2009 NAQP SSB January as NC4KW @ N1LN

First, many thanks to N1LN and N1YXU for the invite, the great company, and the hospitality. The station and the setting are wonderful, and I can’t think of a better way to spend an afternoon of radiosport.

The contest operation itself did not hit the goals I had in my head for us. I really expected to beat our own score from August, but we did not. We actually came up quite short.

The 20m band was really abysmal. I started out the contest on 20m. After the first 40 minutes, the “run” dried up, and never was re-established. The first two hours ended with only about 45 Q’s on 20m, woefully inadequate. I knew it was going to be bad when NT4D lapped the QSO count the third time on the 40m station. He had 100+ while the 20m station was stuck at 33. Ick. No one else had any better luck on 20m either. Just terrible. 15m was far worse. I moved there to pick up the CA mult and 6 or 7 CA QSO’s. N1LN picked up another mult and another 6 or 7 Q’s on 15m a little later. 11 Q’s total.

10m? Ha.

The good news was that 40m/80m/160m all supplied a steady stream of Q’s. With 20m shut down tight, the “happy hour rush” was pretty slow, as 40m had been milked pretty thoroughly by 5:00pm local. I did manage to notice it was twilight, and picked up a handful of FL, GA, and AL on the low 40m beam. But as soon as that finished I was beginning to work WA and OR on the top of the stack. 40m was long at sundown. NT4D abandoned the futility of 20m to start 80m pretty early. When N1LN took over the 80m run a little later, the rate had become pretty good on 80m. O’course, 40m had petered out.

80m was fairly productive for the rest of the contest, and there were a few good runs on 160m later in the evening. The term ‘good’ in the context of this operation was a best combined 60 minute rate of only about 125/hr. The three and ten minute rates hit 200 several times, but only for short intervals.

The company was great even if conditions for HF were not. I am learning a lot from N1LN and his station, and I really appreciate the opportunity to see the station in action. Time well spent.

The 3830 entry.

Call: NC4KW
Operator(s): NT4D, W4KAZ, N1YXU, W4SAR, N1LN
Station: N1LN

Class: M/2 LP
QTH: NC
Operating Time (hrs): 12

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Mults
-------------------
  160:  168    40
   80:  381    52
   40:  371    44
   20:  110    22
   15:   11     3
   10:    0     0
-------------------
Total: 1041   161  Total Score = 167,601