2008 ARRL August UHF Contest
08/07/2008 |
WA2FGK
As in playing golf, you always have a highlight during an outing. I will say this, there were not to many from the western part of FN21. There were no traces of inhancement during the entire contest. Activity was way down. What ever happened to our friends from the Philadelphia area. Once the powerhouse of the country, the Pack Rats.
Saturday started a bit slow with four serious thunderstorms moving through the area in two hour incriments. The temperature dropped drastically, which I am sure closed the bands down.
The conditions to the south were terrible. Only K4QI in North Carolina was solid through 1296.
I pounded the auto keyer to the south on 432 with little returns. I figure over a KW and 100 elements should have gotten more replies. The Saturday evening highlight was finding Don WW8M in EN72. We immediately worked on 222 and 432. We switched to 903 and heard nothing. I again saw Don on 432 and we tried 1296. Bang there he was. 559 solid copy. We again tried 903 and signals were immediately heard. Also worked on 903 was Mark, K8MD. Solid copy but nothing was heard on 1296.
Sunday I was up at 6am local. I called my butt off and never worked a new station until 7am. Thank God for rovers or Sunday would have been a wash.
Thanks to all our old friends and new. This contest is like running a marathon. No matter what happens, you eventually get to the finish line.
We are still waiting for our 5 and 10 gig systems to be completed.
Steve at DEM has had delays but with his new transverters, we will be exactly on frequency. Surely worth the wait.
We are working on our new four stack on six meters. We have one more section to put up before the top guy wires are installed. Since we have to work on our 144 meg new antenna system, I might only have the top two antennas on for September on 50 megs
We have been off of 144 megs for quite some time. The next time we have a QSO, ask me how I blew up the black box on the 17B2
I love this hobby
Herb K2LNS
Stn Mgr for WA2FGK -- K2LNS
Saturday started a bit slow with four serious thunderstorms moving through the area in two hour incriments. The temperature dropped drastically, which I am sure closed the bands down.
The conditions to the south were terrible. Only K4QI in North Carolina was solid through 1296.
I pounded the auto keyer to the south on 432 with little returns. I figure over a KW and 100 elements should have gotten more replies. The Saturday evening highlight was finding Don WW8M in EN72. We immediately worked on 222 and 432. We switched to 903 and heard nothing. I again saw Don on 432 and we tried 1296. Bang there he was. 559 solid copy. We again tried 903 and signals were immediately heard. Also worked on 903 was Mark, K8MD. Solid copy but nothing was heard on 1296.
Sunday I was up at 6am local. I called my butt off and never worked a new station until 7am. Thank God for rovers or Sunday would have been a wash.
Thanks to all our old friends and new. This contest is like running a marathon. No matter what happens, you eventually get to the finish line.
We are still waiting for our 5 and 10 gig systems to be completed.
Steve at DEM has had delays but with his new transverters, we will be exactly on frequency. Surely worth the wait.
We are working on our new four stack on six meters. We have one more section to put up before the top guy wires are installed. Since we have to work on our 144 meg new antenna system, I might only have the top two antennas on for September on 50 megs
We have been off of 144 megs for quite some time. The next time we have a QSO, ask me how I blew up the black box on the 17B2
I love this hobby
Herb K2LNS
Stn Mgr for WA2FGK -- K2LNS
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