Contesting

During the weekdays of February 8-12, look for participants in the ARRL School Club Roundup on phone and CW. The weekend of February 13, the CQ WPX RTTY Contest will be the big deal on the air. New this year is a "distributed multi-multi" category. Don't forget the Thursday evening (US time) NCCC RTTY Sprints to make sure your RTTY configuration is in order. The normally-in-person Orlando Hamcation is the weekend of February 13, and all sessions are available online. There are multiple tracks to suit varied interests, including a Contesting track. "The CW (February 6) and RTTY North American Sprint (March 13) will begin ONE HOUR EARLIER at 2300 UTC instead of 0000 UTC! The contests are still 4 hours long, so they will end at 0259 UTC. This change recognizes that 20 meters has been closing at the start of the winter contests. Moving the start earlier by one hour will give contesters in the north and east a much bigger window for 20 meter activity, making the contest more fun for everybody. The new start times in February and March are an experiment and will be evaluated after the contests to see if we want to continue with it. Also note: The September contest start times will not change. The log submission deadline is still 7 days from the end of the contest. All logs must be submitted via the uploader app and everyone is encouraged to post their claimed score at 3830scores.com. Results for the CW Sprint will be published on an accelerated schedule with preliminary line scores available approximately 2 weeks after the contest and the full online results published about one month after the preliminary scores. A condensed version of the full results will then be published in the magazine version of NCJ. The NCJ-sponsored North American Sprint web page with all results, rules, team registration, and other information is at ncjweb.com/north-american-sprint. A new how-to article by N3BB is available as well - look under "Tips" at the lower right of the Sprint web page. 73, Ward N0AX -- NA CW Sprint Manager" Scott, K0MD, writes: "The last hour of the Minnesota QSO Party and the first hour of the NA CW Sprint will overlap this year. We are asking all Minnesota stations to give out a Sprint friendly exchange the last hour, which will be name, three-letter county abbreviation (required by Mn QSP), and a sequential number for the Sprint participants. We hope we can work one another in high numbers!" Minnesota stations in the QSO Party will be calling "CQ MNQP," which indicates to the Sprint participants that these stations are in Minnesota. For those using N1MM Logger+ that want to try the new category, it will pay to read the N1MM Logger+ document entitled "Multi-Computer and Multi-Op Contesting" especially section 4.2 "Distributed Multi- Ops". The N1MM Logger+ team announced in early December, 2020, that Microsoft Windows XP would no longer be supported as of February 1. On January 18, Andy, KU7T reiterated that as of February 1, Windows XP would no longer be supported. An experimental version of N1MM Logger+ was made available on January 29, breaking Windows XP compatibility. By the time you read this, the first weekly build of N1MM Logger+ containing more modern libraries, and removing support for Windows XP, will be mainstream. "Due to the world coronavirus situation, the EUDX Contest Committee has decided to consider, for this first edition, the Multi Multi category as Multi-Transmitter Distributed category. Stations operating in this category may have a maximum of six transmitted signals, one per band at any one time, from stations in different locations (each station = one person). All equipment, including remotely controlled equipment, must be located: • in the same Region for the European Union Countries (see Rules, Point 7); • in the same DXCC entity and same ITU Zone for non-European Union Countries. Six bands may be activated simultaneously. Please visit https://eudxcc.altervista.org/eu-dx-contest/ for more information." -ARRL Contest update

DELARA on 160

I only operated for a few hours. Thanks Joe for posting your results after the first night. I had forgotten the contest was going on and would have missed all of it if you didn't send the email. Must be old age. This is my favorite contest. My inverted L still works great. I only have 4 ground radials but that makes a big difference. The only problem is I'm on the second floor so there is a lot of RF in the shack. Enough that it knocks down my internet. So if you were logged in to my skimmer you would have lost connections a few times. Speaking of which. I checked the Skimmer at the ARC and WOW!. It was posting spots every second or two. Sorry I didn't get the address out sooner. Next contest don't forget this asset it's working great and will help your score. Once again the IP address at the ARC is 162.155.252.101:7000 . This address never changes were as my address at home will change now and then. I'm too cheap to buy a static IP. All in all this contest was still lots of fun. Also, speaking of contests. Once Covid is under control I think we should start doing more contests at the ARC. I was there last week and what a nice setup. There are two IC-7300's (Yes two of them), of course the FT-950 and another Kenwood and (thanks to Dale and others), some of the best antennas around. I would look forward to the comradery. Just a suggestion. George WD8KNC Another one in the logs........great contest as usual! Ran high power this time. Unfortunately, didn't find time to finish building the Magic-T transformer which will connect the above ground NE/SW beverage and the on ground NE/SW beverage together so receive capabilities weren't as good as I had hoped. Despite that, worked DX as follows: Day 1 Prefixes: CO2, KP2, KP4, NP2, XE1, ZF2, ZF5; DAY2 Prefixes: CO2, CU2, DL1, EI6, F6, NP2, TM2, V31, XE1. 45 of 50 states (No Alaska or Hawaii again) and 8 of 12 Canadian provinces. Much activity but unfortunately, most DX shows up between 1am and 4am. Tough on us old guys!! Worked Joe (MP) and George (KNC). Didn't hear any other club members. 'Til next time.......... Start Date : 2021-01-29 CallSign Used : W8KTQ Operator(s) : W8KTQ Operator Category : SINGLE-OP Assisted Category : NON-ASSISTED Band : ALL Power : HIGH Mode : CW Default Exchange : OH Gridsquare : EN80 Name : Dale Bauer Address : 3120 N Three Bs and K Road City/State/Zip : Sunbury OH 43074 Country : USA ARRL Section : OH Club/Team : Delaware Contest Team Software : N1MM Logger+ 1.0.8930.0 Band QSOs Pts StP DXC Pt/Q 1.8 784 1831 54 12 2.3 Total 784 1831 54 12 2.3 Score : 120,846 Rig Elecraft K3, KPA500: Antennas : 160M Inverted V @ 40' I ended up operating about 10.5 hours. I didn't think the band condx could get better than A=3, K=0 but it actually did. (A=2, K=0) Those numbers are great for 160. The bad news is that we're supposedly heading into a sunspot peak and low A & K indices mean it ain't happenin'. I never heard ND or AK, but I did put Hawaii in the log this morning, around sun rise. I didn't get any Europeans. I chalk that up to running barefoot. I did get quite a few Caribbean stations. Besides Dale, I also worked Larry, N8CWU. I heard George, WD8KNC, but we were both S&P at the time. Interestingly, I had the same score 2 years ago with 84 fewer QSOs. The difference was 8 more multipliers. 2021 CQ 160 METER CONTEST CW Call used: K8MP Location: OH Category: Single-Op Mode: CW Power: Low Callsign of Operator(s): K8MP Exchanged Information: K8MP RST OH Hours of Operation: 10:31 band QSOs points ----------------------------------------- 160 644 1469 ------------------------------------------ TOTAL 644 1469 X 64 multipliers = 94,016