 December 6, 2023 Editor: Paul Bourque, N1SFE | |
In this Issue: Your Editor, Paul Bourque, N1SFE, is on leave. While he's out, Brian Moran, N9ADG, is filling in as ARRL Contest Update Editor.
Bruce Horn's, WA7BNM, online Contest Calendar (https://contestcalendar.com/fivewkcal.html) shows reoccurring contests in the Weekly Contests section. Popular events such as the CWops CW Test can help improve your skills between the contest weekends. Ten meters has been quite productive for long-distance contacts recently, which should favor participation in the ARRL 10-Meter Contest during the weekend of December 9. In addition to US states and Canadian provinces and territories (plus Labrador), Mexican states are multipliers. During the weekend of December 16, DX contests include the OK-DX RTTY contest, or the Croatian DX Contest for CW and phone. On December 17, you can listen for "CQ RR" on CW, and work a few Rookies in the ARRL Rookie Roundup. See the "Contests" section below for complete contest information. 7 December - 20 December 2023 December 7
December 8 December 9
December 10 December 11
December 12 December 13
December 14 December 15
December 16 December 17 December 18 December 19 December 20
With the ARRL 10-Meter Contest coming up, Bob Cox, K3EST, wrote some helpful hints for success suited for West Coast contesters: "For part timers, here is more detailed advice on band openings. Looking at 10-meter logs for 2012-2015 (roughly corresponding to where we are in the sunspot cycle - Ed.), here are some data. "EUROPE: The opening each day is in the morning and is short. Sunset in London is 3:52 pm their time. That equals 1552z. The band will be open longer into their twilight but mostly finished to Europe about 1730z. If you are interested in [making] some EU contacts, the time to be beaming in that direction is between 1530-1730z. "JA/ASIA: From the start of the contest, Asia will be workable for a while. Then in the afternoon, JA/Asia will peak about 2300z to 0130z. "USA/NA: Almost anytime. "SA: The best time to work SA is in the afternoon. "In the evening after about 0230z, you can work Ws mostly in the west. "Ten meters is a fantastic teacher of propagation. Short skip, E-skip, and F2 propagation are all happening sometime over the contest weekend. As a contester, you just hear a guy and work him. You don't think about the mode of propagation; however, after the contest, you can read up on the various paths you may have encountered. "The sun is the great controller of 10m propagation. In spite of a CME hitting during the recent CQ WW Contest, 10 meters was still open to Europe and Asia. With the SFI predicted to be 145 during the 10-meter contest, that will help overcome potential solar problems. "Even a small antenna system will prove enough to make many QSOs. Take advantage of 10 meters during this sunspot peak. Even QRP stations can make lots of QSOs. "Summits on the Air (SOTA) is running a 10m Challenge in 2024. Solar Cycle 25 has started to offer regular good conditions for DX on the higher bands, so it is hoped that portable summit operators can take advantage during 2024. Some predictions indicate the peak of the cycle may occur during the summer of 2024. We encourage activators to consider 28MHz for their summit operations in 2024. "For the 10m Challenge, scoring will be done automatically by the database software. Activations and chases should be entered as normal. The software will note 10m QSOs and score them according to the rules below. Usual SOTA rules apply, multiband activations are entered as normal and all results get updated, with qualifying 10m QSOs [getting] scored completely separately. There will be a special 10m Challenge results page and certificates available showing your name, call, association, and score. "The challenge runs from 0000 UTC January 1, 2024, to 2359 UTC December 31, 2024. "For more information about SOTA - Summits on the Air, please visit http://www.sota.org.uk." The Daily DX reports via Twitter (X) that JT1CO's contest station, JT5DX, was destroyed by fire. Michael "Dink" Dinkleman took part in the operation at PJ2T during the recent CQWW CW by operating remotely. He shared his experience on the Western Washington DX Club (WWDXC) reflector: "With my circumstances unable to support a personal entry in the CQWW CW, I took the next best opportunity and was actually able to provide meaningful assistance to my friends at PJ2T. "As described by Geoff (in comments on the 3830 scores website), this CQWW CW at PJ2T was hit with a number of cancellations on short notice. Fortunately, I was able to attend remotely. Mostly, I worked hours late at night, locally, while the household was asleep. That put me on 40m to Europe and the US. "Much to the dismay of my wife, I had a couple of short day shifts on 15m (also Europe and US), which was a total blast and reminded of my first trip to PJ2T when all I did was 15m all day long. "The only way it could have been more fun was to have been at Signal Point in person. Someday again. "There is a very specific turn-over procedure from local op to remote op. I guess the local ops enjoyed seeing the remote equipment magically power up as scheduled. Not so calm on my side as it always seemed that N1MM want[ed] to lock up at startup. Once past that, it was just like being there. There are two Beverages that can be used as RX antennas on 40m, and I was constantly switching between EU and US. The 40m TX antenna was a Yagi pointed north. Both EU and US are easily worked with this arrangement. I made an improvement (suggested by Jeff K8ND) of using a separate computer for the Slack channel and AnyDesk terminal. Then, when I had to totally reboot the N1MM computer, there was only one application to restart. It also cut down on screwing up when working in another application and forgetting to go back to N1MM. It made for an interesting station with 5 computer displays, plus the Geochron monitor above. "I saw the A go to 38 and felt the pain for those in the PNW (the true Black Hole) knowing the auroral path would suck to EU. I was able to enjoy a large number of contacts with friends and a few of you got a 73, which may have made you wonder. When running a pileup, it's hard to do much more." Could WSOTA - Walking Stations On The Air -- become the next "OTA" craze? When you just can't get as portable as you'd like to be, consider a desk on wheels to hold your station, logging computer, and generator, especially for those contests held on April 1. The Farnsworth method of sending CW is defined as sending individual CW characters at a faster speed in relation to sending inter-character and inter-word spaces. For example, characters are sent at a spacing of 13 WPM, but the characters themselves are sent at 18 WPM. In contest situations with QRM or QSB, sending call sign or exchange characters with extra spacing can improve copyability. Steve Babcock, VE6WZ, is providing video details on his new Beverage On Ground (BOG) system he's installed, including a comparison with his conventional 1,000-foot Beverage antennas. The second video even includes construction details and information on how you can create your own PCBs for this project. Part 1 the BOG RX system: https://youtu.be/_LkaRpsiB60 Part 2 the TI amplifier: https://youtu.be/Th-uoh5l1qE The preliminary scores for the Scandinavian Activity Contest CW and SSB are ready. Please go to https://www.sactest.net/blog/sac-2023-preliminary-results/ and check your category and score. Click on your call sign to see the log checking report! (Thanks to SM5AJV via CQ-Contest for the information.) The ARRL June VHF Contest results are ready, with the results database and certificates available from http://contests.arrl.org. The results article and line scores may also be available by the time you read this. When calling a running station, the goal is to obtain a contact as quickly as possible. The contact should look like this: Running station: CQ TEST N9ADG N9ADG TEST Calling station: W7XYZ Running station: W7XYZ 599 WA Calling station: 599 ID Running station: TU N9ADG TEST And that's it. Don't add anything else. Specifically, don't call the running station with their call sign. Don't bother with 'DE' in front of your call sign when calling. Don't send any call signs with the exchange. Don't send 599 twice. These guidelines, to omit all information except that which is absolutely required, can also apply in any pileup situation. Unshielded twisted pairs liberated from Cat5 or Cat6 cable can be used for RF signal transmission at low power levels. With the cable's 100 Ω nominal characteristic impedance, one could arrange the 2:1 impedance match by using parallel pairs, or by use of a transformer. One hundred watts at 14 MHz might be considered the highest power at the highest frequency for this type of cable. More than a year after it occurred, scientists have determined that the ionosphere was affected by the largest-ever (so far) recorded gamma ray burst on October 22, 2022. This burst originated from the direction of the constellation Sagitta, and affected the ionosphere's D, E, and F layers between 60 and 350 kilometers above the Earth's surface.RF energy coupled to USB computer cables can produce a wide spectrum of problems. For example, keyboard keys may stick when a signal is being sent, or mice may be unresponsive. CAT connections may be lost, or software may crash because data is scrambled. When encountering weird computer/rig problems, one of the first things to try is turning the power output to 0 during operation. The disappearance of the problem indicates that it is RF related. Cross-Training I'm writing this while on the way back from an 18-day DXpedition as part of team H44WA. A DXpedition is similar to a marathon contest, in that the goal is to get as many unique band and mode contacts in the log as possible. Even in the final hours of the operation, callers were clamoring to get in the log, especially to fill open band and mode slots. Pileups were available approximately 22 hours a day; there were lulls during the local midday hours due to the equatorial latitude. It was great practice for contests, using all of the same tools as in a contest situation: computer logging with N1MM Logger+, K3 radios, and antennas. It was also an opportunity to learn best practices with other operators and discover obscure but useful radio or logger functions. Consider traveling to a DX location and operating for a weekend or a week to improve your skills and have a ton of fun. You might even find a rental QTH to make it an arrive-and-operate-style operation. That's all for this time. Remember to send contesting-related stories, book reviews, tips, techniques, press releases, errata, schematics, club information, pictures, stories, blog links, and predictions to [email protected]. 73, Brian, N9ADG (filling in temporarily for Paul, N1SFE) 7 December - 20 December 2023 An expanded, downloadable version of QST's Contest Corral is available as a PDF. Check the sponsors' website for information on operating time restrictions and other instructions. HF CONTEST QRP ARCI Topband Sprint , Dec 7, 0000z to Dec 7, 0300z; CW; Bands: 160; ARCI: RST + (state/province/country) + ARCI No., non-ARCI: RST + (state/province/country) + power out; Logs due: Dec 24. VHF+ CONTESTS 7 December - 20 December 2023 December 7 December 8 December 9 December 10
December 11 December 13 December 14
December 15 December 16 December 17
December 18 December 19 December 20
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