ARRL DXCC 200 Trident Award arrived

 200 confirmed countries on CW and SSB and Digital...

CQWW SSB Single Op Assisted Low Power 10M - first impressions

 

Yes, this is possible with only 100W and a good antenna on 28Mhz during one weekend...

After I had sworn last year never to compete again in the non-assisted category of the CQWW contest — due to the excessive FOMOM (fear of missing out multipliers) stress — I decided this year to participate in the low-power category, albeit assisted.

This, too, is a challenge.
You instantly know where the multipliers are, and you can usually hear them fairly well, but actually working them is another matter. You constantly end up in pile-ups with high-power stations, while the clock keeps ticking and running isn’t an option.
Operating with 100W, however, gives a much better sense of the antenna’s performance. That was my main concern this year: to answer the question — does a 5-element Yagi really make a difference compared to a standard 3-element Yagi?
In other words, can I build my station around a 3-element multiband antenna — such as an Ultrabeam VL2.3 — or should I (also) invest in several monoband Yagis?

The answer is clear: the antenna definitely makes a difference. I received numerous superior signal reports. With these excellent propagation conditions, 100W was enough to work the entire world on 10m. Sure, 1500W would have improved efficiency, but that’s about it. And this time no QRM complaints from neighbours.

For the future, it’s clear that in addition to the 5-element on 10m and the 2-element on 40m, I should add a 5-element (Momobeam?) for 15m and a 4-element (DXBeam?) for 20m.

Compared to last year, there were two major improvements: the entire contest was recorded, and the voice keyer was properly configured this time, resulting in excellent modulation.
That I had to run above 29 MHz is just a detail. It probably cost me quite a few QSOs (and a bit of ego), but the upper part of the band is much quieter — which should have had a positive impact on my error rate.

>1000 QSO with 132 countries and 38 zones as a fantastic multiplier result. I only missed ZD7, and zone 1 was so briefly open that I didn’t make it either. I also noticed that very few stations, even in the HP category, worked more than 38 zones. The icing on the cake was KH6 as my final QSO — worth two multipliers.

The ON record in SO(A)LP 10M will surely have been broken — propagation conditions were truly exceptional.

Onward to CW, as SO(A)HP 10M…

back on 160 meter band

I’m active again on 160m. 

The inverted-L antenna I used before could be reinstalled without any issues, and the old measurements are perfectly reproducible.
At the moment, I’m only using 9 radials, each 1/8 wavelength long, which I hope will to be buried in the ground during wintertime. In a few weeks, additional temporary radials will be added.

The SWR is OK within my operating (CW and FT8) range of the antenna and is 1:1 with the help of the TunerGenius.  

Over the past few evenings, 230 contacts have been logged, including 3 new countries (CU, OD, and T7), bringing my total number of unconfirmed entities to 99. Since I never received confirmation from JT1CO a few years ago, I hope to reach 98 confirmed DXCCs within a few weeks — just 2 more to go for 10-band DXCC. 

The other day I picked up a single signal from ZS1J, unfortunately too brief to make a QSO, and yesterday I was heard in ZD9 and  in Antarctica by DP0POL, but no one was active there at the time. 

The most important thing is that the antenna clearly has potential. One of these days, the BOG will be connected so I can improve my receive performance.