WQ6X Wangles a Weird 7-GiG Radiosport WeeKend

The 3rd weekend in September brings us a series of 5 State QSO parties coupled with the Scandinavian CW and SPRINT RTTY contests inserted somewhere in the middle of operations.

• [X] - Scandinavian (SAC) Cw Contest
• [X] - Iowa QSO Party - IAQP
• [X] - Texas QSO Party - TXQP
• [X] - New Jersey QSO Party - NJQP
• [X] - New Hampshire QSO Party - NHQP
• [X] - Washington QSO Party - WAQP/Salmon Run (S-R)
• [X] - SPRINT RTTY Contest

QSO Party-wise, Texas (TXQP) and Washington (S-R) filled the Cw bands with signals; Ssb QSO Party activity, while not plentiful, was there to be found - made easier by the array of audio filters in use at the local (non-remote) site.

Altho the IA, NJ and NH QSO parties were allegedly underway by 16:00z, signals from those areas were not heard until 21:00z to 23:30z - Bummer Dewd!. While NHQP had a Sunday period, nothing was heard from New England - Double Bummer Dewd.  Because the RTTY SPRINT began at 00:00z, by the time it ended (04:00z), IA/NH/NJ were probably all sound asleep.

To their credit, Washington and Texas kept running until 20:00z (TX) and 23:59z (WA) on Sunday.  Texas brought us several rover stations who provided at least a dozen+ more county multipliers for the WQ6X QRP Log

Speaking of QRP, I am constantly amazed at how often the QRP signal can "bust a pileup" - much
of the time it's Luck and Timing.  Having multiple calling function keys enables several ways to slip in
the WQ6X callsign in/around the pileup mess.

While recent improvements in the Concord internet connection have considerably improved remote radio operations, later Saturday afternoon seemed like a reversion to a week ago.  Of course, on Sunday (when it is usually at its worst) was actually quite functional - GO Figure.  If I suddenly disappeared in the middle of a CW/RTTY exchange, an internet dropout was likely the cause - I wasn't ignoring you.

Lack of TRI-state QSO party action was compensated by a 15-meter (and later 20-meter) opening
to Scandinavia.  While 24 QSOs is much, at least it can be said that WQ6X was playing the SAC contest.

When it was all over, WQ6X made noticeable entries in 4 out of the 7 contest GiGs.

DiD YOU work any of the above seven contest GiGs?

Is WQ6X in any of YOUR LoGs?

WQ6X Works a Wandering WAE Radiosport Weekend

Because it is a somewhat complex 48-hour radiosport Experience, I rarely worked the Worked
All Europe (WAE) Ssb contest, altho I thoroughly enjoy the August-CW and November-RTTY WAE contest variants.  Finding the WA6TQT super station STN-2 available for the weekend, I logged in remotely Friday afternoon to setup N1MM+ to most effectively run the contest largely by way of the
voice keyer messages in the remote K3 radio's DVK facility.

With local internet dropouts a continuing problem, once started, a DVK message can be playing
out even tho a brief internet dropout occurs on the local end of the connection.  Friday evening,
(what turned out to be) a weird software conflict prevented the PTT-line from keying properly,
so, I setup a near-identical configuration on Station #1 (STN-1), only to discover no propagation
to Europe after all.

Rereading the 2025 contest rules, I discovered a disclaimer from the 2024 WAE contest.
Evidently the N1MM and WriteLog  contest logging software were somehow producing BOGUS
Cabrillo format .Log files.  I remember encountering this N1MM and somehow got around it.

With nothing left to do but sleep, I did just that.  Awakening around 14:00z, the STN-2 problem
had been resolved, encouraging me to resume the original operating plan.  With the solar flux index
(SFI) back down to the 120's the only good thing to say about it is that there were no annoying geomagnetic storms during the contest period (the storms did not arrive until after the WAE
contest was over.

15-meters made for a great contest beginning on Saturday.  Unfortunately, propagation to EU
all but folded up in the afternoon, moving WQ6X down to 20-meters, making an easy transition
into the NAQP SPRINT Cw contest - which always commences on 20-meters.  At least 2 BOOKs
of QTC were offloaded then.

Unfortunately, the NAQP SPRINT was RIDDLED with internet outages.  Out of the 4-hours contest time, approximately 40-minutes were WASTED just reconnecting with a stable (for 5 minutes) connection to the internet.  The last 40-minutes gave me a stable connection, altho the loss
(mainly on 40-meters) had already occurred.  At least I can say I wuz there.

Sunday morning again opened on 15 meters and stayed open well into the afternoon enabling
55 QSOs and sending 11 QTC BooKs. When 15 died a move down to 20-meters produced 5-QSOs - the ones for which QTC messages were never sent.

GOOD-NEWS: Around 22:00z to resolve a local plasma TV problem, all the cables to/from the router were pulled and reseated.  VOILA!  Most of the local internet dropout evaporated - just like that.

BAD-NEWS:  Propagation to Europe had simultaneously also evaporated - Bummer Dew!

INTERMEDIATE-NEWS: WQ6X only got stuck with 5 undelivered QTC messages - a far cry from some years back when I failed to deliver QTC messages as I went along and ended up STUCK with 72 undelivered messages when a solar flare suddenly disrupted the USA --> EU propagation link.

DiD YOU work the NAQP SPRINT Cw or WAE Ssb contests?

Is WQ6X in YOUR LoG?

WQ6X Wangles a Russo-Asian Radiosport Weekend

The 1st contest weekend of September is one of those "mixed-bag" affairs.  Being an Ssb contest,
All Asian is typically a major disappointment.   However, this year I discovered the Russian DX RTTY contest embedded in the packets of downtime in the All Asian GiG.

Client commitments kept me at my Alameda office (with no remote radio access) during Friday evening's potential 15 & 10 meter openings.  For WQ6X, A-A startup time did not begin until 06:00z, looking for a 20-meter opening while watching the greyline window, looking for Asia (JA in particular) to transverse into evening, when 40-meters opens in Japan towards their East - West Coast USA.

Being an Ssb contest, I was not surprised to hear the4 usual contest weekend non-amateur signals invading the lower 40-meters phoneband segments.  (For some reason, these intrusions rarely occur midweek).  The A-A contest weekend brought us the following 40-meter occurrences:

• 08:48z - 7132.66 - A station (LOUD S-9) was sending 5-character code groups.
  (WQ6X was running a frequency on 7135.35)
• There was what I call a "Data Cranker" - some sort of digital signal that sounds kinda
  like a toilet.
• There was of course the usual not-allowed Ssb operations in the middle of the CW/RTTY segment of the 40-meter band.
• The Russian "K"-Beacon is of course heard every evening, after about 07:00z on ~7.039.

Over the course of the 48-hour contest period, WQ6X made it all happen in only 3 operating periods:

• Friday Evening
  06:00z - 08:37z - 100 QSOs on 20-Meters
  08:50z - 12:35z - 59 QSOs on 40-Meters
• Saturday Evening
  06:41z - 07:27z - 8 QSOs on 20-Meters
  08:50z - 12:35z - 10 QSOs on 40-Meters
• Sunday Afternoon
  08:50z - 12:35z - 21 QSOs on 15-Meters

According to the 3830 Scores website, WQ6X took 1st-place for USA using Low Power (LP).

In between the non-Asian openings, I switched to running the Russian DX RTTY GiG.

Making this contest work using an older version of N1MM required patching two different
log segments together to deduce the proposed ending score.

The Tennessee QSO Party (TNQP) is one of those GiGs that doesn't know what weekend it belongs on.  While I like the idea of running on Sunday, this year, client commitments kept me off the air for most of the contest.  Then again, when I WAS on the air there were hardly any TNQP stations being heard, nor any being spotted - Wassup with that.

Bottom line, WQ6X added 3 contests to the 3830 Scores list to say I wuz there.

DiD YOU work the above radiosport contests?

Is WQ6X in YOUR LoG?

XYZZY

WQ6X PiTches a Case for the California QSO Party (CQP)

In preparation for the 2025 California QSO Party (CQP) event coming up in October, I followed
the steps outlined in the recent Blog post on Preparing for Preparation ([CLICK HERE] to read that). 
As President of the Amateur Radio Club of Alameda (ARCA) my goal is to pitch a case for club members to be involved with this monumental annual radiosport event.

While ARCA has always made a notable Field Day presence, operating the California QSO Party
is a relatively new experience for the radio club.

• [X] - (2021) - K6QLF Runs a Memorable 1st-time ever CQP Event
• [X] - (2024) - Amateur Radio Club of Alameda (ARCA) runs a CQP Training Exercise

To assist people in understanding what makes CQP so significant, I offer you these thought morsels:

• WHAT is CQP?
  CQP is the pre-eminent State QSO Party - one of the last state QSO parties
  for the calendar year.  Think of CQP as the ultimate Emergency Preparedness Exercise.
  
  
• WHEN is CQP?
  CQP Runs the 1st FULL weekend in October (Oct. 4th 9am PDT to Oct. 5th 3pm PDT).
  Ideally, equipment is setup and tested the day before - Oct. 3d.
  
  
• WHY is CQP?
  CQP provides activation for ALL California Counties - specifically the "RARE" ones,
  enabling operators to qualify for the coveted WACC (Worked All California Counties)
  Award.
  
  
• WHERE is CQP?
  CQP is anywhere you want it to be.  When choosing a location give thought to the
  importance of operating ALL 30-hours.
  
  
• The GOAL of CQP
  Over the course of ONE weekend you can learn superior operating skills
  that will be with you for the rest of your time on HF radio.
  
  

As it turns out, the 2024 operations for K6QLF and WA6OYC - simple CQP setups from the Oakland Yacht Club (in Alameda) - netted us a 5th-place win in the Expedition class and a QRP county record for Alameda County - proof once again that sometimes just showing up is enough to be some sort of

a contender.

For 2025, Alameda County (ALAM) has risen on the county needed list from #58 (Bottom) to #44.

WHAT are YOUR ThoTs on Operating the quickly upcoming 2025 CQP QSO Party?

WQ6X Posts Blog #777 after 13 years

It seems astonishing to me that despite often hit-missing Blog postings, the WQ6X
contest Blog has now reached the lucky 777-th post.  While some blogs do indeed share
common characteristics, most of the Blog posts are completely unique.  Here is an overview

of how things turned out.

• [X] BLOG #001 - The World of WQ6X Contest Activities
• [X] BLOG #100 - WQ6X Contest Blog 100th entry! - the REAL value of Radiosport
• [X] BLOG #200 - WQ6X Single-OPs CQ W.W. Cw Remotely
• [X] BLOG #300 - WQ6X Blast from the Past: ARRL RTTY RU

• [X] BLOG #400 - WQ6X Wangles another Weird Triple-contest Weekend
• [X] BLOG #500 - WQ6X Posts Contest Blog #500
• [X] BLOG #600 - WQ6X SURPASSES 600 Blog Posts
• [X] BLOG #700 - WQ6X CONTEST BLoG - PosT #700

Blog #700 was posted about this time last year.

The Question is, when can we expect Blog Post #800?

Stay Tuned for the upcoming answer to that Question.