06/22/2003 | K4SCH This is the first time I have worked a VHF/UHF contest and I must say it was a blast! Myself (Jim K4SCH) along with my father Larry W4LJS worked the contest from Clingmans Peak on top of Mount. Mitchell North Carolina EM85. Elevation there is about 6,600 feet and some change. We worked 6m SSB, 2m SSB and FM, and also 70cm SSB and FM. For antennas we had 1 KB6KQ loop on 6m, 2 KB6KQ loops stacked on 2m, and a small 2m/70cm Vertical. Needless to say we didn't have much in the way of big antennas but we were pleasantly surprised with the wonderful performance we got out of the loop antennas. For equipment we had a Yaesu FT-100D running on 6m, and an Icom 706MkIIg running on 2m/70cm. We arrived on Mitchell at about 1345EST on Saturday and were on the air by 1415EST we worked until about 2130EST that evening. Operations started up again on Sunday at about 0830EST and continued until about 1530EST. Saturday brought some great openings to Florida the Midwest and also all the way to California on 6m. On Sunday band enhancements on 6m seemed to dry up but there was still a good amount of local activity. We also had ok luck on 2m on Saturday with some slight enhancements to the north of us and a fairly decent amount of local activity. On Sunday 2m did not do well at all activity was sporadic at best. 70cm was our worst band because we lacked the antennas to appropriately exploit it. The final rundown looked like this:

6m: 140 Q's with 37 multipliers

2m: 70 Q's with 17 multipliers

70cm: 19 Q's With 8 multipliers

For a total score of 15376 Not to bad for a first time out! 73! to everyone and I can only say I hope you enjoyed the contest as much as we did! We already have plans in the works to come back bigger and better next year. -- K4SCH