WQ6X Joins the team @ NX6T for 2013 CQ W.W. Dx Contest

Despite some incredible operational tactics,  my joint operation with NX6T in Fallbrook this last weekend only netted us a 16th place (out of 17 entries) world wide in the Multi-2 transmitter category, altho we may well have taken 1st place for the W6 call area.

Similar to the JIDX GiG, we ran a pair of K3's front-ending a pair of ACOM 2000 auto-tune amplifiers putting nearly 1400 watts into a pair of Stepp-IR & 2-El 40-m yagi combinations.  Similar to JIDX, our operation got off to a shaky beginning, bouncing back a couple of hours into the event.  While N6KI &  WQ6X were primary operators @ NX6T, throughout the weekend other operators ( N0DY, NN6X, N6EEG & K4RB) took one of the helms.  Because I am willing to pull the "night shifts", I am usually given the 3am - 9am shift; especially in this contest.

While the solar flux dropped from 170+ to 140, overall the bands were amazingly quiet.  10 meters was incredibly open, as was 15 meters.  Despite those great condx, as highlighted below, 40-meters delivered over 1/3 of our QSOs for this contest.  While we only managed 21 QSOs on 160, the California--> Asia path was certainly there; had more Asian stations made a 160 appearance they would have found great west coast propagation - too bad they didn't.

Based on spotter reports and consistently busting pile-ups on the 1st/2nd call it would seem that NX6T had a booming presence in Europe & Asia and at least a commanding presence in Central/South America.

My operations consisted of significant time spent in S & P mode, switching to running a frequency when a "hole" in the spectrum suddenly appeared.  Late Saturday evening while running solo I remembered that there was an audio switch box for combining both K3's into faux-SO2R arrangement.  The 15 minutes I spent reconfiguring the cables allowed me to run a frequency on 80 & 160 while S&P'ing on 40 and eventually 20 meters after sunrise washed out 7-mhz & below; at which time 10/15-meters became the RUN frequency.

Although not super eventful, overall, this years W.W. Cw contest was a lot of fun.  Our Multi-2 arrangement gave our 6 operators virtually all the time in the chair they wanted.  Thanks to the operator's apartment next door, I was able to catch 4-hour naps and make an appearance on virtually every operating shift.

The increasing number of "exotic" callsigns this year made CQ W.W. more exciting than ever.  We made DXCC on 40-20-15 meters and 86 countries on 10-m. 
Zone-wise we only missed Zones 34 & 39; both on Africa's east side.

Did you play in the CQ World Wide contest this year?
If so, did you make DXCC & WAZ?