Route 66 On The Air

One of ham radio's more popular special events, the annual Route 66 On The Air returns to the airwaves for 9 days, beginning at 0000Z on Saturday, 10 September, and continuing until 2359Z on Sunday, 18 September. This year, there will be 21 stations representing locations from Chicago to Santa Monica, and utilizing the callsigns W6A thru W6U. More information about the event, suggested frequencies, operating tips, etc., can be found on the Route 66 On The Air homepage: http://w6jbt.org/?page_id=15 and by viewing the W6A thru W6U callsigns here on QRZ.

 

Thanks to Dennis, part of the W6H team, for this notice. Here are some guidelines for working any Special Even Station (SES) quickly and easily:

If you have worked the SES on a band slot already, please don't call again, especially when they're working a pileup. For example, if you have worked them on 40m SSB, but hear them on 20m SSB, please call. But don't call again on 40m SSB. When you do that, you may keep others from making a contact with them. After they acknowledge your report, don't respond with anything. You may cover up another caller. Thanks!

Like any special event station, we hope to work between 100 and 200 QSO's/hour. That doesn't happen often enough. Too few stations follow the guidance below. To find Route 66 On-the-Air stations, use your favorite DX cluster. I use DXWatch.com and search on W6* to find all of them.

On SSB, do NOT say OUR call--we know it! Don’t send it on CW either. Give your full call once phonetically on SSB. That always saves time if we can enter the full call the first time. Follow our instructions. If we say, "Suffix Phonetically", respond with JUST your suffix phonetically. LISTEN LISTEN LISTEN. Listen to the flow of QSO's in previous contacts. (DX Code of Conduct)

If you can't hear us well enough to tell if we have finished a QSO, DON'T CALL! Wait for our signal to rise. DON'T say just your suffix or prefix. Do NOT send our call! We know our call. Do NOT repeat anything unless asked. Read and follow the DX Code of Conduct and you and all other stations will make fast, short contacts and we'll get more stations in our logs.

We'll occasionally call for specific all areas on SSB. If that is not your area, please don't call. If you continually call out-of-turn, you may not make the log!

Help us work you, and you will more likely make it into the log. Rude callers may not make the log. HF Propagation, local noise, and QRM make QSO's difficult at times. Work another W6x station and come back to work us. Use CW if SSB doesn't work. The former is a far more effective mode. We'll slow down or speed up to your speed. For CW rag chewers, working W6H is NOT a rag chew. Don’t send our call twice followed by your call twice! Don’t repeat anything unless asked. “599 CA” suffices when we turn it over to you. Sure, “73” is OK, but don’t take 60 seconds when 15 seconds is sufficient for the entire contact! Others are waiting in line, and they may disappear if you take too long.

We will have ops using FT8 (1,700+ contacts in 2021) and perhaps FT4 again this year due to the soaring popularity of this mode. Watch for their spots on your favorite site. Please spot us when you work us, regardless of band or mode. That helps to keep attention focused on current operations. Want to know when we'll operate? Go to http://n2iw.com/route66-2022/index.php to view our schedule. Thanks to James, N2IW, W6H has this great on-line scheduling app. All ops take time out of our lives to give you contacts. Please follow the guidelines and we'll work hard to put you in the log!

If you are operating another W6x station, please, please check the cluster first! Then, listen. Don't choose a frequency with a pileup. If nobody else is on or near (+/- 3 kHz on SSB, 1 kHz on CW), listen, then self-spot on a cluster, ask if the frequency is use, and if it is not, call CQ.

Thanks and 73, Bill, K8TE

 

Nice explanation of operating procedures for Route 66 On The Air this year! Good luck!

 

I am a member of the Elk City group working as W6J. We are keeping each other advised via the Telegram app as to what freq and mode we are using, I have been mostly working 30m so far and responses have been heavy. Please if you call and don't get a quick response don't just run off, most likely you are one of several responders and I work them in the order in which they are seen on my screen. Thanks for your patience and good luck.
Ralph KG5EYC

 

Thanks Bill and the rest of the clubs and Operators on the RT66 Team! This is one of the best events of the year and it's already off to a bang of a start!

I checked the schedule you mentioned above, but there isn't all that much on it. Is it sort of intended as an "on the fly" schedule along with the cluster spots? Also, it seems to show the Op's personal callsign and not the W6 call.

Keep up the great work, guys! Fantastic event!

Dave

 

"Thanks to Dennis, part of the W6H team, for this notice. Here are some guidelines for working any Special Even Station (SES) quickly and easily:"

Good universal advise.

 

That particular operating schedule is ONLY for the W6H callsign, it doesn't show the operating times for any of the other W6* stations.

 

Ah, OK, thanks. No worries. I'm doing fine looking around the posted freqs and watching the cluster. I'm only missing B and L right now. I'll stick with it this week and get to all of them.

Cheers!

 

I doubt I'll get all 21 stations, but I'm trying to get at least one contact from each Route 66 state. I'm now only missing W6Q, Illinois.

 

I haven't heard many of the stations on CW... been hunting though.

Not many = 2

Seems less than previous years?

 

I'd like to appeal to some of the Route 66 On The Air station operators: Please, please, please, try to be on the air a reasonable amount of time. Try to operate when the bands are open to various parts of the country. If you operate on a certain band during the same time period every day, propagation may not be favorable to all parts of the country (or even for DX). This is especially true for the west coast stations. Phone is, by far, the most popular mode for this event. If you operate phone only infrequently, massive pile-ups will result. One of the more rare stations appeared on phone last evening, he had an enormous pile-up, and the operator was not handling it well. Conntinuous calling for ten or fifteen seconds, with many stations repeating their callsign several times, and then continuing to call even after another station was being worked. Pile-up management by the special event operator is critical to maintaing a decent QSO rate, if you don't control the crowd, chaos is the result. Rewarding the continuous calling lids with a contact only encourages the behavior and results in far fewer contacts than would otherwise be possible. Work the stations "by the numbers" if you have to do so to maintain order. Fewer contacts per operating session results in larger pile-ups trying to work you when (and if) you return to the air.

 

Managed to work all of them one way or the other already, but I'm trying to get a CW sweep. I sympathize with WR2E in not hearing many CW activations.

However, W6O is on 14.030 right now with a nice signal!

 

Especially the "tailenders" ! grrrrrrr.................

 

Not really chasing them but have worked a few while tuning across the bands. So far W6M and W6F on CW and and W6E and W6J on FT8

 

Illinois (W6Q, W6U) has been scarce for me. I did get W6Q this morning on 14.033. He was booming into my QTH, but wasn't very busy. As of right now, I have 13 unique contacts, but have the several stations on different band or modes.