I put in about about 6-7 hours of SS - all on 40m with the K2 and a long buddipole up 8 ft in the front yard. About 4 hours were between 0300-0730z and woke up early Sunday morning to put in 2-3 more hours (1230-1500). Had no time after church to work any more SS (was hoping to get on 20m and get more sections). I worked roughly 50 sections and I think I made almost 100 contacts. I turned it all off when it was time to leave for church, and I do remember my last contact broke the 10,000 pt barrier - and I was a very satisfied operator (and thrilled with the K2).
I haven't worked 40m much late at night, but I think I'll try to do it more often when I can't sleep. California was amazingly open after sunrise - but I think I was aided more by the super contesting station's antennas and conditions than my 5W and buddipole. With my compromise antenna and QRP signal, I would tune around (with the pre-amp off) and look for signals that were at least s9 to work. If they were s5 or less, I usually found that they could not even hear me. Most of the time, I was averaging 15 contacts/hr, and maxed out close to 20 in the morning. Not being a highspeed (>20 wpm) CW op - I found that I had to use a CW receiving 'crutch' on my pc. It saved my hide about 75% of the time ... but my ear was improving towards the end, and I found that I was getting comfortable with the 25wpm ops. For W0NTA - I heard you Sunday morning working a KS station (and you were quite strong into OK), and wish I could have worked you - it would have been my only 2-way QRP contact. - Daniel / AA0NI K2 #3421 _______________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Post to: [email protected] You must be a subscriber to post to the list. Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.): http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com
