WQ6X Works another Wonky WAE Contest

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The opening page of the DARC website shares the following observation about what makes the Worked All Europe (WAE) radiosport events (Cw, SSb & RTTY) so unique among DX contests:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Over the years, next to the domestic November Sweepstakes contest, the WAE GiG has become my favorite Cw radiosport contest.  NoT surprisingly, BOTH contests simulate some aspect of message-traffic handling; whether it's sending a message header (for Sweepstakes) or a QTC traffic-summary (in WAE), these events keep our emergency preparedness skills prepared for real-life emergencies, should they ever be needed.

The rules for the WAE contest are very clever.  Instead of 2-points for each logged-QSO, we receive only 1-point.  The 2nd point is EARNED by sending a QTC message (to a different station) summarily detailing this QSO.  While sending QTC messages can be a bit tricky, programs like N1MM+ sport an easily invokable pop-up screen (Ctrl-Z), requiring only a single-click to send each QTC message.

Similar to the JIDX contest (back in April) and the All Asian GiGs, non-European stations work ONLY a specific area; in this GiG, Eu stations.  However just in case, I have defined N1MM's F-12 key to send "EU Only" (needed when I call "CQ EU Test").

Friday evening and the 1st-half of Saturday brought us reasonable AWEsome (and quiet) openings
to EU.  Altho the space-WX numbers didn't necessarily reflect it, atmospheric noise slowly moved
in, leaving 40-meters waning Saturday evening and 15/20 meters all but impotent on Sunday.  80/10 meters were miserable no-shows all weekend and 15-meters never came back in time on Sunday.

In WAE, the BiG "fear" is that we will be stuck with a bunch of undelivered QTC messages
(as happened to me a few years back).  During the last hour of the WAE contest, it would seem
that more QTC traffic  is sent than QSOs actually being made.  For WQ6X, QTC-traffic was delivered for all but the last QSO in the log - a 99.95% delivery rate.

Running only 100-watts all weekend, the secret to sustainability was the expansive antenna
farm at the WA6TQT QTH.  Being a single area (Europe) contest, pointing the stacked yagi's
to 30-degrees and a KT-36 yagi at 45-degrees allowed WQ6X to blanket Europe by running
both yagi systems in parallel; switching to either offered a barely perceptible 3db increase
in signal.  Numerous stations noted how strong the WQ6X signal was.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When it was over, WQ6X had put nearly 19 hours in the operator chair.

DiD YOU work the WAE Cw contest?

Is WQ6X in YOUR log?