N8YXR

Robert Tuttle < n8yxrtuttle@gmail.com > Sun, Nov 3, 9:05 PM (2 days ago) Call: N8YXR Operator(s): N8YXR Station: N8YXR Class: Single Op Assisted LP QTH: MI Operating Time (hrs): 2:35 Summary:  Band  QSOs  Mults -------------------   160:    0     0    80:     13     4    40:    22    17    20:   0     0    15:    0     0    10:     0     0 ------------------- Total:  35   21  Total Score =  1,470 Club: Mad River Radio Club Comments: Not sure you can call what I did real CW, but I got on and did what I could for the club and to beat OH! Plan a full bore SSB effort as usual. Hope I didn't screw anyone up too much with my effort. This did get ...

Summary:  Band  QSOs  Mults -------------------   160:    0     0    80:   24    12    40:   22    22    20:  177   86    15:   65    50    10:    2     4 ------------------- Total:  290   125  Total Score = 132,414 Club: Mad River Radio Club Comments: Made plans to do better than last year with a goal of 350 QSOs, band plan by hour, and discussed the plan with Jennie. Then, I watched Tamitha Skov's solar predictions for the weekend and realized we would have to play it by ear. W3LPL said it well, "a very rough weekend." (Caught him and K3LR swapping scores on the real 3830. God, I miss that.) Did our best and considering the conditions. I found a spot on 80M to call CQ for a little bit. Mostly worked Canadians, but then a bunch of Am...

Call: N8YXR Operator(s): N8YXR, KC0RBV Station: N8YXR Class: Multi-Single LP QTH: MI Operating Time (hrs): Too bloody long and embarrassing Summary:  Band  QSOs  Mults -------------------   160:    0     0    80:   37    28    40:   49    37    20:  123   70    15:   29    70    10:    0     0 ------------------- Total:  238   155  Total Score = 110,670 Club: Mad River Radio Club Comments: We started out so positive and energetic. Then, well the bands did us in. Our goal was to try and beat the 8 land multi-single record, but as the weekend went on we saw it slip away. About Saturday evening, our goal shifted to simply surviving and minimizing the damage. What a !#$#% time! Truly horrible conditions up here!...

Call: N8YXR Operator(s): N8YXR, KC0RBV Station: N8YXR Class: Mult-single LP QTH: MI Operating Time (hrs): 23 Summary:   Band  QSOs  Sec ------------------------------    160:     80: 193  27     40: 141  26     20: 72  26     15: 16  4     10: ------------------------------ Total: 422  83 Total Score =70,052 Club: Mad River Radio Club Comments: Ok, the goal was only 300 QSOs. WOW! The Inverted-L seems to really cook for us. Never thought I would see that many QSOs on 80M. First time making a clean sweep since graduate school. Jennie's first time ever. VERY COOL!!! Last section was Ontario North of all places. Hopefully, this helped the club. I'm pretty sure without our big guns on this weekend OH won. If you did, good job guys. Worked several of the school clubs. It seems their participation is up. It will be interesting to see the results. Wo...

Call: N8YXR Operator(s): N8YXR, KC0RBV Station: N8YXR Class: Mult-single LP QTH: MI Operating Time (hrs): 27 Summary:   Band  QSOs  Zones  Countries ------------------------------    160:     80: 32     12    24     40: 32     12    18     20: 172   22    67     15: 63    15     37     10: 17    5       9 ------------------------------ Total: 316 66 155  Total Score = 193,375 Club: Mad River Radio Club Comments: Normally, I hate this contest. Always seems rough on us. Not sure it was better, but I don't feel like I was in a bar fight. Much better score than we have ever done. Due to a work event all Saturday morning and cub scouts tonight, we didn't max out operating time at all. The new 80m antenna worked okay. I had a lot of noise so eventually, I n...

Back in 2016, my wife and I were becoming more serious contesters. We had a station on the air, but wanted to become more competitive. I also wanted to improve my DXing. I had earned DXCC using our 5 band Hustler trapped vertical, but desired more entities. Reading a lot of others it seemed the biggest bang for your buck always tends to be antennas. We already owned a K3S so there was also not much more to improve on that. While benchmarking, I realized we would need a tower and a directional antenna.Thus, the summer of the tower was born! Examining what to buy and what to do took a lot of time. I asked questions and opinions from Mad River Radio Club members to understand their experiences. I read the ARRL Antenna Book and the Antenna Towers for the Radio Amateur book. The list of variables was bewildering. Like a normal engineer, I found I needed to use a process to help me decide what I wanted. Initially, I started with some goals. Improve DXing contest scores Increase my co...

 Call: N8YXR Operators: KC0RBV N8YXR Station: N8YXR Class: Muti-Single Low Power QTH: Michigan Operating Time (hrs): 15 Summary:  Band     QSOs      7      61     14     284     21      20  Total     365 Mult: 87 Score: 67,251 Nice to do some contesting mid-summer. My major goal was to get better at finding and running. Had a good two hour run towards the beginning of the contest with a rate peaking at one point of 180/hr. Jennie (KC0RBV) did a good job keeping that run going. We were spotted during that and another run so that was good. First time to be spotted multiple times. Didn't work many WRTC stations. It looks like they were mostly doing CW. I need to start operating that mode.