaxing, I can’t read my scribbling, so a readable log might be only a dream. Now, time to move everything back to where it was last Friday, and start over.
KC1V – ANOTHER GREAT PARTY! THANKS TO ALL THOSE THAT MAKE THIS CONTEST POSSIBLE.
KU1U – HAVE NOT DONE NEQP IN ABOUT 11 YEARS. FORGOT HOW FUN THIS CONTEST WAS!
N1DC – Great fun again this year. Didn’t match last year’s results. Missed quite a few multipliers I thought would be easy like ND,SD and HI. Conditions were OK but not great especially to EU on 20M.
Happy with results overall : 860 QSO’s in 13 hours = 66/hour average. Max rate was 4/minute. Max 60 minute rate = 117. Thanks to all the contest operators and CWops members that called in.
N1JI – BECAUSE OF WORK AND FAMILY COMMITTMENTS I WAS ONLY ABLE TO DEVOTE ABOUT FOUR HOURS TO THE NEQP THIS YEAR. STILL, I HAD A FUN TIME – IT’S PRETTY RARE TO BE CALLING CQ WITH ONLY FIVE WATTS AND GENERATE A SMALL PILEUP. MY ANTENNA WAS A 163′ DOUBLET, ABOUT 90′ OF WHICH IS UP 25-30 FEET. THE REST OF THE ANTENNA SNAKES DOWN THROUGH TREES, ALONG FENCES, ETC., ENDING 4-5 FEET ABOVE GROUND LEVEL.
N1NN – 14TH NEW ENGLAND QSO PARTY
N1NUG – Had a blast running my Drake TR7 and Kenwood TS-440 for this event.
N1SNB – Thanks for the contacts. Had lots of sloppy CW qsos, apparently I can listen to SSB in one ear and CW in the other. Goal was to beat last years score which I easily did. Lots of IN, DE, 7QP that help enhance this event.
N1VD – Operated portable from Pope John Paul II Park in Dorchester Saturday Afternoon. Shoutout to KM1NDY and WX1MAR for letting me crash their Parks on the Air activation and sharing both their antennas and pizza!
NE1RD – A modest effort from my small station. The nice thing about QSO parties is that you run into friends and can take a moment to chat. That happened several times in my ~250 QSOs and it made it fun for everyone.
NF1O @W1UMR – Well, we were going to do more, but the WX was better than the next weeks prediction. Mary and I decided to take a trail ride on the Sunapee river Trail with our 4 wheeler.
NN1SS – Had a great time for about 9.5 hours split between Saturday and Sunday. Itseemed like there was no shortage of stations to work. Dial up a band, CQ,GO. Thanks for the Qs and thanks to those responsible for organizing this event. Truly a party.
W1DYJ – NEQP is one of my favorites. Even with a small station you can feel wanted! My 14th year and the 3rd in Harpswell, ME. This was my best from ME, and the highest point total overall, but only 1/2 the mults! Where was everyone? From reading earlier YCCC reports, perhaps I just wasn’t finding them. It did seem like whenever I took a break, that was when 10 and 15 were spotted. My luck! (Or maybe my lack of chair time.) CW was all S&P, some running on phone.
W1GD – Limited time as usual this time of year, but this was fun. I was amazed at the burst rates.
W1HMM – PLAGUED WITH ANTENNA PROBLEMS BUT HAD A GREAT TIME ANYWAY. LOOKING FORWARD TO NEXT YEAR!
W1HS – Had a great time, I really like operating NEQP. Conditions were rough though. I wasn’t able to operate at all on Saturday, but I was able to put in a few hours Sunday morning and into the afternoon. This was almost entirely a run operation for me with just a small number of New England S&P contacts. For the most part I really couldn’t hear any of the other New England stations thatI saw spotted. There was a little bit of EU activity, but I’m really glad this wasn’t a DX contest, it would have been a complete bust. Occasional west coast stations calling in, but didn’t work anyone operating in other QSO parties.
Operated Icom 7610 at 1kw using an Elecrat KPA1500. I used primarily two 61′ G5RV dipoles hung at 35′, but would occasionally switch to the SteppIR Urbanbeam headed toward EU to try and drum up some activity there. The dipoles were much more productive for picking up southeast US and central US. I had intended to operate some digital and maybe CW, but just didn’t quite get around to it this time around.
W1JQ – Almost exactly the same as last year. 31 more Qs, but not as many mults; abit more time. The big difference is that I spent more time DXing, which gave me 8 or 9 more mults. This year, I spent almost all my time running(S&P was maybe 1 or 2% of the QSOs). Seriously, though: it was a bit odd. I hit 8 hours with over 800 Qs. So I’d been averaging over 100/hour; the few hours that were under 100 were very close. (And I even had a 100 hour during the hour when I had dinner Saturday.) Sunday is always harder, but this year it really seemed to hit a wall. Maybe more hams are vaccinated and had other things to do on the weekend? Or I just planned my time wrong: I went for a long bike ride at around 12:30 Sunday; last year, I probably went out at 3, when the Sunday doldrums were really in force. Mults were better last year. US/VE was almost exactly the same; I think I had a couple more VE mults, but still nothing from the norther tier. Neve rfound HI or ND. Two AKs called in. Along with a JA–first time that’s happened for me. This contest would be a lot better if it were in January, or if you could guarantee rain. I might have made more use of the S antenna; I stuck with the dipole on 20,even when the propagation was clearly to the S, because I hoped ND or HI would call in.
W1KDA – GOOD CONDITIONS MADE FOR A GREAT QSO PARTY – ACTIVE BANDS ON 80, 40 & 20 MADE FOR A LOT OF QSO’S – NICE WEEK-END ON THE RADIO!!!!!
W1PY – One of my favorites because of both the fun and nostalgia. I missed hanging with the rest of my crew (NE1C) up at AA1YW’s place in WNHVT again this year, but it’s also fun to run the station from HMPMA, which seems to be just as rare. The nasty windstorm we had a few days prior to the contest did a real number on my yagis position vs what the controller reads. Need to add tightening and pinning the masts/rotators to the summer to-do list. Still battling RFI from the neighborhood. I have the gear to chase it down, but not the time. Anyone want to come out to the lost world of WMA and do some hunting? Can I afford it? It’s frustrating because it’s killing my ability to work the weak ones and on SSB it’s really a pain in the ear. Scoreboards continue to make the game fun for me. You know what would makeit more fun? If more folks would use it. Thanks to those of you who take the time. K1VUT was the station that kept me on my toes and pushing me when If elt like taking a break. If K1XM and K1TR had also been posting to the scoreboard, it would have been even more fun. Maybe it will become a requirement in contest rules some day. I know I know.
Highlights for me: – Having N7HEX call me on 20m phone and tell me who he is (Jagur is not a common name). We used to both be involved in the Mountain Unicycle community (yes you read that correctly) back in the mid-2000’s and rode in the Sierras and Santa Barbara together. So cool when you connect with an old pal from a different world via radio. – Trying out dueling CQs for the first time on 20/15 and 20/40 when it was slow. – And of course dit-dits and 73s when working all the folks I’ve been lucky enough to meet and hangout with over the years. In the end I had to quit a few hours early for family stuff. I also feel like I missed some openings and I wish I could have stayed on long enough to crack 200K points and 1K Qs, but family first. Thanks K1KI and crew for a really fun event.
W1QK – THANK YOU TO THE MANY QSO PARTY CHALLENGE PARTICIPANTS AND CWOPS MEMBERS FOR THE CONTACTS AND FUN ON THE RADIO. LOTS OF ACTIVITY BECAUSE OF THE 7-LAND, INDIANA, AND DELAWARE QSO PARTIES AS WELL. THANKS TO ALL THE ORGANIZERS.
W1TO (@NE1QP) – W3MLJ, K1MK, and NT2X were remote, W1TO, NJ1F and K1TTT were local. The team thanks Dave, K1TTT, for hosting our operation.
W1UE @W1KBN – It was a fun contest! Nice, relaxed operating. Had a few station problems- no 80m antenna, loaded tribander for 40m, and I couldn’t turn the TH5 for the highbands (it was west all weekend). Was only able to put in 3.5hrs the first day-network problems kept cropping up. Thanks to Marty NN1C for his aid in fixing that problem. SUFMA wasn’t rare this year!
W1VE (@NS1DX/K2LE) – Always a fun contest from Andy’s in Vermont. As others have said, conditions were the best of times and the worst of times. You make of it what you will.We had fun playing radio contest and giving out BENVT to the masses. We have a big checklist of K2LE/1 fixes to work on over the summer. I also spent 45 minutes seeing what mobiles I could work from Panama… Everyone had decent ears: Call: HP/VE1RM
W1WEF – Fun most of the time! I never thought id put in this much time in a contest ever again but I made an effort to drink alot of water to avoid legcramps and I exercised more than ever while operating. I put in close to the full 20 hours despite not sleeping well last night.Single op, non-assisted, high power , SO1R.
W1WIU – ANOTHER GREAT YEAR ! THANKS TO THE ORGINIZERS AND SPONSERS THAT MAKE IT ALL POSSIBLE. MEET LOTS OF “OLD” FRIENDS AND MADE SOME NEW ONES.HAD SOME NICE RUNS ON BOTH 20 AND 40 METERS. OPERATED IN MEMORY OF PAUL NEWBERRY, N4PN. HOPE TO SEE YOU ALL AGAIN NEXT YEAR !
W3UA – We returned from Florida vacations after midnight on Sunday, so the first round was out of question. I wanted to try to work Digital only, but it appeared that WSJT-X does not allow NEQP exchange. I manually put one once, made one QSO and realized that this will not work. Spent about 1.5 hours looking for a solution,and finally realized that I just can’t figure it out. So I decided to make a couple of CW Qs just for fun. But the conditions were so good, I couldn’t stop;) It was the most relaxed contest I ever had in years. I got quite a few calls from Europeans, since they were looking at hamlog packet cluster, which was showing only few NE stations — I believe W1QK, WU3A and myself. My first goal was to make 100 Qs, then 200, then 500 — and I couldn’t stop till the event was over.
While I was away, my friend NU3C, who is overseas now, used our multiplier rig,which has remote access, to put WU3A on the air. He started working at the first round, but due to time difference, went to bed after a few hours. When I arrived, he was running again. It’s the first time when both W3UA and WU3A were on the air simultaneously, so maybe we confused quite a few folks 😉 . Indeed,it was a double fun. He made twice as much Qs…
WM1N – Just wrapping up my log, hoped to do better, was a learning experience, and fun. My question is, are there extra points for operating in the backyard under a screen tent?
WO1N – Seriously insane rates. The 4PM start is nice but I made the mistake of getting involved in some yard projects that took longer than expected. First Q was 24 minutes after the start and I experienced the effect, “wow, these guys are sending really fast” once I sat down in the chair. However, dinner, shower and a powernap later the experience was “Zen CW”where I was picking callsigns out of pretty decent pileups almost magically. N1MM+ says one 110 hour but many 50+Q run in excess of 150/hr. K1VUT was out there with a decent LP CW only score and I guessed K1XM was probably LP but not reporting on the scoreboard. Since I wasn’t going to generate a competitive score, I sacrificed myself to the propagation gods and made many attempts to open 15 and 10. Non-productive. I suspect 15 could have supported rate, but could not generate responses to my CQs despite working stations as far south as Florida and west to Illinois. Stations reporting to the online scoreboard was disappointingly low. It was quite a spectacle watching AK1W (K5ZD) and K1ZZ duke it out with massive Q counts. This was a lot of fun.
WS1L – Elecraft K3S, KPA-500 amp. Hexbeam, vertical and wires from the Berkshires. I only had time for a few hours here and there this weekend. Saturday evening was great on 40, with rates well over 100/hr. Sunday afternoonon 20 was the same. By Sunday afternoon and evening the rate had slowed to about 66/hr.
WZ1V – Glad to give Middlesex county to all who found me. All Q’s SSB. Discovered my 15M antenna was kaput, so tried 10M Sunday and it was open with Es but few NE stations on.