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Larry Roll, K3LT |
I've noticed in the Soapbox that a few stations failed to work Delaware, and I somehow feel responsible for that by not working as many hours of the contest. I'll try to do a lot better next year. I managed to "steal" First Place in Delaware Section Low-Power Single-Operator category by being the one-and-only enterant. My score was a piddling 494 points out of 32 QSO's. I will certainly be working on a more respectable score for next year. I thank all the stations that I worked this year and will reply to all QSL's received.
73 de Larry, K3LT
Dover, Delaware
Wow!
The M/S N3XLS team which consisted of Joe, N3XLS and Al, N3KAE had an absolute blast in RU this weekend! This was a first-time RTTY RU for both of us... and should become an annual tradition from now on.
Thank you to all the stations who worked us. We tried some CQing in addition to our S&P technique. Both seemed to work quite well. We worked about 22 hours and squeezed out 500 contacts. Wait... oh... I am still hearing RTTY in my head! hihi I know that total may not be much compared to some big guns out there, but try not to grin too much when you read the equipment we used.
Sincere thanks to the software writers for WL, MMTTY, and the plug-in for a job well done!
73 de Joe, N3XLS and your truly Al, N3KAE
----------------------- N3XLS PA -----------------------
500 CONTACTS
45 STATES
09 CA PROV.
33 DXCC
EST SCORE 43,587
--------------------
EQUIPMENT
PENT III LAPTOP
WL 10.32E
MMTTY 1.63
MMTTY PLUG-IN
TS-430 (WITH NO FILTERS)
MFJ INTERFACE
50W OUTPUT
136' OCF DIPOLE @ 45'
----------------------------------------
This year's RTTY Round-up was a lot of fun as usual. This is one of the few contests I seriously get involved in.
I don't believe propogation was as good as last year as I heard little from the Pacific. As usual though, 40 and 80 Meters late Saturday night was a sight (sound) to behold.
There seemed to be good participation and I again managed to better my previous score (My way of "winning").
Don't ever drop this contest. RTTY is my favorite mode and without the "Round-up" WAS/RTTY would have been nearly unreachable.
This was my first Rtty Round-up ever. I have always been interested in Rtty but never pursued it. That is, until the sound card software became availiable. First it was PSK31 in May of 2002, then Rtty in December, 2002. What a Blast! I made 47 Rtty qso's in approx. 1-1/2 hours of operating. I would have like to operated longer, however this was a busy weekend.
Band conditions seemed good with contacts made on 20, 40 and 80 meters. Besides 20 meters, I seldom hear Rtty on any of the other bands except during contests. I wonder why this is ?
I look foward to the next Rtty Round-up.
73 to all
Terry
The XYL, the kids, the antennas: all of them would like more attention... |
Worked (most)All States during the RTTY Roundup |
Moreover, after many many years, ... well maybe not that many years since it was like ... last year or so, I thought I should have a look at the possibility of earning a worked all states award on RTTY, with confirmations received for contacts made exclusively during the Roundup.
I've heard it before from others, many work all the states during the course of a single weekend! But I've never done that myself ( the kids, the XYL, the antennas: kind of need more attention … ) , but like I said before, after that many many years, ... well maybe not that many years, I do keep a tidy logbook of all my contacts and I do have a nice QSL cards collection !!
So I went on to get those QSLs out of the drawer. I mean, I thought I had cards for all the 50 states already, didn't I ? -- No, I didn't have all my QSL cards.-- But wait, I can find contacts with each state made exclusively during the Roundup ! Yesss…
I got the logbooks out and found those missing states – AL, DE, HI, KS, MO, NE, RI, UT, WV --. Some more cards got printed, got envelopes, got some return stamps from the US, etc. Many hours were spent finding addresses, writing envelopes, getting stamps, waiting for the postman, ...
The results ? …, the state of Hawaï still eludes me, because I've got ONE and only ONE QSO in the logbooks for all those years !
Let's get one more card out ... and pray, "Dear OM, KH7V, I am once again writing to you, because I sure hope the contact I've made with you last year was a valid one!"
73, and see you next year for more fun! Stephane
Had to go single radio in this one as the Icom-745 is about to give up the ghost. Aside from that and my logging problem with state and VE mults, all went well. 10M was kinda disapointing from this location but the other bands seemed in good shape.
Best 1 hour continuos rate was over 90 on 80M of all places on Saturday night/Sunday morning! Had the 10 minute rate meter over 120 for quite some time.
A good opening to Europe or JA never really happened for me but North American activity was great, lots of new calls and most everyone seemed to know what they were doing. Out of over 1000 QSOs I believe I was only duped 4 or 5 times. Not sending the /0 helps in that regard. (I was duped over 35 times in WPX last year when sending KI6DY/0). Lots of 5 banders as well.
My attention was torn Sunday afternoon between the radio and the TV where I intermittently watched my beloved Cleveland Browns blow another big lead and lose to the Steelers.
This still remains my favorite RTTY contest.
Some of the big gun stations new to RTTY need to tweak their exchanges, like starting and ending every buffer memory with a CR. Garble run into the call or state is a pain and slows down the rest of us when trying to reply. The two characters saved is nothing compared to the time spent deciphering the exchange before hitting the mouse for the reply!
Also, Baudot is not like ASCII; numbers, dashes and slashes do not have unique codes, they are 'shifted' letters. Don't send a dash between state abbreviations, your PC is sending FIGS, dash, then LTRS characters between each state (really slow and leads to garble). Use spaces between groups of letters, and dashes (no spaces) between groups of numbers.
73 - Glenn
The ARRL RTTY Round-Up is what got me into contesting! The Round-Up is such a blast. I look forward to the Round-Up each year with great anticipation. It is a pleasure to work old friends and see the new OP's giving it a try for the first time. Thanks to the ARRL for sponsoring this fine event. 73 Russell
This years contest was a lot of fun...
Is it just me or has RTTY become more popular than ever?
Fifteen meters was my best band, with signals ranging from 21.060 to 21.120 or so. Forty was also good from here, but 80 was a bust. Other respondents on the RTTY reflector noted many signals on 80, but I did not hear a single one up here on Saturday night. I guess I need a better antenna...
CU guys next year!
73 Gary WG7X
It was a jungle out there but I had a blast as usual. Seemed that DX was not that great but had a great chance to work all US and Canada. I am an avid PSKer and was troubled to see several stations right on top of PSK signals. Other than that observation, all was fun. Can't wait for the next contest. So where are all those RTTY people during the weeknights and non contest weekends? Hope to see more regulars. Thanks for all the nice contacts.
WA4KY - Gary - Kentucky
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