ARRL 10-Meter Contest: CW & Phone (Worldwide)

CW was "OK" here in Oregon this morning. Worked east coast and some mid west in addition to PNW. SSB opened briefly but only to Brazil. For the last few hours the band has been totally quiet both modes.

 

A couple of weeks ago in the CQWWCW a lot of guys were saying how great conditions were. My idea of great is not when20 meters shuts down at sunset here in the Midwest. If 20 isn't open 24/7 conditions are not great. I did work a few guys on 10 tonight at about 0030Z, mostly East coast and a few Fl stations. Didn't hear one S.A OR Carribean station. Hopefully another year will make a huge difference.

 

Terrible propagation in my area. Didn't expect this after World Wide SSB ....
On the second day it is even worse - almost no one is heard.

 

NIL here. I have an 80M OCFD up about 40 feet and it usually brings in the sigs, but I'm not copying anything but the somnolent hiss of white noise. Maybe a dit or dah here and there, but nothing to work with.

 

not the best conditions at my QTH, I could hear several K/W stations but little pistol station could not get through.

 

Well I sure learned the meaning of "sporadic" E! Nothing- nothing, then five PY's, nothing - then 30 min of New England (just above noise.) Squeezed out just over 100 qso's in 3 or 4 hours listening each day. And miraculously, Namibia popped up for 10 minutes and he heard me. 100 watts from an Icom 765 and 130 ft OCF wire. (SSB only) Can't wait for those mystical legendary just around the corner sunspots. I will say these conditions bring out patient ops. Tnx.

 

Fortunately the propagation gods were better the second day. Both CW and SSB were open earlier in the day here in the PNW and stayed open almost until the end of the contest. Most of the USA was workable. The only DX for me was SA. No pacific and no Carib but lots of PY's etc.

 

I really only had Saturday to work the contest. I think I worked every ham in FL from my temporary WV QTH though. More than once my entire N1MM log screen was only FL. They day started out with antenna trouble. I found out I'd be away from home and didn't really have time for antenna projects, so I ordered in a pre-made 10-meter antenna. Of course, MFJ lived up to its QC reputation and the SWR was off the chart, brought it down and sure enough, broken solder joint in the matching network. Didn't have soldering iron with me, but a temporary fix of squeezing the wire between a nut and bolt did the trick for Saturday.

 

I dabbled a bit in the contest, first contact was to Nambia but after that only made 3 more SSB contacts, one to CA and 2 to AZ. Then we put up a 40m dipole and I had fun chasing POTA activations!

73s

 

Worked about 45 CW contacts Sunday, mostly west (from Iowa) and some South Americans, nothing in continental US east of Illinois. Lots of deep QSB 100 watts and Butternut HF9VX vertical.

73, Chuck
N0NC

 

The band was really quiet on Saturday and I heard and worked all of one station. Sunday was better and I had a bit of time in the morning where I worked about a dozen stations though none were very strong. Fun to even hear a dozen or more stations on 10m as it's been a while since I've seen that much 10m activity.

 

Sorry to hear about your cast. I've had one and it's no fun!

For kicks I tried the contest using an old Radio Shack HTX-10 instead of my 7300. I made just over a dozen contacts (10 stateside.) I don't know why it's more fun getting a reply on that little radio, but it always brings a smile.

 

I made exactly zero contacts. I sporadically checked on Saturday. NOTHING but one or two cw folks, and they were too far in the noise for me to even contemplate working. I have a 10M propagation dead zone at my qth in the best of conditions...

 

I did a little better than last year. Which was my first year operating cw. 80 contacts, 27 multipliers, 5dxcc. All qrp. I have an efhw up around 40 feet. But I also have a hy-gain SPT 500 tuned for 10 meters. The hy-gain antenna was able to pick up some of the contacts that the efwh couldn't hear. Pretty happy with the old cb antenna.