WQ6X Dabbles and Delves into Misc. Radiosport

The last weekend of August brings
a myriad of radiosport contest events sprinkled around a 48 hour operating period, opening with the Hawaiian
QSO Party (HQP) beginning @04:00z Friday evening (9pm, California time).

I didn't find out until Saturday morning that the Hawaiian area was hassled
by ravaging storms.  Later in the contest period, the entire planet was deluged by a solar-induced geomagnetic storm.


While the solar cycle may be at near minimum, that does not preclude solar "BELCHES" creating devastating (altho temporary) noise storms, or even brief blackouts. Instead, radio blackouts were replaced by internet dropouts on the Fallbrook end of the NX6T remote connection.

N X 6 T - STN-1

One of the goals from this weekend was to revisit the Autek QF-1A + MFJ 752-C audio
filter combination, specifically to process the laptop audio coming in remotely from NX6T
(in Fallbrook) by way of the RCForb radio-control software on both ends of the connection.

　

Hawaiian County Multipliers

In years past WQ6X has taken
2nd & 3rd place (for California)
in the Hawaiian QSO Party (HQP).
I was hoping this year would allow
me to surpass those efforts.
Oh well, maybe next year.
[CLICK HERE] for HQP
contest rules.

There were an additional handful
of contest events during this last weekend of August, including:

• The Ohio QSO Party [CLICK HERE] to see the rules.
• The Kansas QSO Party [CLICK HERE] to see the rules.
• The SCC RTTY Contest [CLICK HERE] to see the rules.
• The W/VE Islands Contest [CLICK HERE] to see the rules.
• The YO DX Contest [CLICK HERE] to see the rules.

Circumstances did not allow participation in the W/VE GiG or YO Dx Contest.  I almost didn't find
time for the QSO parties or the SCC RTTY Gig.  Nevertheless there was enough variety of contest conditions to give the Autek and MFJ filters good exercise.

OHQP Ending Screen

My BEEF with OHQP is the short contest period (only 12 hours) and the relatively poor turnout of Ohioans for their own QSO Party.

As a Californian I am spoiled by the HEAVY turnout for the annual California QSO Party (CQP), meaning that I have high expectations for other state QSO parties and am easily disappointed.

KSQP Ending Screen

Now, do not construe this to imply
that I am singling out ONLY Ohioan amateur stations; the KSQP and HQP events showed little activity as well. 

This is always my frustration in QSO parties - not enough stations play in
the QSO party for their own state.

If you are looking to add contest
award certificates to your wall, state QSO parties are an easy way to accomplish that goal.

SCC RTTY Ending Screen

After the OHQP event ended (@04:00z), tuning around on 40 brought a flood of RTTY signals.  LooKing up radiosport happenings
on the WA7BNM Contest calendar,
I learned these stations were running the SCC RTTY HF Championship.

 By 07:30Z I ran out of SCC stations
to work.  Needing sleep, I shut things down.  At 14:00z the SCC GiG was over, with 31 QSOs in the log.


Getting back on the air at 15:00z there was 5 hours left in the KSQP and 13 hours left for the Hawaiian QSO party.

Did YOU play around in last weekend's radiosport events?

Is WQ6X in YOUR Log?

Q-Filtering for Fun and Profit - Part 2: What I've Learned So Far

OUTBOARD FILTER COMBINATIONS USED by WQ6X

In recent months, I have been experimenting w/various combinations of outboard audio filters for the FT-1000mp I operate from W7AYT's QTH in Concord.  In March of this year I wrote the original BLOG on this subject, not knowing what kind of changes I would be considering, each and every month.  ([CLICK HERE] to read the original BLOG entry.)   Recently, an original (ca. 1972) Autek QF-1 has been added to the mix of outboard filter equipment I use in contest operations; whether operated remotely from Alameda or portable @ W7AYT.  The original testing and evaluation of the QF-1
was made during my remote operation of NX6T in the recent NAQP Cw contest.  The QF-1
offered enough promise that it was transplanted to W7AYT joining the other Autek QF-1A unit.

QF-1 (Top) and QF-1A (Bottom)

Comparing the QF-1 & QF-1A filters,
it would seem that while the PEAK, NOTCH & LOWPASS capabilities are functionally similar, a close-up look at
the equipment schematic diagrams
show the circuits to be implanted
quite differently.

The original QF-1 shares a design flaw with the MFJ-752 series of filters.  Both filter designs utilize a pair of dual-500k pots (for selectivity and frequency) to control the feedback circuits for Peaking and Bandpass filtering.

Both designs suffer from a "cramped" tuning range caused by the selection
of a 500k pot value.  I am proposing a bridging resistor across each dual pot. 


Doing this will "spread" the actions of each knob more evenly "across" the dial, making the adjustment less "touchy".  How this experiment turns out I will document in Part 3 of this BLOG Series.

An interesting conundrum is that the QF-1A filters ALSO make use of dual-500k pots and yet there is no "dial-cramping" with the newer (1977) design.  Go Figure.  Operationally, the two filters are quite similar.  The 1A simply adds a dedicated notch filter allowing Peaking and Notching at the same time.

Component-wise, the QF-1 filter unit uses an LM-741 IC along with LM-747 IC's (which are dual-741 OP-amp IC's) in the filtering circuits.  The QF-1A uses LM-348 IC's which are QUAD-741 OP-amps inside one DIP package.  Comparing the two filter units, operationally I find the QF-1A does a superior job of filtering compared to the original QF-1; and of course, the QF-1A does not have
500k-pot range problems.

A not-externally noticeable advantage of the QF-1A is a pair of trim-pots inside of the unit.  Page 7 of the Autek instruction manual details a relatively simple alignment procedure to peak the performance of the QF-1A unit.  The manual ALSO says [re-]alignment should not be necessary.  In fact, however,
3 QF-1A units I have refurbished ALL were somewhat out of alignment.  Investing a mere 20 minutes per unit yielded increased output gain on all units.




FILTER COMBINATION - AUGUST 2018

 

In recent years I have made use of various combinations of external filters.
While the Autek QF-1A and MFJ 752-C are functionally similar, I find the Autek
unit to produce sharper and/or more-pronounced audio peaks than the MFJ units.

For the current configuration, I brought back the JPS NIR-12, reinstating it in the Sub-RX
audio path of the Yaesu FT-1000mp.  It is NoT well understood that the Sub-RX has nothing
in the way of IF-Shift, NOTCH or DSP.  The NIR-12 effectively provides this functionality. 
The NIR-12's DNF (Digital Notch Filter) is quite effective.

While the NIR-12 has a sharply tunable bandwidth, outputting the signal to the MFJ-752C allows taking advantage of the MFJ CWF-2 custom-installed "under the hood" replacing the MFJ's cheesy NL (noise limiter) diodes.

Bottom-line: No matter how highly-rated your receiving equipment, they can all benefit from external audio filtering.  Additionally, if you are a "knob-twiddler" like me, external filtering keeps me busy and provides the illusion that I can eliminate ANY QRM that seems to be problematic.

What about YOU?
Do YOU utilize external filters?
If NoT, WHY NoT?

WQ6X Wings another NAQP SSB Dual-Operation

WQ6X/6 @ W7AYT in Concord

Altho this was another last-minute WQ6X Dual-OP Operation for NX6T @ W7AYT, I found out
later that N6KI had put me on the OP-list nearly a week ago. The "burbling" internet connection
I encountered 2 weeks ago before during the NAQP Cw contest has never really been resolved;
it seems to "randomly" come and go producing 150ms dropouts throughout the contests, wasting
significant time in getting EXCH data from other stations; conversely, they copied me just fine.

On the WQ6X remote end of things, thanks to the beautiful audio of the Electro Voice EV-664 broadcast microphone into the FT-1000mp,
I didn't need the Heil-PRO headset.

For listening, I used a cheesy pair of white ear buds with fidelity matched
by the outboard audio filters.

Saturday morning before the 11am contest start I implemented an easy enhancement to the WQ6X Lazy 8JK Sloper array.

This came in the form of 280-ohm terminating resistors at the electrically "far end" of each leg in the Cobra-dipole array (4 legs); the goal being to lower the signal radiation angle, hopefully transforming the sloper into more of a DX antenna and less of an NVIS cloud warmer.

The latest filter configuration @W7AYT

Another goal was to disentangle the morass of audio cables that have haphazardly evolved during previous contest operations @ W7AYT.
For this event I ended up by cascading one of the QF-1A filters into the newly acquired (but considerably older) QF-1 filter (circa 1972) for the left ear audio from the Yaesu FT-1000mp's Main-RX. Because the MP's Sub-RX has no DSP the JPS NIR-12 Dsp unit into an old MFJ-752 does almost as good a job
as the eDSP in the 1000mp.




Afternoon OPs - New and Old

Running as a Multi-2 entry allowed us to attain B-I-C (butt in chair) for Station #2 throughout contest (except the dinner hour).  Anytime there was no onsite B-I-C, remote operators kept Station #2 active at all times.

WQ6X opened the contest remotely from Station #1, being relieved at 20:30z by the afternoon onsite operators.  W2PWS opened the contest on 20-meters with B-I-C.  Hundreds of QSOs were put in the
20-meter log and hundreds more when N6KI made the scene.


Because NAQP contests are over too early to coincide with the usual after-midnight intentional QRM, imagine my surprise during pileup running when the run frequency was invaded by one of several IDIOTs who thought it was the National Tuneup Frequency (NTF). Why is it that NTF QRM usually happens while I am trying to pick an S-3 signal out of an S-9 noise-level. Luckily the K3 has an
IF-based DNF (Digital Notch Filter); that coupled with a JPS NIR-12 on my end rendered most
of those numerous carriers all but inert.

Antennas @ W7AYT's QTH

Installing the 280-Ohm terminating resistors on each leg of the WQ6X Lazy 8JK Sloper SEEMS to have lowered the radiation-angle, as I was hoping.  After the NAQP GiG was long over, I spent time listening to JA signals as they played around in their local KJC contest.

In recent Asian contests I have considered the Northwest antenna direction to be a propagation-vortex to Japan and beyond.  This weekend suggests that problem may have well been alleviated.

Reception conditions of WWV on 20 & 25 Mhz also seem to have improved considerably with the 8JK antenna update.  Unfortunately, the A & K Indexes reminded us that S-9 noise levels could be expected, and in fact were.  On the WQ6X end of things band condx were noisily-HORRIBLE, resulting in only 6 QSOs to the log.
Bummer Dewd.

 When it was all over, we ended with 781 QSOs and 120 multipliers giving us
a not insignificant score of 93.6k points.

Did YOU work the NAQP contest?
Is WQ6X in YOUR Log?

WQ6X Dual-OPs NAQP Cw (another look)

(While I wrote up the August NAQP CW contest for the WQ6X Contest Blog, I had originally intended a different write up, which was promptly misplaced.  In the spirit of completion, here is the original BLOG entry with some different yet appropriate PICs to go with it.  [CLICK HERE] to read the
original Contest BLOG post.)

It's hard to believe 7 months of 2018 is already behind us.  For WQ6X, NAQP signifies the beginning of August and the beginning of the winding down of Summer.  While the NAQP RTTY contest was held the end of July, domestically the NAQP CW/SSB contests are the focus of the month of August.

Because NAQP is only a 12 hour contest, it makes no sense to make a trip Fallbrook to join NX6T;
it [almost] isn't worth the trip to operate from W7AYT. Client commitments were light on Friday so I took the remainder of the afternoon off, arriving is Concord before 6pm; with enough daylight left
for antenna-futzing, which turned out to be unnecessary.

N6KI & WM6Y

The goal for this NAQP weekend was to assist NX6T remotely while enjoying 6+ hours of WQ6X
operator time from Concord (EB section).   Unfortunately, a shortage of live operators in the chair (B-I-C = butt in chair) for long periods relegated N6CY & WQ6X to remotely keeping NX6T "pounding them out".  Luckily, we had a busy afternoon shift with the operators who could make it.   In the end, just like 2018 FD, WQ6X had 90 minutes to put QSOs in the log.  Those 61 QSOs were a fraction of the 300+ I made running STN-1 for NX6T.




NX6T after NAQP is over

During several recent NX6T / W7AYT dual-OP weekends, I have perfected a set of Y-Split audio cables, allowing the combination of XCVR audio from NX6T and stereo (2-channel) audio from the Yaesu FT-1000mp I run from W7AYT.

In the current (but consistently changing) configuration, I enjoyed having a pair of QF-1A, back-ended
by an MFJ 752-C audio shaper for the predominantly left ear oriented sound; all that, couple that with the 1000mp's eDSP and Shift/Width facilities, and the WQ6X end of the remote connection is as filtered as it gets.

With the FT-1000mp, for S&P'ing while running a frequency (with the Main-RX), the Sub-RX is predominantly right-ear and can benefit from outboard audio processing.  The same is true for the NX6T remote audio coming in via the internet; it TOO can receive benefit from the Autek, MFJ and JPS NIR-12 filters.  The only thing these filters CAN'T "Fix" are internet dropouts; being analog filters, they are unable to process things which are not [there].

Because time was also spent experimenting with the WQ6X parallel antenna switch, considerable attention was made to reception/propagation from Northern / Southern California using the CH-250 vertical, the WQ6X Lazy 8JK Sloper, and both in parallel.  Synchronizing the radio's 2-VFO's allows "diversity reception" (as described on P.46 of the Yaesu FT-1000mp operator manual)  The use of outboard filters complements the diversity reception capability of the 1000mp considerably. 
At several points throughout the weekend, I was listening in Concord (SF East Bay) to NX6T
in Fallbrook (near Oceanside), all while S&P'ing @ W7AYT via the Sub-RX.

WQ6X Ending Screen

When the NAQP contest ended, WQ6X put a whopping 62 QSOs in the log from W7AYT and over 300+ QSOs in the NX6T log remotely.  The dual-OP operation allowed me to improve the audio routing as ongoing experiments are made to determine the best outboard filter combination for maximizing performance of the already AWEsome Yaesu FT-1000mp.

Did YOU work the August 2018 NAQP Cw contest?

What kind of outboard filters do YOU use?

　

WQ6X Stumbles Thru WAE Cw Contest

WQ6X Remote operation w/QF-1 & QF-1A Filters

Every radiosport event brings unique/different problems often requiring custom solutions.
For the 2018 WAE (Worked All Europe) GiG, the biggest problem came in the form of a repeating internet dropout approx. every 5 seconds. This continual outage defined the WAE contest weekend.

The Worked All Europe contest is considered by many (including myself) to be the most COMPLEX
of all radiosport events. In most contests, a regular QSO is worth 2 points. In WAE, each QSO is worth ONE point; to receive another 1-point you must send a different station a QTC message,
which is in effect a report to the 2nd station about the QSO made with the 1st station. 
For efficiency, QTC messages can be sent in sets/books of 1 to 10 to a single recipient operator.
[CLICK HERE] to read the 2018 WAE contest rules.

The 2018 WAE contest resulted in barely 10% of the 2017 score. Because of the internet dropouts, there was NO WAY I was going to reliably send 10 QTC messages (let alone 1).  Of course sending
a QTC message for every QSO effectively doubles the score. When stations would send "QTC?",
I would press the pre-configured F-10 key to send "NOQTC". It was frustrating to listen to all the
"boys and girls" sending QTC's and I couldn't - Bummer Dewd!

NX6T station during Friday nite setup

CW-wise, WAE brings us many SUPER European operators, like YQ6A who kept the code speed under 28 wpm, sending a fast 5NN and a much slower serial number; the correct way to operate.  Unfortunately, MANY European operators were trying to impress people by running 35wpm during their CQ calls.  When you combine that with QRM/QRN and internet dropouts, it often took 20+ seconds to JUST figure out the callsign.  By the time I am ready to call the station, he is now
receiving a packet of 10 QTC messages.  WQ6X ain't waiting around for that - Buh Bye!
Remember: Your callsign is your calling card, if we copy it incorrectly then YOU don't
get credit for the QSO - SLOW DOWN people.

Commitments with my Toastmaster's club prevented me from getting started until 05:30z; by then, Europe had already faded into Fallbrook oblivion.  I took the time to configure the N1MM+ software
for WAE, connected and tested the outboard audio filters and caught 8+ hours of sleep. 
The 1st WAE QSO did not make it to the log until after 15:00z.

As you can see from the graph, 20-meters was the primary band for working Europe.  Running the C-31 yagi (7-el on 10, 5-el on 15 and 3-el on 20) I took a number of looks at 15 and 10 meters. 

Unfortunately, a low SFI of 67 did not contribute to an opening on those bands, at least the A-K Indexes were reasonably low; while there was plenty of static QRN, amazingly, the K3 radio's NB circuits knocked it all out.

Starting late on Friday missed an opening on 40 and 80 never materialized to Europe from NX6T's NVIS coaxial (double bazooka) inverted Vee for 80.


In radiosport, no matter what the contest result, I always learn something new technically.  
Just before the WAE contest weekend, an original Autek QF-1 filter was added to the laptop audio, effectively in parallel with the already existing QF-1A.  While each ear was routed through one of the filters, because RCForb laptop audio is effectively monaural, technically, the same audio content was being filtered in two different ways for each ear; not quite stereo Cw, but certainly effective enough to raise even weak signals above the noise.

N1MM+ Ending Screen for 2018 WAE

While the 2018 WAE Cw contest was quite a disappointment, it did allow me to work things out at
the remote access site.  I also learned how to invoke the onsite air conditioning in Fallbrook, allowing me to be self-sufficient.  Running 550 watts allowed WQ6X to be heard while keeping the NashVille shack relatively cool.  How CooL is that?

Did YOU work the WAE Cw contest?

How many QTC messages did YOU send?

WQ6X DUAL-OPS NAQP CW CONTEST (and other things)

WQ6X running barefoot for a change

Just when I thought summer was just getting started, the end-of-July NAQP RTTY contest came
and went. ([CLICK HERE] to read about WQ6X's participation in that event.) Right behind the RTTY GiG is of course the NAQP CW event.  Wanting to run another dual-OP GiG, Friday afternoon I made my way to W7AYT's QTH for the weekend. During the weekend a goal was to investigate different receive audio filter combinations for the FT-1000mp as well as test different antenna configurations for the custom-wired WQ6X antenna phasing switch.

Every remote operation with Fallbrook (whether run from W7AYT or from unknown locations in Alameda) bring with it a unique set of problems; most recently radio to RCFOFB audio connections.  Thursday evening I remoted in to verify the internet connection & the audio; everything checked out.

On Friday evening the audio again failed to come through. 
Troubleshooting the problem brought the realization that somehow some of the audio settings in the RCFORB software had "mysteriously" been changed.  When queried, no one owned up to changing anything; or, as my mother used to say: "then "Mr. Nobody" must have done it".  Nevertheless, once the settings were reverted back to their proper settings, everything worked FB.




WQ6X Equipment setup @ W7AYT

Once the NX6T remote access was resolved, then it was time to setup the Yaesu FT-1000mp @ W7AYT's QTH.  In recent weeks I have been running the 1000mp into various combinations of outboard audio filters.  Because I also run NX6T remotely during the same contest, I have worked
out a parallel cabling arrangement between the 1000mp, a Toshiba WIN-7 laptop and a HEIL Pro headset.  The cables are routed directing the internet audio from RCFORB into the input of the
Autek QF-1A filter, along with the transceiver's Main-RX audio.

Directing the radio and laptop audio run through separate isolation transformers keeps unnecessary ground-mismatch hum out of the ears.  Other annoying artifacts can be eliminated incidentally via the PEAK/Lo-PASS filter paths of the QF-1A.  For this weekend's operation, output of the QF-1A was fed into a long-used MFJ 752-C Audio Shaper, before making its way to the HEIL headset.
 
Running NX6T as a Multi-2 operation allowed a number of different operator configurations; some remote, some live in the shack atop the hill (900' high) in Fallbrook.  At 18:00z on Saturday, N6CY
ran 20 meters remotely while I alternated between 15 and 10 meters.

Because of the surprising 10-meter opening in the NAQP RTTY contest, I was hoping for a similar opportunity for NAQP CW; nope, lengthy S&P'ing and CQ calls yielded a WHOPPING 2 QSOs for
the log.  Luckily, 160 meters (at the other end of the spectrum) produced 32 QSOs to counter-balance the statistics.

For some reason, RF was getting into the K3 on 10 meters causing the radio to power itself off during each 2nd CQ call.  Reducing the power to 80 watts was enough to resolve the problem, but not enough to add more 10-meter QSOs to the log.  The 64 QSOs on 15 meters, while not a huge number, was to me a "bonus surprise".



NN6X + N6KI + N6EEG

Throughout the afternoon WQ6X ran station #1, taking breaks to put a few QSOs into the WQ6X Concord log.

23:00z on 20 meters & 01:15z on 40 were the longest runs for WQ6X.

By 03:00z I was back running remote during the "dinner hour".

N6KI joined me again around 05:10z and
we ran dual until 05:50
when I called it quits
with NX6T.

The last 10 minutes of NAQP were focused on 40 meters for WQ6X.  I was rewarded with QSOs from 8P5, WH6 and KH6, amongst some statesiders.  While WQ6X missed the minimum goal of 100+ QSOs, I DiD manage to fulfill several other operational goals for the portable operations from W7AYT's QTH.

Included in these goals was an innovative way to make use of the WQ6X antenna switch.  This allows running the WQ6X Lazy 8JK Sloper and the CH-250 vertical, either separately or (using  switch position 3) paralleling the coax from those antennas, running the two simultaneously.  While the radiation lobe(s) of these combined antennas are probably WEIRD, a number of stations were heard with the combo that could not be brought through with the individual antennas run separately.



2-el-10 + Lazy 8JK Sloper + CH-250

Overall, the NAQP Cw weekend was a mixture of fun, frustration and WEIRDness.  In the Multi-2 classification, NX6T took 8th place for USA and North America.

While WQ6X barely made an appearance this Cw GiG,
at LEAST I took the opportunity to test antenna sharing
as well as audio sharing

In the realm of audio-sharing, this operation allowed consolidating the previous morass of different audio
cables and multiple "Y" connectors down to two cables
and one junction block.

Combining the laptop audio with audio coming from the radio allowed the possibility of streaming electronic music from Pandora while running frequencies, however occasionally the music would "beat" with the Cw making code copy difficult; which is what Pandora's PAUSE
button is for.

 

Tuning around 40-meter Cw after the contest I encountered Buddhist chanting on 7.020 Lsb.  The chanting would build to a fervor and then it would be quiet; repeating this cycle every 5 minutes or so.

HuH?  WTF?

 

Did YOU work the North American QSO Party (NAQP)?

 

Is NX6T or WQ6X in YOUR log?

 

Addendum: The original rough draft for this BLOG entry was recently discovered and written up.  [CLICK HERE] to read that entry.

WQ6X RUNS NAQP & DMC RTTY Contests

Like many WQ6X remote operations, the July NAQP RTTY contest was a last minute setup.
Earlier that week there was an attempt to run NX6T in the NAQP contest as a remote Multi-2 operation until they discovered there is no reliable/accurate way to remotely dial back STN-1's
ACOM 2000a amplifer down to exactly 99 - 100 watts (the power limit for NAQP contests).

Enter WQ6X. On Friday evening it occured to me that running STN-1's Elecraft K3 barefoot at 55 watts would result in only a 3db reduction in the signal level; an amplifier would not be necessary.

The BiG secret to running lower power operations is directing the RF energy into gain-producing antennas , such as the C-31 and Shorty-40 yagi's at NX6T's Fallbrook location; both 31mh.

The 80-meter coaxial dipole (atop tower #2 in it's 13mh lower elevation) was enough to put 15 RTTY QSOs in the
80-meter section of the log.

While the overall operation was ad-HOC, WQ6X managed QSO #1 by 18:01z. Running the Elecraft K3 @55 watts kept the radio and the shack relatively cool; had I run the ACOM 2000a with no one onsite to turn on the shack A/C, simple heat problems woulda become BiG problems.

Thanks to the DMC RTTY contest (which began at 12:00z), putting 11 QSOs in the DMC log from 16:00z - 18:00z allowed testing of the radio facilities in Fallbrook, as well as the internet connections on both sides of the radio operation.

NX6T on Friday evening

Pre-loading N1MM's keyboard RTTY macros on Friday evening, software operation ran nearly flawlessly; there were even 1/2 dozen opportunities to effect proper use of the F-10 "NOW"
key while running a frequency.

During S&P operations another 1/2 dozen QSOs made it to the log by way
of the other station's proper use of their "NOW" key.

As I often do during RTTY & CW GiGs, run frequencies are PRECISELY chosen such that when some IDIOT calls Cq EXACTLY on my run frequency, I know
it did NoT happen by accident.

 That is also why I have the F-11 key configured to send "QRL - Pse QSY". When a station attempts to move-in on my run frequency, I press the F-11 key TWICE for each time I press F-1 to call CQ. 
In most cases the intruder gets the message and QSY's to another frequency.

While we are still near the bottom of the solar sunspot cycle, the SFI was UP high enough and long enough that 15 AND 10 meter openings were a part of the daytime operation. In fact, more QSos made it into the log on 10-meters than on 15 - GO Figure. While running 10-meters a periodic scan
of the C-31 from North to East to South America and back again put dozens of QSOs in the log.
While contest goal of 300 QSOs was JUST missed (293), considering the 55-watt power level,
I was amazed how easy it was to keep run frequencies active.

Because NAQP GiGs are 12 hour contests beginning at 18:00z and ending at 06:00z it is reasonable to expect that encountering intentional QRM probably will not be a problem; especially during a RTTY contest. Unfortunately, when I started up on 40 meters around 02:00z, I no sooner put out the first "CQ NAQP" call, when a Spanish-speaking SSB station (with no callsign ID, of course) zero-beats
the 7094.94 run frequency EXACTLY; i.e., this was no accident. While I am used to Asian SSB signals in the upper portions of the 40-meter Cw/Digital spectrum, rarely does that occur before midnight (07:00z), and certainly not in Spanish.

Events of the day allowed working the allowed 10 out of the 12 NAQP hours (the limit for Single OP operations). Altho there are fewer stations operating the final 2 hours of the contest, it is not surprising to hear "new" stations during that period; possibly OPs who got on the air at the last minute to make a few QSOs.

What about you?

Did YOU play in the NAQP and/or DMC RTTY contests?

Is WQ6X in YOUR log?