Today I received the 2012 WPX RTTY plaque for #1 North America in the Multi-Two category for the NG1G operation at W1AN (W1AN, K1DM, K3IU, W1PN, and NG1G). This original plaque will go to John to place in his station.
I’m hoping that this time next year we’ll be hearing about a plaque received for #1 World in the M2 category from NP3U.
73,
Pat, NG1G
Update: The plaques are in and the results are official. When parts of this article were first published we thought we had a good chance at breaking the US record we set in 2007. The results are official and the club holds a new US record, and a winning score for 2011 North America. Read more for the story of how this was accomplished.
What a wild ride! In the week before the contest we put together a multi-2 effort at W1AN. Minutes before the contest started, Mike, K1DM asked what call sign we were going to use. Good question! No one had given any thought to that, and as this is a prefix contest, Mike thought it might be good to use NG1G. So we decided to go with that and one can only figure it helped, since we might have been the only NG1 in the contest.
All together we had 8 operators from the club take part, and it was great getting N1HRA, KO1H and KA1CQR in the chair and catching up on old news. This was Chuck’s first time in a multi-op contest with the club, and what a good one to start with. Chuck brought new member Chip, N1MIE, with him, and I enjoyed a good chat with Chip while I put Qs in the log on 15M.
We started out on 20M and 40M but after 13 20M Qs decided to go down to 80M. 40M was hopping but 80M was slow going, with signals being tough to decode. By the time we went to 20M and 15M at 1222Z, we had 493 40M Qs and 305 80M Qs in the log. We spent the entire day CQing on one frequency on 20M, and divided our time on 15M between CQing and S&Ping. Our S&P rates stayed high, as we were consistently answered on the first call. Starting just before 2200Z, W1AN worked a nice pile of JAs and socked away more mults. At the end of 24 hours we had over 1,600 Qs in the log and things were shaping up for a run at the US record we set in 2007 at KI1G. This was the first time in a RTTY contest for both Ed, W1PN and John, W1XX. With just a little instruction (apparently on a strict one-hour limit) both men were clicking away like pros in no time.
The Sat/Sun overnight dragged a little, as it always does. But we managed to add 200 Qs on 80M and over 300 Qs on 40M. By around 1600Z we had hit 7M points. Shortly afterward, unbeknownst to us, a Class C solar flare had occurred, causing our rates to plummet. However, the Two-of-Three Johns (W1AN and KO1H) soldiered on like QSO robots, eventually putting the ribbon on the whole shebang at over 8.4M points. Depending on how many mistakes we made, we have a good shot at beating the US record we set in 2007, raising the bar just a little higher for next year.
There seemed to be an unusual number of stations duping us. It was very frustrating and although it was our policy to work all dupes, it slowed us down on more than one occasion.
Many thanks to everyone who came out to support the operation and contribute to our great score! Everyone seemed to have a good time. A special thank you to John, W1AN and Nancy for hosting the operation. Nancy takes such good care of us with plenty of great food and drink! They are wonderful hosts.
We had no equipment failures. No lightning strikes, floods, power outages, or other disasters, man-made or natural. There was nary a hiccup to be had except for Writelog’s timed CQ function causing some havoc. Perhaps using a different call at W1AN confused Murphy, who might have been hanging around my house looking for me. Sucker! John’s station is a pleasure to work. There’s nothing like being a big fish once in a while!
Other than K3IU, KO1H, and KA1CQR, I’m not sure of what other club members we worked. Thanks for the Qs guys!
| Band | QSO | Points | Pref |
| 80M | 484 | 1554 | 127 |
| 40M | 923 | 3880 | 344 |
| 20M | 1047 | 2479 | 278 |
| 15M | 616 | 1582 | 133 |
| 10M | 9 | 23 | 4 |
| Total | 3079 | 9518 | 886 |
Score 8,432,948
73,
Pat, NG1G
There sure have been a lot of great scores submitted! Congrats to everyone for a fine job. For the M/S operation at W1AN, the weekend did not start out auspiciously. Due to an inaccurate oil gauge, I let myself run out of heating oil Thursday night/Friday morning, and spent much of Friday afternoon trying to get the system primed and firing. After a trip to Home Depot at 9PM for a new (but not completely correct) nozzle I got it running like a top. John, W1AN was on 40M putting Qs in the log until I got there just before midnight.
After about an hour of “catching up” I took over and continued our low-band operation into the night. Have I mentioned my distaste for 40M phone operation? Both 40M and 80M provided decent run rates and by the time Mike, K1DM, showed up Saturday morning I was ready to give up the helm for a while. I went back to Warwick to get the correct nozzle for my burner and got some rest, returning early Saturday evening.
During the day, Mike, John, and Ed, W1PN, divided most of their time between 15M and 10M. 15M has really come alive as others have mentioned, and it yielded many Qs and multipliers.
Upon my return, John, Mike, and I sat around for about 3 hours and discussed a great many things, almost none having to do with contesting. For my part, I was not looking forward to another night on the low bands but I gave in around 0330Z and got on with the business at hand.
Bill, W1WBB, arrived Sunday morning and after turnover went on the prowl on 15M. John, Bill, and I kept our eyes peeled for multipliers on the high bands and alternated operating to keep up our Q rates and get those mults. Near the end of the contest we were doing a better job of using those 10 band changes per hour to maximize opportunities on all the high bands.
Overall, we had a relaxed operating style. Very relaxed. There’s no doubt that had we operated in a more serious manner we could have scored much higher, but everyone seemed to enjoy the slower pace. It is, after all, about having fun.
Thanks to John for letting us operate at W1AN. It’s a real pleasure being a big signal. Thanks also to Nancy for her wonderful hospitality and great food!
We used N1MM logger and I must say, it has some features I really like. We did experience some glitches though, but they weren’t show stoppers. Otherwise, everything worked perfectly as usual. We worked KI1G on 3 bands but I don’t think we worked any other club members.
73,
Pat, NG1G
Call: NG1G
Operator(s): W1AN, K1DM, W1WBB, W1PN, NG1G
Station: W1AN
Class: M/S HP
QTH: CT
Operating Time (hrs):
Summary:
Band QSOs
————
160: 0
80: 145
40: 429
20: 236
15: 384
10: 177
————
Total: 1371 Prefixes = 753 Total Score = 2,916,369
