As was documented in last year's "BLAST from the Past" Blog, I've run SS events from Livermore
(as a teenager), Cincinnati OH, Eastern OH, an expedition from Carpinteria state beach, Brentwood (w/N6GEO), Fallbrook (NX6T in SDG) and of course numerous events (each uniquely different)
from W7AYT's QTH in the East Bay (EB) section.
During Sweepstakes events in recent years, I have been able to run dual-OP as WQ6X, while putting in a not-insignificant number of hours as a remote-OP for NX6T from the Fallbrook location. Different for 2021 was running SS as NX6T for the 1st time from WA6TQT's super station on the mountain top in Anza, with stacked yagi arrays for the 40 thru 10 meter bands along with a 4-Square for 80-meters.
At the WQ6X end of operations, the revamped 8JK phased Cobra dipole array produced much improved operation overall, with increased signal levels, despite the horribly UP/DN space weather throughout the weekend. (Sunday afternoon @23:40z OZ7X cam thru on 40-meters - wOw - something that never happens even during late-evening from the Concord QTH.
However, I'm getting ahead of myself.
With thorough station setup completed Friday evening after posting the BLOG on last weekend's
CQ WW contest, I settled in to run the Saturday's Sweepstakes GiG at the 21:00z starting time while N6KI began putting QSOs into the NX6T log. Within minutes Dennis telephoned to let me know that internet audio streaming to his RRC-1258 (the K3/0's hardware interface) was cutting out HORRIBLY. Instead of running the 5 to 7:30 shift, I took over N6KI's shift while he waited for internet recovery.
By the time the Dennis took over the 5pm (01:00z) to 7:30 shift, I had 255 QSOs in the log.
Despite the UP/Downess of the Space-WX, 15 meters was wide-open domestically.
10-meters never happened in Anza OR Concord, despite numerous CQ calls on my part.
Until the last station cable revamp, the 8JK Cobra Array was RFI'ing the shack, even to the point
of overloading the OP-computer's USB lines. Preliminary tuning tests BE-4 the Sweepstakes found everything in order, and in fact, the CH-250 vertical was used only occasionally during the contest; mainly as a receive comparison antenna. When the Space-WX wasn't geomagneticstorming, band condx. were incredibly improved over even a year ago. It seems like years since 40-meters was reliably open to the E. Coast by 23:30z.
The BiG problem for the weekend was intermittent Left-Ear audio. The us of Stereo-CW was
easily produced with the K3/0's audio while it seemed to be "frequency sensitive" w/the Yaesu
FT-1000mp's split audio. When Stereo-Cw works, it is utterly AWEsome. Surrounded by signals during a pileup, different pitched signals appear in a 0 - 180 degree azimuth arc; words can hardly adequately convey the experience. (Read Previous Blogs on this and develop your own Stereo-Cw arrangement.)
In addition to Stereo-Cw, having a pre-defined set of F-KEYs (each sending only ONE piece of information) made for snappy exchanges, just like we used to do during my traffic handling days. (Remember: Sweepstakes was originally a traffic handling training exercise.)
While NX6T eventually accomplish a clean sweep (all 84 multipliers), for WQ6X the task is not so easily accomplished. However I was astonished by the number of "rare" sections who called-in on my RUN frequencies: VY1, VO1, VY2, ND & NE. reading other soapbox comments, the near-unanimous experience was the rarity of EWA and UT; usually it's NE.
Being so used to running SS on the lower bands during a lengthy sunspot minimum, I'd almost nearly forgotten what it is like to run things on 15-meters, instead of FORCING all the upper-band action onto the 20-meter band alone.
Several attempts were made to create SS-action on 10-meters; alas it was not to be this year. Usually a handful of local (EB) stations can be hooked up with on 10-meters, demonstrating all-band activity in published summary STATs. Outside of a possible RBN spot, there was no evidence of any 10-meter activity.
Despite all of the above, Cw Sweepstakes 2021 met all of my expectations for how a simulated traffic handling event should run.
DiD YOU play in the 2021 November Sweepstakes Cw contest?
Is NX6T or WQ6X in YOUR LoG?
As of April 2022:
NX6T made 8th place overall, 3rd for Southwest Division and 1st for SDG (San Diego) Section.
WQ6X ended up in 80th place overall, 2nd for PAC Division and 1st place for EB (East Bay) Section.
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