ARRL DX SSB

This weekend we had some visitors that came up from SM0. I did not plan any contest this weekend since the station is not yet fully functional but when SM0W called and asked if he could come and join us, since he had a work trip planned north during this week, I said OK. We will work as much as we can and luckily the station was in quite good shape before the contest, since I arrived already on Thursday evening. SA0AZT joined him on the trip north and I think he had a pleasant weekend at the SJ2W station.

On Thursday evening SM2LIY also joined and I noticed that the 60m tower did not turn. So I went out and the sound from the motor was the typical “one phase is missing” sound, so I suspected that a month ago when I tripped over a cable that I might have pulled something out of the rotor, and the suspicion was confirmed and easily fixed. However when I turned the tower I noticed that it seemed to have ice in the bottom bearing so with help from SM2XJP we took the blow tourch and got rid of the ice but when XJP turned the tower I noticed the bottom plate turning as well. So I took out the welder and welded it stuck to the bottom base and now it works as it should.

The contest sucked, it was horrible propagations. During the first night/morning we worked 69 qsos (!) which must be a bottom low for us. We had no openings at all on any band. It got better on Sunday but still not great, however we had a few nice moments of big runs and I think that SA0AZT at least enjoyed his time on the radio.

                    ARRL DX Contest, SSB

Call: SJ2W
Operator(s): SA0AZT SM0W SM2LIY SM2WMV
Station: SJ2W

Class: M/S HP
QTH: Da Traesk
Operating Time (hrs): 38

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Mults
-------------------
  160:    0     0
   80:   15    14
   40:  217    43
   20: 1382    61
   15:  564    58
   10:   41    26
-------------------
Total: 2219   202  Total Score = 1,344,714

Club: Worldwide Young Contesters

Comments:

SM0W had planned a work trip up north and asked if he could join and do ARRL. I
had not planned any operation but I said yes and we did our best. However
propagation's were horrible and after the first night/morning we had 69 qsos
(!).

SA0AZT also joined SM0W on the trip north and did a good job along with the
regular SM2LIY.

It got better on Sunday but the lowbands were really bad and 10m didn't really
open up towards north american except for a few sporadic openings via aurora
and side scatter to south america.

160m: 39m vert
 80m: 4-SQ
 40m: 3/3el
 20m: 6/6/6el
 15m: 6/6el
 10m: 6/6el + 6el @46m

Rig: 2xFT1000MKV
Amp: ACOM 2000A (Sponsored by Ojojoj Music AB) + 4CX1500B

1 Comments.

  1. You did a great job although bad propagation. I like photo nr. 14 the most. It would be a great desktop background on the contest computer. 73, Bas