“Storm Watch”

Newsletter of NZ1U – The Barnstormers Contest Group

 “The Barnstormer’s News”                                                                          Volume 5 No.3 February 14, 2000

 

Special Pre-ARRL DX CW Edition

 

Well, only a few days until ARRL DX CW. Here are the pre-contest plans as of now:

 

First of all we had a productive weekend last Sat. & Sun. AA1CE and I were able to get the 40 Meter KLM beam down to the point on the tower where we replaced the element that had fallen off. Also we found a very corroded and water-filled hardline connector on the 40 Meter system. All is good now and ready to go. Chris and Kim checked out the TL-922 and with 1KW out on 10 meters it was declared fixed and ready to kick butt.

 

We did not have any wire so the 160M shunt fed tower did not get the new radials. Further analysis confirms that the problem with this antenna is the grounding system. On Saturday the SWR was 1.5:1!! I have consulted K1JCL and a fix is in the works however it may not be until Friday that we can run the new radials.

 

Kim brought a load of wood and we need one more to make sure Frank has enough wood for the weekend.

 

Frank is bringing his radio over this week. We hope to have all running and tested on Stations 1 & 2 before Friday. On Friday, Mark will bring his gear and we will set up Station #3.

 

Kim and I are working on a full weekend menu. We will make use of the BBQ grill and plan some simple meals. Going for take-out 3-4 times is too much of a hassle.

 

I suspect right now that K1EBY, AA1CE, N1XS, KB1DFB, KB1H, and NB1U are committed to 48 hours of on-site. Ted, W3TB, will work around his weekend schedule. Ted, please let me know what you think you can do.

 

 

 

 

What are some of our goals?

 

Well for one we are still trying to achieve the 5BDXCC that we thought we had in CQWW. A reduction ended up with 4BDXCC plus 99 on 80M!!! We will be Multi/2 but with the third station we hope to not miss that multiplier we may have in the past.  Run, run , run, is the story. Believe it or not, our station has been set as the one to beat by other M/2 operations. We want to make sure they still have that goal next year!  I also would like to see KB1H as one of the top spotters when the statistics come out after the contest. This means spot anything you hear while tuning. Alt-F3 is easy to do so let’s try hard to flood the network with spots. If the station is not in your bandmap (and we have already worked it) spot the DX. Of course improving the UBN is a BIG goal. Remember, in ARRL CW last year we stunk up the joint with more than 3%. Please OPON when you sit down. I will be watching to make sure everyone does this. So, what are the numbers we are looking for? Here they are…

 

            Our score last year was 4,532,526 points, 3306 QSOs, 457 Multipliers.

            The band breakdown starting with 160 through 10 was:

 

                        160 –   21/20

                        80 -      173/64

                        40 -      648/86

                        20 -      747/89

                        15 -      1036/103

                        10 -      681/95

 

            Our goals for the ARRL DX CW 2000  are:

 

                        160 -    35/30

                         80 -     275/75

                         40 -     700/90

                         20 -     800/100

                         15 -     1300/105

                         10 -     1000/100

 

This should give us a total of approximately 6,000,000 and beat last year’s 3rd place score. I expect everyone else will go up in score as well but let’s see if we can make our goal and let the chips fall where they may.

 

See you all this weekend and get ready to kick some butt!!!