Another year another SSB Sweepstakes.

This year I gave myself extra time for travelling, acclimatising and setting up.  This worked well for acclimatising.  But I think I was too leisurely in setting up.  As I still ran out of time before the contest.

This year I was finally able to complete the VE7CA triband 2 element wire yagi.  I was also lucky that the trees where it naturally would hang were in the direction I wanted the signals to go.  The snag I discovered just before the start of the contest, was tangling of the lanyards to pull the antenna up with those of the main antenna.  So I lost 2⅟₂hrs of the contest.  Which made all the difference.  The most useful article I built on site was an 18ft wooden pole with a notch cut in the top.  I used this to easily position the dipole elements over branches.

So what was the contest like.

Propagation was different from 2014.  Not so many signals on 15m and 10m.  But not that many more signals on 40m and 80m.  I thought I would have suffered from the effects of ‘wall to wall’ signals on 40m and 80m, from East Coast stations working other East Coast stations and not hearing my QRP signal.  But this wasn’t the case.  I also didn’t work as many West Coast stations on 40m and 80m.  I think I should have started one hour earlier on the Sunday morning.  I heard more stations on from Utah but only managed to work one.

The VE7CA wire yagi worked very well.  But it did take time to assemble on the ground.  I was lucky to find a large roadside pull in to lay out all the parts.  I had built and tuned up the elements at home before packing the coiled elements into my hold luggage.  A visit to Home Depot on route to my portable location, provided me with the wood (lumber) and fixtures for the spreaders.  I would recommend this antenna to anyone with trees and a plot size to set one up.  Especially as a 45° sloper.  It enabled me to work into the far NE USA and Canada.  I used it so much that I missed many contacts to the Northwest and Alaska.  Which normally come in on my dipole antenna. 

Again I found that I wasn’t calling CQ often enough.  I tried an improvised voice keyer but this was not very effective.  I found I had to call CQ for some time before I would get a small group of replies.  The dilemma was how long to call before tuning around for ‘search and pounce’.

So what for 2016? 

The old faithfully 500ft inverted V.  Definitely build another VE7CA  yagi.  I gave my contest one away to a local Ham.  A sloping dipole orientated towards the NW for the enhanced propagation towards WWA, NT and Alaska for the 90mins around Sunset.  I would also like to try a 40m half size bobtail.  A voice key and some serious thought on CQ calling techniques.

As always a fun and friendly Contest.  Where people spend time and effort to work all the stations.  Especially when you are the multiplier.  So all have a good Year and I look forward to working you in the 2016 ARRL SSB HF Sweepstakes.

 73’s  GW0NVN  N1XIH