TxQP Soapbox built 10-31-2011 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: AA8IA Class: SO CW LP Total Score = 168 I initially planned to work a significant portion of the TxQP and then not do anything else radio-related this weekend. But, after I started looking for Texas stations at 1930z and found very few, I played a bit in CQWW RTTY. Anyway, sorry i didn't set aside more time to work the stations from Texas. Hope you all had a great time. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: AD4EB Class: SO CW HP Total Score = 2,511 Great CW operators, heard some big pilups being whittled down. Missed not be mobile in Texas this year. Hope Melody and I can make it in 2012. 73 - Jim - AD4EB ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K4BAI Class: Single Op HP Total Score = 101,686 FT1000MP, Alpha 78, 1 KW, TH6DXX, dipole, inverted vee. Missed the first 6 1/2 hours due to having been out of town. Final score includes 5500 bonus points for working mobiles. Thanks for all QSOs, but particularly the mobiles. I worked three all time new counties. Need only 8 counties now: BAIL, BAYL, DALM, GLAS, MARI, REAG, SHMN, STER. Thanks to N5DO/M for IRIO and UPTO and to W5ETJ/M for PARM. 15 was too long for any but far west TX for most of the contest. No TX stations heard on 10M. Very little activity on 80M CW and none heard on 75 phone. 40M CW activity was low, probably because of the RTTY QRM from the CQ WW RTTY Contest. Stations in TX on CW need to move low in the band (or perhaps an alternate frequency for 40M on say 7110 CW might work better?). Thanks for a very nice, active QSO party. Look forward to next year. 73, John, K4BAI. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K5IID Class: Single Op QRP Total Score = 169,900 Total Score includes bonus points (5,400) Wow! What a kick that was! I think this is the first time I have tried QRP in this contest from here in TX. Anyway, I was amazed when Eu stations were answering my CQs on 40 with me running 5 watts to a droopy dipole at 35 feet! Next year I have to have a better 40 meter antenna! I really could not believe some of the ststions that could pull me out of the muck! Thanks to everyone! I had a real blast! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K5JX Class: SO CW Mobile LP Total Score = 58,032 Plus 8,000 bonus points Total claimed score: 66,032 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K5KG Class: Single Op HP Total Score = 230,769 What a great contest. We did not intend to work this one seriously, but once I got started, I got hooked. There seemed to be an endless stream of TX stations, especially on SSB, and the mobile activity was spectacular. Here are the our QSO totals with the mobiles: NO5W - 26 N5NA - 22 N5DO, N5TM, W0BH - 19 W3DYA - 18 WD5IYT - 14 KK5W - 10 K5JX - 9 N4CD, WB0TEV - 8 N3BB - 6 NO5W was consistently the loudest mobile, but certainly each of the other mobiles ran close seconds or thirds depending on the band condx at any moment. W0BH mobile, although maybe not the loudest mobile, was an interesting one to work. He signed a quick dit-dit at the end of each Q, and did not append /CTY or /M to his call. It seemed as though these things really helped his rate. Also, he was giving out up to four counties at a time which was a nice surprise! 20m was the money band. 40m CW was ok except for the many RTTY stations that were quite low in the band, thereby forcing the CW stations down even further. 15m was spotty with some European DX, but few TX stations to work. However, on Sunday afternoon, both N5DO and W0BH were incredibly loud on 15 when there were no other TX stations to be heard. Go figure! Also, on Sunday afternoon, 10m was crawling with European stations, but the skip was just too long for TX. I tried moving several stations to 10m, but no joy. On Saturday night, I tried to go to 80m, only to find that my antenna was inop. I later discovered that one end had fallend down...(hmmm, why didn't I check that before the contest?) Bonus points 14,000 for working the mobiles in multiple counties are included in the total score above. Tnx to all the TX ops, and especially the mobiles, who made this contest a success. 73, George, K5KG ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K5LH Class: SO CW LP Total Score = 213,435 What a difference a year makes! Down 25-35 percent in every category, with the same set-up and same operating strategy! Being located in the center of TX can be either a blessing or a curse with. Last year it was a blessing, this year a curse. Ground wave too short to pick up even nearby mobiles, sky wave too long to work most mobiles on 40 or 20. May have to reconfigure my inverted V 40-meter dipole for better results. No problem on 80 meters with a horizontal dipole. Under these circumstances the guys with the big guns win. But what a turnout on CW! It was a sheer delight to hear the bands light up with TX stations both fixed and mobile. Seems as if Gill County decided to make this its TXQP weekend. Hope you do well in the standings. Cudos to the mobiles for fishing my signals out of the QRM and QRN. Best ears go to W3DYA, then N5TM, NO5W, N4CD, N5NA, W0BH, KU5B, WD5IYT, N3BB, N5DO, and W5LCC. Working N6MU is always a special pleasure and we went all the way to 10 meters with solid signals between TX and CA in the first hour of the contest. Another delight and surprise was hearing and working my old classmate and friend DK2OY (Manfred, Manny, Ed) on 15. We went to school together in Germany in the 1960s, he ending up with the call DK2OY and I with DK5LH. Just this past June we had a wonderful lunch together in a restaurant in northern Germany overlooking the Baltic Sea. As a surprise, he and my other friends in DL had organized for me a tour of DL0CS, the well-equipped club station nearby that Manfred often uses for his activities. Hope you gave him plenty of points from TX. Lastly, thanks to Chuck, NO5W, and his gang at NARS in Houston. While I did not work him as often as I usually do in the TQP, just posting the mobile routes is a definite benefit for anyone in the contest. Thanks for all the QSOs and a cherished experience. Will see you next year for an even more exiting TQP. Chris, K5LH Rig: Omni V (90 Watts), wire dipoles in my old Pecan trees, Aetherlog for Mac. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K5NA Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 4,455 I managed to work a little on 40M CW in the TQP while Susan was doing the CQWW RTTY Contest on the high bands. 73, Richard - K5NA ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K5OT Class: Single Op HP Total Score = 854,598 The Texas QSO Party has really grown in popularity over the past few years, and I've had some interesting TQP adventures since my first entry in 1998. Most were operated while in motion - either as a single-op mobile or more recently as part of a multi-op mobile team with various combinations of K5NA, K5DU, W5ZL, NO5W, and K5AV. Those multi-op trips were indescribable. As a change of pace this year, I chose the single-op fixed approach and bypassed the camaraderie, big Texas scenery, and petrol expense. Thanks to George K5TR for the opportunity to contest at his station over the weekend. A great QTH, SO2R capabilities and many antenna choices helped keep things interesting. NO5W is a tireless ambassador and promoter of the Texas QSO Party, and his guidance is the core reason that this contest has exploded in popularity in recent years. Well done (again) Chuck and NARS! It seemed to me like there was a particularly good group of mobiles this year ... both in number and in ability. My vote for top new mobile entry goes to WD5IYT - watch out for Jim in future contests! Finally, thanks to the Central Texas DX and Contest Club members for their activity in TQP. I can't begin to list all of your calls that I heard on the bands. W5RQ & W5ZL did a great job motivating the club to get involved in this annual event. NR5M (with K5GA/K3TD) kept the club call W5CT busy with some big numbers from George's WALLER county QTH. It's terrific to have a such a broad base of club members that actively participate in the TQP each year. 73, Larry K5OT ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K6CSL Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 720 Conditions were great. Unfortunately Saturday was the only day my Brother-in-Law could come to Riverbank to help me install new toilets in our mobile home. I'm looking forward to a full time effort in CQP nrxt weekend and hopefully a full effort in TX QP next year. The five hours I got to operate were fun however. 73's and TNX for 4 new TX Counties in my log. I now have 74 or 29% of Texas 254 Counties. Bert, K6CSL ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: K8MFO Class: SO CW HP Total Score = 187,398 I wish that I had planned to a full effort in this great contest. I started 45 minutes after the gun went off, operated for an hour and a half, and then went to a ham garage sale for an hour. Took time to sit down and eat meals, etc. Nonetheless, it was a great time. Could I have worked 200 counties without the late start and the breaks? As they say, Only The Shadow Knows. Obviously you have to be old to remember that too! First of all, the true stars of this event were the mobiles. Here's a list of those that I worked. Each did a great job. KU5B, N3BB, K5JX, K5END, N5TM, N5DO, N4CD, WD5IYT, N5NA, NO5W, and W3DYA. There was some magical CW operating coming out of those vehicles. Who was the loudest mobile? Well, it all depends on WHEN you listened. Each had their moments, depending on where they were at the time. This group of 11 mobiles accounted for 206 of my 318 QSOs. Thanks Guys! It was fun riding along with you. I'm not sure about the calculations for the bonus points. The instructions seem clear enough, but I note anomalies with some of the other reports. I worked all 11 of the mobiles in at least 5 counties, which would give me 5500 bonus points, right off the top. I also worked 7 of the mobiles in at least an additonal 5 counties, which should provide 3500 more bonus points, for a total bonus of 9000 points. Right? Had one minor glitch with N1MM. For one of my QSOs, NO5W/FREE, N1MM credits me with a multiplier, but no QSO points. How can that be? Anyone else run into that? The submission form also wants my number of Phone and Digital QSOS too, even though I indicate SOCW (Single Operator CW) as my entry class. I only had to coax one non contester into a QSO as he appeared on the band. It was a new county too! Used a K3 with AL-1200 amp, loafing at 800 watts. Antennas were a Mosley PRO-57A at 124 feet, and a single element Mosley 40 at 117 feet. I had a reference rotary dipole (also Mosley) at 48 feet to compare with, but the high antenna was hearing better. Thank you for a great time. 73 Don K8MFO ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KA3DRR Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 216 Kenwood TS850S (55 Watts) Grnd Mounted 3BTV W/ 35 radials N1MM Contest Logger Acer Aspire 5532 Notebook Antenna system located between to condominiums. 73, Scot KA3DRR ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KD8AQ Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 243,036 Great runs on 20 and 40 phone and CW. Came home from church on Sunday to no power. Had to break out the grenerator and operated the shack for an hour on emergency power. A kind of mini FD ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KE0G Class: SO CW QRP Total Score = 85,356 K3/10 at 5 watts to a 74' dipole up 50', fed with 600-ohm open line and Johnson tuner. Had a ball chasing mobiles! Q's with mobiles: 20-NO5W, 16-W3DYA, 16-N5NA, 14-W0BH, 12-N5TM, 9-WD5IYT, 8-N5DO, 8-N4CD, 6-N3BB, 4-K5JX, 2-K5BWD. Thanks for your efforts out there travelling around. 4 bands: N5NA. Many stations on 3 bands. Very good signals from the home QTH's. 73, and C U next time. Dan ke0g MN ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KE3X Class: SO CW LP Total Score = 765 Hust a few minutes handing out a few QSO's to my NS buddies in Texas. In between chores this weeekend, I tried out the Wrist Rocket and raised all the wire antennas up another 10-30 feet in preparation for the Fall contest season: - 40-Meter dipole now at at 60 feet - 80-meter dipole now at 50 feet - 160-meter Inverted L at 70 feet Also knocked off several 'to-do' items ahead of Sweepstakes: - bought a MFJ-424B Digital Voice Keyer as a backup to soundcard DVK - fixed my PIEXX SO2Rxlat card (after 4 weeks of troubleshooting, Duh!) - bought a 2,500 Watt slug and two SO-239 connectors for my Bird-43 wattmeter - fixed the mic keying problem with my Yamaha CM500 headset - moved the FIOS wireless modem closer to the shack - installed a landline phone jack in the shack Next item: fix the Alpha 78, then it will be time for SS! Ken KE3X ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KJ5T Class: Single Op QRP Total Score = 27,880 This was my first QRP contest and the first contest with the Flex 1500. There was some hiccups with integrating the logging software with the radio as well as getting my FlexControl working which resulted in me getting a late start to the contest. 20 was not very good to me for some reason but 15 turned out very good. I had no idea how I would do, I certainly think I could have broken 200 had I had more operating time and had my strategy been better. I did spend a lot of time just playing with the Flex just trying to get used to it. I will have a full write-up with pictures and more on my blog at kj5t.net. All in all this was a successful contest and I want to thank Chuck NO5W for his promotion of the contest. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KK7AC Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 47,884 40 meters was down, so did not get to bag a lot of the mobiles that I was hoping for. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KN4Y Class: SO CW HP Total Score = 74,270 The CW mobiles made the QSO party successful, I worked nine mobile with five or more QSO's. It was a 20-meter event. The last two hours of the first day I did not hear a mobile on any band. I even worked the intersection of four counties. I operated CW and kept busy, I lost some serious nap time. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KS4X Class: Single Op QRP Total Score = 32,760 good job by the mobiles ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: KU5B Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Total Score = 74,721 Interesting weekend. We got a late start Saturday because my Little Tarheel II decided to act up on 20m. So, we cut out quite a few of the counties we had planned to do in order to get to Austin before the 3:30pm showing of "Tornado Alley" at the Bob Bullock Texas State History museum. After that was over, we drove over to Holland, TX and stayed with AB5K for the night playing a little bit of CQWW RTTY while there. Sunday we got up early and played a little more RTTY. We then investigated my antenna problem and found that the insulation had been worn off the 20m segment coils and also that the coils were pretty loose there. So, we spent VERY minimal time on 20m. We operated on the way back down to Austin Sunday morning and I worked one OE5 station on 10m; a first for KU5B/m. We arrived at the museum to see the TIV2 (Tornado Intercept Vehicle) around 11am. Got some really good pics and met the driver, Marcus. We left Austin around 2pm but I'd already taken everything apart so we just listened to W5CT on 40SSB on the way back to Somerville. This was NX5M's first real TQP mobile experience but I think he had fun when everything worked. At the end of the weekend, we'd accomplished seeing the IMAX, the TIV2, and done a little bit of TQP. Thanks for the Q's and great job by Chuck and the TQP team for making what sounded like a very successful event. Colin KU5B and Bob, NX5M ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N0TA Class: SO CW HP Total Score = 142,610 Bunch of fun chasing the mobiles! I had the most contact with NO5W -- 34! N5NA was a close competitor, but I couldn't hear him for the last 5 hours. I really appreciate all the work by the organizers and the mobiles. Thanks for a great time! K3, KPA500, Doublet & Vertical, N1MM. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N1CC Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 224,789 Force 12 C3 @ 40' and Alpha Delta DX-LB for 80 and 40 at 38' with drooping ends@30'. 43' Vertical was available, not used. Yaesu FT-990 100W WriteLog 10.88 for logging. Checked "everything" before contest. Then on first QSO the WriteLog in use would not do counties (Guess I ddin't check "everything") Very pleased with WriteLog upgrade and new version, done with PayPal and immediate. Total time lost getting updated was 30 minutes. 15 Meters was nearly useless given my conditions here, even 10 Meters was appreciably better. With the C3 twenty ws the best band. 95% on contacts were made running on all bands. Only a few S&P looking for multipliers. With the SFI at 190 ... conditions remained disturbed so that Saturday the Midwest was overwhelmingly strong on 20, Sunday most could barely be heard. On 10 Meters Skew path was important. Most EU was worked between 75 and 90 degrees, 40 degrees off the direct path. On 20 Direct path was the rule for both domestic and DX contacts. Working Texas Mobiles was not good for me, too many didn't spend enough time on 40 - understandably because 20 was wide open. So finding the rare TX counties was very hard. Most were too close in to work... A good warmup for CQP next week! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N3BB Class: Single Op HP Total Score = 115,184 Worked two hours from home on Saturday, HP. Worked 5.5 hours Sunday mobile with usual Lid manual setup and a FT857/100W with the basic Yaesu ATAS-120A screwdriver antenna on the trunk. Did all logging on paper with a ballpoint pen, sent everything with the small Padlett paddle, did all driving, was alone. It's a big rush to enter a new county and hit the fresh pileup. Worked the new pileup from the side of the road, then drove through the county and worked/sent/logged while driving until the next county line. I don't recommend this. Will try to automate with PC and driver next year. Great fun, though, but tiring. Operated from TRAV, HAYS, BLAN, GILL, KERR, KEND, and COML counties as a mobile. Tnx to NO5W for great organizing, and to quite a few stations outside Texas for super activity. Also, thanks to K8MFO for consoling me when I got lost once, telling me "You're not lost, you're in Texas." That got me set straight again, once I stopped laughing. Ain't CW fun? 73, Jim N3BB ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N4CD Class: SO CW Mobile LP Total Score = 167,782 Chuck, NO5W, tries to get every county on the air �" arranging for mobiles to head to 'unclaimed' counties. Chuck is at every hamfest in TX promoting the TQP trying to get stations interested. If you run with computer logging, he's also got one of the best 'free' program for state QSO parties �" GPS enabled. http://www.no5w.com/ The car was just back from the shop where they had replaced the 'Transmission Control Module' for the six speed automatic transmission so I would check the car out on a couple hundred mile trip. It didn't want to stay in sixth gear and no 'codes' showed up in the car so they didn't know where to start. Chuck, NO5W, had indicated that no one planned to run Cooke, Archer, and a few from Haskell going west. So I told him I'd get that. As of Thursday before the big event, he had commitments from all the mobiles that all 254 counties in TX would be on the air! Someone else was headed to Stonewall and Kent, too, so I could skip those if time got run short. After a nice breakfast, I put the radio in the car, put the antennas on the car, and headed out. I'd start in Denton County, and you run into Wise, then whack the corner of Cooke. When the contest started, I ran on 40M CW.....and things had changed! No S7 spur on 7058. No spur at all. All quiet on 7056.5. Zero car noise! (was S1 on cw - now zero) Replacing the module had eliminated ALL the noise. That was great. Well, at least I haven't found the spur in the lower 60 Khz of the band. Didn't look elsewhere. Residual noise is also down to essentially zero too. Good! That noise has been there since day one in the 2009 Mailbu. I switched over to 20M CW.......whoa...the dashboard lit up, the gauges went wild......something there had changed. It was the same setup I used two weeks ago in the AR QSO Party. Things had gotten a lot more sensitive to RF. NO problem if stopped, but when moving things went nuts. I ran the first three counties stopped on 20M. Then I decided maybe I could fix things. So I moved the coax from the from the driver side door �" from the mag mount. I moved it to the passenger side �" the radio sits on the passenger front seat. I put a small couple turn coil right by the antenna with the coax (about 4 inches in dia �" four turns) and brought the coax into the passenger rear door, and then with a short lead inside to the antenna switch which sits on the front seat, too. That seems to have fixed the problem. Next I'll have to figure out a way to ground the radio inside the car �" never needed it before. Probably time to take the mag mount base apart and check the coax shield ground �" it tends to corrode and not be good. Radio was happy , though with low SWR. RFI problem appeared to be fixed for the moment. Oh....I finally got around to putting county lines on my Garvin 200W GPS. ...I went to W4YDY's site. Well, first I went to the store and bought a 'SD card'. That fits into the side of the Garmin 200W. Then it took me a while to figure out exactly how to do it. I put the SD card into one of the slots in my computer that accepts them. My printer also will take an SD card. Then I looked in 'My Computer' to see which drive I had just plugged in. In my case, it was the “E” drive. Then I went to W4WDY site. http://pages.suddenlink.net/w4ydy/hamlinks.html#County There you will see 'Garmin GARMIN NUVI GPS County lines - Download Click on that and 'save' the file. Your computer will download it. Then you get a dialog box. Up near the left hand corner, you will see an option to 'extract' click on that...and when it asks where to send it, click on your drive for the SD card. I merely put in E drive. It unzipped the files to the SD card. Then I took it out of the computer and put it in the Garmin. Viola! When I plugged it back in and turned it on - County lines now appear! Thanks Dave for making it real simple. Just be sure your Garmin takes an SD card. I'm not sure the newer ones do. Wow..I checked the price for the Garmin upgrade �" mine is 4 or 5 years old. It's $60 bucks for an upgrade- you can often buy a new Garmin for not much more than that!.....I'll stick with the old one. The weather was good for county hunting �" sunny and clear. After Cooke, I headed west on 174 toward Archer City, but zigged south on 79 down to Young and Throckmorton. I made a beeline more or less to Haskell, the other county that no one else was scheduled to go to. I was running a big behind schedule having had to stop to run on 20M for the first couple of counties until I fixed the RFI problem. I didn't have time to go to SSB �" cw kept me fairly busy. I grabbed a quick lunch in Archer and kept moving. Nothing much to report..the band really went 'flat' in the middle part of the day �" contacts plummeted and don't think I got spotted in a few since no county hunters showed up! Either that, or they didn't hear me or vice versa. They seem to live or die by the spots. I realized I wasn't going to get to Kent...but the NO5W map showed W5LCC was scheduled to run that one. At Haskell, I dropped down into Jones and headed east on 180 The temp was expected to be in the mid 90s.....as I ran through Stephens County, it was 100 degrees in Mineral Wells. Yuk..more hot weather, but it should only last for few days then back to 90 or so..or lower. The band improved and the DX showed up �" OK2EC, PA3ARM, DK2OY, DL8USA, and DL3IAC were in the log. He sun is not quite as 'hot' either while sitting in the car �" it's already fall! I ran all the counties I ran though �" there were about 25 TX counties in my log �" only worked mobiles a handful of times �" W3DYA, N5XG N5NA, W5LCC, N5TM, W0BH �" but most of the time I suspect they were on 20M (or higher) as that is where all the action was during th It's hard to be a mobile in state and get too many counties, but the multipliers worked out well. Not to worry, I was just out for fun and the check out the car. Just one day out. Sunday I stayed home and operated from the home station chasing mobiles on 40M. Either I didn't hear them or they didn't come to 40M in most of the counties they ran! As I was close to home, the RTTY started to fill up 40M �" another RTTY contest and they infest the band after 5pm or so local time. For a while, you can slide down to below 7033 and escape the racket...but soon they are everywhere and by 7pm it's hard to find a 0.01KHz without RTTY to use. I managed to run Tarrant - on the six and 8 lane roads filled with cars �" then hit DALS �" Long run there �" then back to the house at 95 deg. Ate dinner after 30 minutes of putting out the home county - COLN. Summary; Car worked fine transmission wise. Now up to 70K miles. Mileage was about 31 mpg poking along on 2 lane roads for most of the trip except the first 40 and last 40 miles on 6 lane roads (and lots of traffic!) . Lunch $4.50. Car seems more 'RF sensitive' �" got to work on that. Sunday I stayed home and chased the mobiles �" and put out my home county �" Collin a few times. Rig: Trusty ICOM IC-706 Mark Original (now about 15 years old), six foot mast on mag mount (grounded) on rear trunk deck with resonators for 40/30/20/17/15 mounted horizontal. Schurr paddles. All hand sending - no computer- and no driver. 15M doesn't tune well - too many resonators interacting. Didn't run on 15M. Score includes bonus points for 16 activated counties. Never heard a mobile more than a few times so no joy there to get bonus points for working one five times. de N4CD, Bob editor County Hunter News www.chnewsonline.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N4CD Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 32,364 Saturday I was mobile. Sunday I stayed home and chased mobiles and worked TX stations. 58 counties worked on Sunday. SPent a lot of time on 40M. There were several others in my county giving it out for 2 days, so didn't feel need to spend a lot of time on 20M giving out COLN. Had fun. Still need 2 counties in TX. Missed them. Propagation in and out and finding mobiles who only spent a few minutes on 40M was challenging. I suspect many just didn't come down. Heard one mobile work stations up the band....quick...low to high..then disappeared without ever putting out his county. Rig: FT-1000 and inverted vee up 30 feet at center for 40m, and R5 vertical on 20M. Listened on 15 but didn't hear anything and and no one came back. 10M dead. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N4JF Class: Single Op QRP Total Score = 142,850 Score includes bonus points. Tx to Chuck NO5W for promoting the event..IT was really fun chasing stations all over the bands. 80 and 40 were disappointing. This was a 20 meter contest for me. NICE working old friends and making new ones. Hi to Colin KU5B who has operated my station in yrs past while going to college. The mobiles were especially active from lots of counties..Good CW operators. Now this was a QSO Party to remember. Very relaxing. Took time out to watch the AL football game.. 73s Jerry N4JF Mobiles wkd:for bonus points NO5W 20 N5NA 21 N5DO 17 N5TM 16 WD5IYT 15 W0BH 14 N4CD 9 N3BB 7 KU5B 6 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N4ZQA Class: SO SSB HP Total Score = 312 Gentlemen one and all. Thanks to all that came on the air. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N5DO Class: SO Mobile LP Total Score = 314,159 Thanks to James, K5FD, for driving about 1142 miles while I operated -- and for keeping the vehicle going. Last year was my first time to operate a contest mobile, so I thought I could certainly improve this year. But this was a different year -- I had about 50 more QSOs this year than last, but aboout 50 less multipliers. That was due mostly to the lack of 40M this year. Last year I had 715 QSOs on 40M, this year only 195. I picked up a lot of Texas counties for mults on 40 last year. The other big difference was that I had a hard time hearing this year. Same antenna, same rig, but everything seemed much noisier. Sunday conditions seemed so bad on 40 and 20 that I assumed some sort of solar event had occurred. I went up to 15, and everyone I heard was very loud, but there were not a whole of people up there. James (K5FD) and I had talked about improvements we could make to our physical set-up for a long time since last year's contest, but we waited until Wednesday night before the contest to start making them. It took two very late nights (or early mornings). We made some improvements, but were definitely tired when we started. One major improvement was the use of NO5Ws CQ/X program. Last year I used TR Log, and had to open a different log for each county. Because I waited until late to download CQ/X, I wasn't able to use a GPS, but CQ/X works super as a stand alone program. I loaded my county crossings file into CQ/X and with one keystroke I could change counties on the program. Next year I plan to have the GPS going so I can save the one keystroke. We got a late start Friday night and drove east 260 miles to Eagle Pass (Maverick County), spent a short night in a motel, and started back to home, zig-zagging our way back to the west. We spent Saturday night in our own beds in Alpine, then did a western swing on Sunday. The major excitement came on Saturday when we left Val Verde County and went into Edwards County miles from any community. Suddenly James lost all power functions on his diesel pickup -- steering, brakes, etc. We stopped and found that the idler pulley had failed and the serpentine belt was destroyed. Luckily (I feel it was luck, James says that it is just good prudent sense to travel with some spare parts), James had spares. With me holding the tools and James doing all the work, the pulley and belt were replaced in a little over an hour and we were back on the road. All-in-all it was fun time again, and we are already talking about what we can do better next time. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N5JB Class: Single Op HP Total Score = 321,650 Total Score includes 500 bonus points for 5 QSOs with WB0TEV/M. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N5NA Class: SO Mobile LP Total Score = 424,522 My score includes 34000 bonus points for activating 34 counties. Thanks to everyone who called this weekend! And a big thanks to my wife, K5AKS, for driving over 1000 miles around WTX! I found conditions to generally be poor. Many strong signals but many very weak signals too. Rapid QSB brought signals up and down. In addition to the conditions I think I may have an antenna problem. If you were calling and I couldn't copy I apologize. This year I used a new feature in CQ/X where the distance to the next county is calculated along the planned drive path. Last year the distance was a radial distance which may or may not be very accurate. This year I knew EXACTLY how far to the next county as well as an estimate of the arrival time based on current speed. The same applies to any waypoints as well. A great help for staying on schedule! My route this year was a bit more ambitious than in the past. Saturday was just under 600 miles covering 23 counties with Sunday planned to be about 300 miles covering 9 counties. Early Sunday morning I decided to add Yoakum and Terry which added about 100 miles. Top callers were: VE3KZ(36), N6MU(32), K8MFO(31), WB9CIF(28), N0TA(27), N4JF(27), VE3KP(24), KE0G(23), WA3HAE(23), W4UCZ(23), K5KG(22), NC4KW(22), K4ZGB(21) Equipment: K3, HS-1500 antenna, 2000 Chev C2500 antenna support. Again, thanks to everyone for calling and following me around WTX! 73, Alan N5NA ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N5QQ Class: Single Op HP Total Score = 15,288 Fun working a few guys, thanks for Q's! K3 and Alpha 78 with 18AVQ on the roof at the home QTH in Dallas. Ron N5QQ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N5TM Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Total Score = 329,668 Wow..... Another great TQP... Thanks to everyone who followed us around!!! Saturday started out slow with poor condx on 20m. Finally about 3pm, 20 opened to EU. Never heard any SA stations. The evening was better with good sigs on 20, 40 and 80. Sunday was much better with non-stop pile ups all day on both 20 and 40m. The pileups were incredible. Thanks to everyone for being patient and courteous. The last hour on Sundays insane!!!. Sorry we could not get to everyone. Our best Q rate was 240/hr, with many sustained rates of 120/hr or more. This contest would not happen if it weren't for all the out of state stations. Great bunch of operatros!!!! Now to de-compress..... Dan (n5tm) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N6MU Class: SO CW LP Total Score = 183,562 Score includes 16000 mobile bonus points. Kudos to the myriad of mobiles doing their thing. Top mobile for me was W3DYA with 51 Qs followed by NO5W(38), N5NA(32), N5DO(23), W0BH(22), N5TM(19), N4CD(12), WD5IYT(11) and K5JX(10). Thanks to all (especially NO5W and NARS) for the latest edition of one of my favorite Parties. 73... John, N6MU TS-570 & 4BTV ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: N7XU Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 35,260 Sorry the conditions were poor. With all the planning that goes into an event like this, it's difficult when the mobiles cannot hear much of what's calling. I had a ball anyway chasing the mobiles. Thanks for the good ears guys. I hope conditions improve for next weekend when intrepid members of the Central Oregon DX Club venture into the wild and desolate northeast corner of California to activate Modoc County as N6M. See 'yall then! 73, Dick, K4XU = N7XU ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: NA5DV Class: Multi-Op HP Total Score = 239,200 This was the first year (as far as we know) that the Battleship Texas has participated in the Texas QSO party. It was also historic for us, as after some repairs and TLC, this was the first time that one of the ship's original vertical antennas was used to transmit in about 60 years. Thankfully for us, the vertical is right at a 1/4 wave vertical on 40m, and that's tied into a 25,000 ton RF ground floating in brackish water. Hard to think of a better install! It's a real kick to work with a blowtorch like that. That antenna was supplimented with a 80m OCF dipole strung about 40' above the deck, which is around 40' above the water. We also utilized a "cobweb" antenna on 20m, which was composed of two double extended zeps phased for broadside fire. Worked really well up into the northeast. We all had a really good time talking to everyone out there, and the antenna setup really helped pull them in. Video and pics of our operation are up on our website at www.na5dv.org. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: NC4KW Class: Single Op HP Total Score = 248,024 Another fun weekend of TQP is behind us for the 2011 year. The mobiles were able to keep the activity up during most of the contest. That was a good thing as the propagation between North Carolina and Texas was not as anticipated, so the original band and radio plan was change only 45 minutes after the start. Plan A was based on the assumption that most activity would be on 40 mtrs and 20 mtrs, so at the start the K3s/Amps were configured accordingly. However, as 40 meters was void of any Texas signals, the plan changed. Plan B was to have one K3/Amp on 20 SSB and the other K3/Amp on 20CW. The towers/antennas are about 145’ apart and when the antennas are pointed toward Texas, the booms are exactly parallel to each other. When running legal limit the rig to rig interference was almost non-existent. GO ELECRAFT �" WELL DONE! Although I tried many times to get a run going on 20cw, it was not to be had. I was able to get a few short runs on 20ssb, but even that had some difficulty. When I called CQ, every call ended with “LOOKING FOR ANY STATION IN TEXAS”. I guess that was not clear enough as calls continued to come in from all over the country, and �" fortunately, some from Texas. My best run had to wait until after dinner, 2330 UTC, when the NC TX path on 40 finally opened. So Saturday night I was able to move between 40 and 20 and even made a few Qs on 80. However, when Saturday ended I was well behind last years QSO total, mult count and score. Sunday had to be very productive if I was going to catch up. Sunday morning I started on 40 and 20. After a short 10 or 12 Qs 40 was gone again. So, it was time to go back to plan B. Fortunately the Mobile stations were going strong and, for the most part, in all new counties, so the multiplier count continued to rise. I even tried 15cw a couple of times. I found Dave, N5DO, there and his signal was stronger than on 20. But as the action was minimal it was back to 20 cw and ssb. By the end of TQP I was still well below my 2010 totals in all categories with my final score down by over 113,000 points. Thanks to the Texas Mobiles for the Qs and bonus points. My posted score includes 16,000 bonus points. NO5W �" 32 N5NA �" 22 N5DO �" 19 N5TM �" 18 W3DTY �" 18 W0BH �" 16 WD5IYT �" 14 KK5W �" 12 KK2Z �" 7 KD5HCV �" 7 K5JX �" 7 WB0TEV �" 7 N3BB �" 6 KU5B - 5 I would also like to thank Chuck, NO5W, for all the time he spends promoting, scoring, communicating and traveling around Texas to make TQP a success. Additionally, I would like to thank the NARS club for once again sponsoring the TQP. 73, Bruce N1LN (aka NC4KW) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: ND0C Class: Single Op QRP Total Score = 14,205 I had very limited time to operate due to a business trip and other family commitments, but wanted to get on and play a little and warm up for CQP next weekend. The mobiles did a great job, but I didn't hear as many fixed stations on as I would have expected. I usually have decent propagation to Texas from hear which helps to make up for the fact that I was using my normal 5 watts. I did feel fairly loud until Sunday afternoon when I struggled to get CW contacts! All-in-all I really had fun for the 3 1/2 hours I was on. Station: Yaesu FT897-D running 5 watts out to Wilson three element tri-bander at 48 feet and an inverted vee at 45 feet. 73, Randy, ND0C "You don't have to be crazy to contest with QRP ... but it helps!" ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: NJ8J Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 784 Equipment: Alinco DX-77T LDG AT-11MP Automatic Antenna tuner, MFJ-969 Antenna tuner Antennas: Wires in Weird Configurations Managed to make a few QSOs in the TX QSO party while testing out the re-rigged antenna. Logged in the Linux XLog logger, then transcribed to N1MM on the work laptop for submittal. Need to get TLF compiled on the shack PC for future contests. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: NO5W Class: SO CW Mobile LP Total Score = 393,304 Score includes 40,000 bonus points for activating 40 counties. K3/100, CQ/X ver 1.7.9.7, Hi-Q 4/80 antenna, MFJ-1924 controller, Garmin GPS-18PC, WinKey, Palm Paddle, 75 AHr AGM auxiliary battery, Dell D400 laptop, 2002 Pathfinder. As others have commented 2011 was a very different year from 2010 with 2011 numbers down in all but one category -- we activated four more counties (40) in 2011. Of course most of the credit for that increase goes to my excellent driver Keith NM5G who moved us around the course to reach the destination with minutes to spare. And it was Keith's suggestion on Sunday morning to add four counties to our route -- more about that later. Our Qs and Mults numbers were down this year: 1402 Qs vs 1699, and 84 mults vs 110 with most of the missing mults being Texas counties. It's interesting to note that our 1028 Qs on 20M is about 82% of our 1255 Qs on 20M in 2010 and that our 346 Qs on 40M is about 79% of our 439 Qs on 40M in 2010. So percentage-wise both bands were down by about the same amount. That's what the numbers say but it sure seemed, especially Sunday, that 40M was in a lot worse shape than 20M. Of course some of that is dependent on who was listening where. The only band where we did better this year was 15M. Requests to QSY to 15M were almost always successful and when we stayed around to send some CQs we often got several additional 15M Qs in the log but not a steady run -- if the listeners had been there we could have had a steady run. We didn't have any major excitement from Murphy like serpentine belts breaking -- and it's a good thing too since we had spares for most everything on the radio and computer end of things but the only spare we had for the vehicle was a tire. We did get off to a rough start, though. Right off the bat the line at the first Starbucks fueling station was really long for 7:30am on a Saturday morning. Once we got the coffee and were underway and tried to make a few QSOs the new Sony Vaio machine got cantankerous - I think it must be more RF-susceptible than the old Dell D400 which we promptly put in service. Well, the D400 was cantankerous too. Why in the heck was that? The only thing we could think of that was different from when it was used a few weeks ago in the ARQP was the foot switch cable that we had added that morning for Keith to use to make some SSB contacts. We removed that cable and things were back to normal with the D400. We probably lost about an hour fooling around with the computers and then lost some more time just after lunch when we had to stop to wash the Pathfinder of love bugs that had met their demise on the front of the vehicle and were creating a visibility problem for the driver. Fortunately that was the last of the love bugs and Saturday after we got moving up I45 the rate started picking up with the best results occurring in the counties up near Ft. Worth where initial ten minute rates on crossing the county lines were good enough to keep things exciting: Tarrant(174). Hill(168), Johnson(168), Hood(150), and Parker(144). Parker also treated us to a beautiful sunset as we came over a hill and headed into Hood county, our stopping point for the night. Prior to going to the hotel we had time to make a quick trip down to Somervell (150) county and then returned back to Granbury and the hotel right at the close of the Saturday session. Granbury is a bustling place and has quite a selection of restaurants open after 9:00pm, an important criterion for a mobile operator in the TxQP. So we were able to have a nice dinner, meeting up, as planned, with John, David, and Scott who were spending the weekend in nearby Glen Rose to activate Somervell county field day style as K5PBA. They are part of a Baptist men's emergency communications team and were using the QSO party as a means of testing their ability to deploy in the field. Great idea and one of three known teams who were operating the QSO party field day style. When we got up early Sunday morning Keith remarked that we needed more counties on Sunday because he estimated we were going to be back at the house with at least an hour, maybe more to spare. So the hunt was on for a new Sunday starting point that we could reach in time and that would yield some more counties. Streets and Trips revealed that if we left the hotel in 30 minutes we could reach a starting point on a ranch road just inside Stephens county, come back through Palo Pinto, down through Eastland and Comanche and then rejoin our original route. And it looked as if that would add the necessary hour or so to the route. One of the cool parts about this exercise was that we then got on the internet, tweaked our Google map of the route plan, downloaded a new KML file containing the lat/lon of the new route and then imported that file into CQ/X which then determined our new county line crossing points and gave us our new navigation coordinates for keeping on track. After checking out and a quick stop at Starbucks away we went to find some breakfast and to activate four additional counties. We found the counties but we didn't find any breakfast in the out of the way counties that we had added so we ended up snacking on some nut bread in the vehicle later in the morning during a long stretch of Hamilton county. Adding those counties turned out to be a good decision as it gave us 4000 bonus points and almost 200 QSOs. We managed to make all of our original counties except the last one so our net gain was 3000 bonus points and probably 150 Qs. Even though our total numbers were down the pileups were intense and were a lot of fun made possible by frequent callers: K8MFO(42), W4UCZ(40), N6MU(38), VE3KZ(37), N0TA(36), WB9CIF(35), NC4KW(32), and many others with twenty or more Qs. When I would change bands to 20M and give out a single CQ K8MFO was almost always there, and then the pileup would start. Thanks to all who called. Our goal was to sweep the table clean of any QSOs in each county, stopping if necessary to work down the pile. However, at times the QRN was very bad, signals were weak, and a complete QSO was just not possible. Our apologies if we left a county before you had a chance to get in the log. So that's the story on NO5W/M in the 2011 Texas QSO Party. Many thanks to Keith-NM5G for some great driving and to all who called us. Hope to see you in CW Sweepstakes and after that as a mobile in some QSO parties in the Spring. 73, Chuck-NO5W Keith-NM5G ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: VA3GKO Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 6,000 Wish I had more time for this one with the bands in good shape. Heard a few mobiles but they were really weak here. Had fun with such a short time operating. See you all next year.Greg, va3gko. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: VE1RGB Class: SO CW LP Total Score = 5,335 Only a very few minutes to get the multiplier out and even that short period was disrupted by radio blackouts. 73, Gary VE1RGB ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: VE3GTC Class: Single Op QRP Total Score = 517 Conditions where good on most bands. There where many European stations heard early morning on Saturday participating in the big RTTY contest this same weekend. Even so conditions where challenging; I would hear stations in Texas with strong signals only to fade away to almost nothing and then back again over the course of a few minutes. I had a bit of time to play over the course of the QSO Party and managed to make a few contacts QRP. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: VE3KZ Class: SO CW HP Total Score = 216,091 Seemed like unsettled conditions with low periods at times on 20m. 15 seemed open to W5 most of the day. 40CW was a little loaded with the TTY contest! No 200+ counties for me this time but I strived mightily! With Ken, VE3KP right there all the time, we had the W5's listening carefully. Duncan, VE3OM was also working up a big score. Congratulations guys! Thanks to all the mobile Q's. 19,000 of the points were mobile bonuses! Rig here: TS-950SDX and AL-1200 15m 5el at 70' 20m 4el at 50' 40m sloping dipole 80m inverted vee ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W0BH Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Total Score = 246,080 Score includes 21,000 bonus points for activating 21 Texas counties. Saturday TQP weekend is always Homecoming weekend at Hesston College. This year, our Aviation department sponsored homecoming, so my presence was strongly "requested." I was able to attend festivities on Friday and Saturday morning, but I couldn't stay away from Texas! It was my pleasure to have Ron/ad0dx accompany me this year as a multi-op. Ron did a great job running mobile in the Kansas QSO Party, his first ever attempt at mobile contesting. Ron drove down from the Kansas City area on Saturday morning, and we both arrived at W0BH about the same time. After a quick pack, we headed out at 11:00am for the five hour trip to Texas. We used the five hours to get Ron up to speed on w0bh/m .. logging, radios, GPS, strategies, and driving. Ron made some CW Qs with Texas stations using his own call, but we quickly noticed that the bands seemed to be exceptionally quiet with very unusual propagation. Later we found out that a major solar flare had occurred which explained a lot. By the time we hit Texas, things had settled back down, but as others have already said, conditions just weren't what they were a year ago. We had two "bugs" on the way which cost us some travel time. The logging computer appeared to crash again as it had in the Kansas QSO Party. That time it was RF in a different van and some ferrites solved that problem. I'd never had this problem in the Astro, so I was really puzzled. Switching computers seemed to solve the problem and I've since corrected what turned out to be a programming "bug." The second problem occurred after we switched computers - the radio locked on transmit. That turned out to be a stuck footswitch and had nothing to do with the new computer. I unplugged the footswitch and we used the PTT switch on the headphones to key SSB. During our stop overnight in Amarillo, I took the footswitch apart and resoldered the connections to solve the problem. Note to self .. order a backup footswitch! Our plan called for a Texas border crossing at 4:00pm. We arrived at 4:40pm which has traditionally been a really slow propagation time in most "summer" QSO parties. I ran the first county to give Ron a chance to see and hear everything working, but signals were really weak. Our highway had powerlines on each side for most of the county, so it was really a struggle to hear anyone. John/n6mu told us we were 59+ in CA and lots of ops were calling us, but we could barely hear anyone. We lost one set of powerlines which helped, but it was several counties before signals came back up to "normal" levels. Ron jumped in with both feet in our second county and away he went! It's always fun to try out new equipment. My setup in the Astro hasn't changed much for the last couple of years, so just check out last year's TQP post to see the equipment. This year, I added an N8XJK 12V Boost Regulator for use at county line stops. I bought the new "Super Booster" which includes a fan, and I added the remote meter/switch so I could watch battery voltages and remotely turn it on and off. The Super Booster lets you set the output voltage with an external trim pot, so I set it to 13.8V. I've gone to extremes to limit noise, so without trying the booster "barefoot", I went ahead and added big torroids (also sold on the tgelectronics.org web site) to the input and output power leads. The end result was impressive. Absolutely no noise from the booster that I could detect on all my mobile bands, and full output on the radio with the engine off. The remote on/off worked fine, but the meters were analog and didn't seem to be very accurate. Digital meters would be better and the remote box could presumably be made smaller. I did notice a "hot" smell from somewhere after I used the booster for about 20 minutes at my first county line. I think it happened when the fan first came on and the "new" electronics warmed up. I noticed it one other time at another line, but this time I left boost on with no further problems, and the smell went away. Ron did a great job and seemed to particularly enjoy CW (as do I!). He quickly picked up the art of changing counties, but one time I saw him start to change when the GPS said we still had a number of miles to go. We'd passed a sign that looked like a county line, so Texas (and Chuck/no5w) almost had a 255th county called Hedley to add to the list! I did convince Ron to try SSB from time to time as well. Ron is Canadian, so calling CQ, he says "mobIle" instead of "mobeel" (yes, we do identify as mobile, just not always in pileups!). A voice came on that said, "Must be a Canadian." When we asked who the station was, it was VE4ZZ, which turned out to be our only VE4 multiplier! Ron also tried his first two-county line on CW .. another art to practice! Saturday went way too fast. Since we arrived later than planned, we skipped Randall county on Saturday and arrived in Potter county with about 5 minutes to go. Even so, top ops like K4ZGB and N6MU found us anyway. Someday, I'll have to find out how they do that! We ended the day with 355 Qs in the log. Sunday After an overnight in Amarillo (right near the scene of my famous 2007 tow-truck mobile episode), we headed out to the Randall/Potter county line and a nice pileup before joining the planned route. Sunday was much better than Saturday for propagation, and there were some really loud signals. The pileup at our four-county line stop was amazing. Great job to all who worked us .. very FB manners by all! We arrived at our last county on schedule, then drove through and sat near the Texas/Oklahoma border to finish out the route. Special thanks to John/n6mu and Don/K8MFO who rode along with us in all 21 counties! Stats We operated 10.3 hours, 931 Qs, 228 unique calls, 4 dupes. US/VE Worked : 37 TX worked : 35 counties DX worked : 3 countries (DL YV XE) Rates ------------------- Saturday 2140-0200 : 82 Qs/hr Sunday - 1400-2000 : 97 Qs/hr Total W0BH/m : 931 Qs, 85 mults, 21,000 bonus = 246,080 points County Breakdown (in visited order) Saturday (196 miles during the QSO party) 01 OCHI 34 Ochiltree 02 HANS 31 Hansford 03 HUTC 32 Hutchinson 04 MOOR 36 Moore 05 SHMN 40 Sherman 06 DALM 44 Dallam 07 HART 50 Hartley 08 OLDH 77 Oldham 09 POTT 06 Potter Sunday (241 miles during the QSO party) 09 POTT 32 Potter (again) 10 RAND 23 Randall 11 CARS 47 Carson 12 ARMS 54 Armstrong 13 DONL 33 Donley 14 HALL 43 Hall 15 CHIL 57 Childress 16 COLW 32 Collingsworth 17 WHEE 50 Wheeler 18 HEMP 65 Hemphill 19 GRAY 41 Gray 20 ROBE 52 Roberts 21 LIPS 52 Lipscomb Special thanks to the following ops for 10 or (way) more contacts: 29 K4ZGB 27 VE3KZ 25 N6MU 24 K8MFO 21 N4JF 20 WB9CIF 17 KE0G 15 NC4KW W4UT WA3HAE WA6KHK 18 K5KG 14 K5OT N3UM VE3OM W4UCZ W5CT 13 K5LH N6MA N9FC WA2VYA 12 K3TW W1END 11 K4BAI VE3KP W2AJW W5RQ 10 VE7CV Texas mobiles worked (5): N3BB/m N4CD/m N5NA/m WB0TEV/m W0BH Award Winners - First Place ----- Very Honorable Mention -------------------------------------------------------------- Most overall Qs ---- K4ZGB/29 ------- VE3KZ/26 ------ K8MFO/24 Most CW Qs --------- VE3KZ/26 ------- K8MFO/24 ------ N6MU/23 Most PH Qs --------- W2AJW/11 ------- K4ZGB/7 ------- 5 ops/4 Most counties ------ N6MU and K8MFO/21 -- WB9CIF and VE3KZ/20 Ron's Comments Many thanks to Bob for taking me along for my first entry in the Texas QSO Party. Bob is very generous to share his knowledge of mobile contesting, and I really learned a lot. This was only my second mobile contesting experience, my first being the Kansas QSO Party. Working those county lines is really exciting, and I'm still learning to pick out those callsigns. Sitting with Bob at the 4 county line, I was amazed at the pileup .. it was literally a wall of CW. I feel like I've got a taste of what it's like to be a rare DX station - right from the Texas panhandle! Another highlight was working my friend Michael, KD0OJN, back in Kansas City. Michael is 10 years old and already enjoys contesting. Watch out for him in the years to come. Afterwards Ron and I drove a total of 1022 miles round trip, including a drive by Morse Junction, Texas. We'll have to stop there next time. Special thanks to Chuck/no5w for coordinating the event and keeping track of the mobile routes and counties. Thanks to NARS for sponsoring the event, and of course a big thanks to all who participated from both sides of the state line. Even though we couldn't be on full time this year, we were there! A special invite to all the Texas mobiles to come join us here in Kansas for the 2012 Kansas QSO Party. 73, Bob/w0bh and Ron/ad0dx ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W0PAN Class: SO SSB LP Total Score = 8,488 All S and P. Band conditions were great except for the long skip on 10. Was very appreciative of the KK5W/M,WB0TEV/M, and W0BH Mobile efforts. Missed BH in 2 or would have had him in my bonus calculation. Enjoyed the QSO Party and look forward to next year. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W2AJW Class: Single Op LP Total Score = 14,720 Ten Tec Omni D, various wire antennas, N1MM Logger Total score includes 2500 bonus pts from mobile ops Huge huge thanks to all the mobile ops who made chasing them (and getting the bonus points for working them) fun! As a guy who used to do VHF roving, I know how much work (and gas money!) that is. Shout outs to: W0BH/M - worked 11x WB0TEV/M - worked 10x KK5W/M - worked 6x and just missed the 500pts on N5DO/M, worked 4x Fun contest, it's nice to be (relatively) loud for once with my little station. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W2LHL Class: SO CW LP Total Score = 26,920 Includes bonuses. 100w, vertical. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W3DYA Class: SO CW Mobile LP Total Score = 258,304 Total Score plus mobile county bonus: (31 x 1,000) = 258,304 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W4AU Class: SO CW LP Total Score = 10,731 Was able to get on for just a few hours in various bits and pieces. It's fun when there are lots of counties/mults to work! The mobile ops did a great job. TNX fer all the Q's 73 - John, W4AU ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W4NZ Class: SO CW HP Total Score = 5,781 Only had a short time to play. The mobiles did a great job. 73, Ted W4NZ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W4UCZ Class: SO CW LP Total Score = 107,433 The last couple of years the 20 meter path from Georgia favored West Texas. This year East Texas was loud and frequent and West Texas less so. As was brutally so last year, the RTTY contest bombardment on 40 meters made this basically a one-band contest from the Peach State. Thanks to the mobiles : NO5W (39), N5NA (24), N5TM (20), W3DYA (19), WØBH (15) and WD5IYT (12) and a half dozen more at less than 10 QSO's. Maximum possible kudos to Chuck and all the organizers and operators. Lighting up 254 counties is no "amateur" hour proposition. Score includes 13,500 for mobile five-batches. Still missing 30 counties ... see you next year. 73, Mark, W4UCZ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W4UT Class: Single Op QRP Total Score = 71,285 Score includes bonus points. Tnx to all the Texas mobiles: N5NA, W0BH, WD5IYT, NO5W, N5DO, K5JX, N5TM & N4CD and several others. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W5CT Class: Multi-Op HP Total Score = 1,676,862 With two fulltimers and one parttimer we were seriously understaffed in this contest. Needed bell to bell operations on 40, 20 and 15 meters (two stations on each band much of the time). 10 meters was also open for over 12 hours but only manned for two of those. Hopefully we can get a full complement of ops for next year's contest. Thanks for the use of the W5CT call. I hope we represented the club well. (I was on my best behavior but Billy...well--that's another story!) And thanks to Tad, K3TD, for the much needed help Saturday afternoon and evening. George, NR5M ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W5ESE Class: SO CW QRP Total Score = 31,146 I had fun participating in the Texas QSO Party from the Windmill Backpack campsite in Colorado Bend State Park, in San Saba County. This is the same location I operated from last year. I used my KD1JV ATS-3 QRP rig, and a CF Zepp. It was hot this year; and I had some trouble with heat exhaustion. I pulled the plug at about 12:30 Sunday. Maybe Scott is getting too old for this? Hope not! I posted a few pictures of my outing at: http://sites.google.com/site/arsw5ese/home/wilderness-qrp/texas-qso-party-2011 Many thanks to everyone for the contacts; I had a ball, and hope that I was able to provide some of you with a new county. SOAPBOX: SOAPBOX: 122 CW contacts x 3 pts/contact = 366 QSO pts SOAPBOX: 366 QSO pts x (18 + 63) mults = 29646 SOAPBOX: SOAPBOX: Bonus points - Mobiles contacted in 5 or more counties SOAPBOX: N4CD SOAPBOX: N5TM SOAPBOX: NO5W SOAPBOX: SOAPBOX: 3 mobiles x 500 pts = 1500 pts SOAPBOX: SOAPBOX: Total: 29646 + 1500 = 31146 pts SOAPBOX: SOAPBOX: Location was the Windmill Backpack campsite in Colorado Bend State SOAPBOX: Park near Bend, TX, in San Saba county EM01rb SOAPBOX: SOAPBOX: Rigs used SOAPBOX: 80m, 40m, 20m KD1JV AT Sprint 3 @ 2-3 watts SOAPBOX: SOAPBOX: Antenna SOAPBOX: 40-15m 67' doublet fed with 300 ohm TV twinlead SOAPBOX: 80m 134' doublet fed with 300 ohm TV twinlead SOAPBOX: Emtech ZM-2 matching network SOAPBOX: SOAPBOX: Had some trouble getting a good match with the tuner on 40m. SOAPBOX: Probably had one of those feedline lengths you're not supposed SOAPBOX: to use? Many thanks to everyone for the contacts, and to NARS SOAPBOX: for sponsoring it. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W5VX Class: Single Op HP Total Score = 378 I was only able to get on for brief times. Between watching OSU beat my aggies, a sink stoppage, church, etc. I did have a lot of fun as always. This is a fun contest and is the only state QSO party I ever get on for and I even worked some fone QSOs. Now the only bad part of TXP is next...the QSLs! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: W7KAM Class: SO SSB LP Total Score = 2,944 Very noisy conditions this year on all bands. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: WB0TEV/M Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Total Score = 104,680 First off a giant round of applause to Houston's Northwest Amateur Radio Society in general and Chuck Sanders NO5W in particular for their tireless organization and promotion of the premiere state QSO party in the country. Getting announced operations for all 254 Texas counties is no mean feat. 2011 was to have been the year we turned in our best score ever. After all I’d put together an ambitious route to cover more counties than ever before (36), and the sunspots had come back. Whereas in the past all our logging had been done with pencil and paper, usually with me driving and operating SSB while Mark (KK5MR) logged, this year I’d use a computerized logging program for the first time and so for the most part I’d be riding shotgun operating and logging while Mark drove the 700+ miles our route would take us through much of Northeast Texas. I was even going to bring my modest CW ability to the fray, although we would be primarily an SSB operation. Murphy made his first appearance early when it was discovered that the computer program I was to use to key the rig for CW wasn’t working right. As a result, all the CW from WBØTEV was sent with a pair of Bencher paddles, not an easy trick sometimes while bouncing along a twisting east Texas Farm-to-Market Road. In order to put a lot of counties on the air, you have to make a route plan and time line and stick to it. Thus my apologies for no SSB from Rains county. Looking back at the log I saw that I did nothing but 40m CW from there but had to keep rolling down the road into Van Zandt to try and stay on schedule. One thing that became apparent early on was that I wasn’t picking up Texas county multipliers at the rate I had last year. Part of reason I’m sure was that you need 40m for that, and most of the time I had my 40m antenna set for the CW end of the band, where I wasn’t having that much luck. On Sunday I spent more 40m time on SSB, but even then the mults just weren’t there to be found, at least from my perspective. I thought it may have been just me, but in reading the comments of others, I’ve seen that I’m not alone in not getting near the number of Texas counties from an in-state position. Some of this I think may be attributable to the absence of one of the primary multi-op mobile teams this year. Team K5NA and the “Traveling Burrito Brothers & Little Sister” who usually are good for 40 or so counties mobile, had to stay at home this year and their absence was felt. Bob, W0BH who usually makes the trek down from Kansas to light up a few dozen counties in the panhandle wasn’t able to join the fray until late Saturday and his presence too was sorely missed. Propagation on 40 for those of us trying for in-state contacts may not have been up to par either. On the plus side, 15m had some appreciable activity for the first time in a LONG time. I was even able to get a pretty decent run going on 15m SSB around sundown while rolling through Panola county. In the final 3 hours Saturday, after a supper stop in Longview we made a loop down south from Gregg county through Harrison, Panola, Shelby, the extreme NW corner of St. Augustine and barely into Nacogdoches before turning around and heading back to Longview to our hotel from which we’d begin anew Sunday morning. We didn’t get back to the motel until about 10pm. I didn’t sleep that well and was pretty weary when the alarm went off the next morning. I may be getting too old for this! Next year I think I’m going to aim for fewer counties with more time in each and be close to a bed when Saturday’s session ends at 9pm. Maybe too, go mobile only on Saturday. We’ll see. Once the gun went off at 1400Z Sunday AM my spirits were refreshed when the QSO count started climbing. Had a number of stations following us as we knocked off several counties in rapid succession that morning. We actually got ahead of schedule and arrived at our final destination (a 3 county intersection) for the grand finale. While there we were able to give out 3 counties in succession (to those who hadn’t already worked us in one of them earlier) and in so doing pushed a couple of folks like N5JB & K8JQ over the 5 QSO threshold for bonus points. Looking over our log when it was all done I saw that our biggest “customer” by far was KK7AC who worked us in 18 counties. His QSL request and those from several others in the county hunting community have started to show up in the mail box, so am happy we could fill in a few squares for those folks. I’m not a county hunter myself (I think they must all be a little nuts, but that may be the pot calling the kettle black), but am happy to indulge the obsessions of others, especially if it caters to my own. WB8LBZ in El Paso worked us 14 times. About 2 dozen stations worked us 5 times or more. Equipment rundown was a follows: Rig: 1985’ish Yaesu FT-757 Rolling Shack, power supply and antenna ground plane : WB0TEV’s 1986 Pontiac Parisienne Antennas: Hustler vertical on the right fender with 20m/15m/10m coils/whips on a 3 way mount all held down by a 40m coil/whip. 80m & 7m coils in the trunk, but not used this year. Computer: A little Acer Netbook running N1MM logger. Operators: WB0TEV & KK5MR, both of which are more than twice as old as the radio and vehicle used. When it was all over with, the score and especially the multiplier count were down from 2010. Score was only about 105k versus 125k last year. Made slightly more Q’s (487 vs. 443) but the multiplier count was way down, only 68 versus 105 last year. The number of Texas counties really took a hit. This year we only worked 24 versus 71 last year. Part of the reason was that 20m was where the rate was, so didn’t spend as much time on 40m. Considering that NO5W reported his numbers were also down from last year, I don’t feel so bad. Did make 5 or more QSOs from all 36 of our covered counties so made 36k in bonus points. Hope to see you next year. Victor (WB0TEV)& Mark (KK5MR) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: WB5BKL Class: SO CW QRP Total Score = 122,806 Claimed total reflects dupe removal and 5500 in bonus points from the many Texas mobiles with very sharp ears - and patience. Used a K3/10 @ 5w to a 15M 2-element delta loop, a 20M wire delta loop or a 40M extended double Zepp. My thanks to Chuck, NO5W for all of his efforts and to NARS for their sponsorship. I had a grand time - and improved a little from 2010. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Call: WD5IYT Class: SO CW Mobile LP Total Score = 227,865 My single-op CW solo effort netted a decent score and lots of fun! I activated 18 counties. Thanks to everyone who worked me through the S7-S9 noise on 40. Also thanks to Chuck, NO5W not only for the excellent contest, but for the great CQ/X logging software. That made this year much easier on my right arm! Can't wait for next year, but I think I'm going to find a driver. Too much wasted time driving and not operating! Jim WD5IYT Index of Calls Call: AA8IA Class: SO CW LP Call: AD4EB Class: SO CW HP Call: K0AE Class: Single Op LP Call: K4BAI Class: Single Op HP Call: K4ZGB Class: Single Op LP Call: K5FP Class: Single Op LP Call: K5IID Class: Single Op QRP Call: K5JX Class: SO CW Mobile LP Call: K5KG Class: Single Op HP Call: K5LH Class: SO CW LP Call: K5ME Class: SO CW LP Call: K5NA Class: Single Op LP Call: K5OT Class: Single Op HP Call: K6CSL Class: Single Op LP Call: K8MFO Class: SO CW HP Call: KA3DRR Class: Single Op LP Call: KD8AQ Class: Single Op LP Call: KE0G Class: SO CW QRP Call: KE3X Class: SO CW LP Call: KJ5T Class: Single Op QRP Call: KK7AC Class: Single Op LP Call: KN4Y Class: SO CW HP Call: KS4X Class: Single Op QRP Call: KU5B Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Call: N0TA Class: SO CW HP Call: N1CC Class: Single Op LP Call: N3BB Class: Single Op HP Call: N4CD Class: SO CW Mobile LP Call: N4CD Class: Single Op LP Call: N4JF Class: Single Op QRP Call: N4UC Class: Single Op LP Call: N4ZQA Class: SO SSB HP Call: N5DO Class: SO Mobile LP Call: N5JB Class: Single Op HP Call: N5NA Class: SO Mobile LP Call: N5QQ Class: Single Op HP Call: N5TM Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Call: N6MU Class: SO CW LP Call: N7XU Class: Single Op LP Call: N9FC Class: Single Op LP Call: NA5DV Class: Multi-Op HP Call: NC4KW Class: Single Op HP Call: ND0C Class: Single Op QRP Call: NJ8J Class: Single Op LP Call: NO5W Class: SO CW Mobile LP Call: VA3GKO Class: Single Op LP Call: VE1RGB Class: SO CW LP Call: VE3GTC Class: Single Op QRP Call: VE3KZ Class: SO CW HP Call: W0BH Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Call: W0PAN Class: SO SSB LP Call: W2AJW Class: Single Op LP Call: W2LHL Class: SO CW LP Call: W3DYA Class: SO CW Mobile LP Call: W4AU Class: SO CW LP Call: W4NZ Class: SO CW HP Call: W4UCZ Class: SO CW LP Call: W4UT Class: Single Op QRP Call: W5CT Class: Multi-Op HP Call: W5ESE Class: SO CW QRP Call: W5GWH Class: SO SSB LP Call: W5VX Class: Single Op HP Call: W7KAM Class: SO SSB LP Call: W7YS Class: Single Op LP Call: WB0TEV/M Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Call: WB5BKL Class: SO CW QRP Call: WD5IYT Class: SO CW Mobile LP Index of Calls organized by Class Class: Multi-Op HP Call: NA5DV Call: W5CT Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP Call: KU5B Call: N5TM Call: W0BH Call: WB0TEV/M Class: Single Op HP Call: K4BAI Call: K5KG Call: K5OT Call: N3BB Call: N5JB Call: N5QQ Call: NC4KW Call: W5VX Class: Single Op LP Call: K0AE Call: K4ZGB Call: K5FP Call: K5NA Call: K6CSL Call: KA3DRR Call: KD8AQ Call: KK7AC Call: N1CC Call: N4CD Call: N4UC Call: N7XU Call: N9FC Call: NJ8J Call: VA3GKO Call: W2AJW Call: W7YS Class: Single Op QRP Call: K5IID Call: KJ5T Call: KS4X Call: N4JF Call: ND0C Call: VE3GTC Call: W4UT Class: SO CW HP Call: AD4EB Call: K8MFO Call: KN4Y Call: N0TA Call: VE3KZ Call: W4NZ Class: SO CW LP Call: AA8IA Call: K5LH Call: K5ME Call: KE3X Call: N6MU Call: VE1RGB Call: W2LHL Call: W4AU Call: W4UCZ Class: SO CW QRP Call: KE0G Call: W5ESE Call: WB5BKL Class: SO CW Mobile LP Call: K5JX Call: N4CD Call: NO5W Call: W3DYA Call: WD5IYT Class: SO Mobile LP Call: N5DO Call: N5NA Class: SO SSB HP Call: N4ZQA Class: SO SSB LP Call: W0PAN Call: W5GWH Call: W7KAM