There was the 24-hour IARU ham radio contest this weekend from Sat morning to Sun morning. I checked things out Sat morning and didn’t hear much and had plenty of other things to get done so I didn’t fire up N1MM and start logging. made a few contacts but there wasn’t much in the way of propagation so after about 25 contacts I took a break and did other things inside/outside.

I checked back around 2000z (4pm local time) and there was more activity so I fired up N1MM and started logging contacts. 10m and 15m had very little activity that I could hear so I spent most of the time on 20m. Worked about 1.5 hours, had 35 contacts and took about a 90 min break. Came back, conditions were better and I spent the next 2.5 hours operating finishing up with 121 contacts and hit the sack for the night for an early morning alarm. Nothing exotic in the log but some good contacts and a few stations contacted across 3 bands.

Score summary:

 Band    QSOs    Pts  Mlt   HQ
  3.5       3      3    0    3
    7      26     46    6   12
   14      88    246   11   25
   21       3      3    0    3
   28       1      1    0    1
Total     121    299   17   44

Score : 18,239

I got up early on Sunday morning, picked up N2CG and drove to the Sussex hamfest about 1 hour away. It’s the largest hamfest in the immediate area and up until this years trip to Dayton, it was the largest hamfest I had been to. Shortly after getting there I spotted a light duty Radio Shack rotator, control box and rotator cable that looked in excellent shape and picked it up for $25. Tested it at home and it seems to work well. Strolled around the rest of the day and just picked up some connectors. Saw lots of folks I know and chatted with some vendors. Weather was great if just a bit warm in the sun. I also watched NB2F, Dee, work some satellites from his portable station. I really enjoy the satellite contacts.

We also had our clubs monthly meeting Sun night where I won the 50-50 and about $30. I can’t complain about that – paid for my rotator from the hamfest! Since I usually am the guy going around hawking the tickets a couple of folks commented in jest, but I don’t pull the winning ticket. Also seems that we might look to create a contesting group within our club which could be a lot of fun.

Before heading to the club meeting I was doing a few things and noticed that Jan Mayden was spotted on 20m RTTY. I tuned in and had a light but mostly printable copy on them. I tried for a while sending my call out but had no luck. I needed to head to the club meeting for a while so I shut everything down. After I got home JX5O was calling CQ again and was a bit stronger so I put out my call after each CQ and after a bunch of attempts they came back to me as K2DSR. I resent K2DSL and he came back with the correct call for a 20m RTTY contact with them. Though I made a couple of previous contacts, this one contact alone covers my DXCC Mixed, 20m and RTTY awards.

A very diverse ham radio weekend. Next weekend is the NAQP RTTY contest on Saturday afterrnoon and evening so you’ll know where I will be.

73,
K2DSL