PEI Remote Story from Ken
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This was my first remote contest experience. The good news is I beat last year's
score when I was present in PEI, so that is a major positive. At times,
mentally, I felt completely in my shack in PEI. Having to wake up at 2:30 AM
local for the band opening was the only negative.
There were some issues. I was unable to use my computer mic and DVR recordings
on my computer. I think that is a local computer issue. I wasn't able to record
messages on my K4s to get around that problem. That was probably due to a K4
operator error. I plugged mics into the back of both radios, but it only worked
on the right radio, so that became the phone radio and the left was the CW
radio. Not having a voice keyer prevented most SO2R operation since I can't talk
and listen to CW at the same time.
Initially, I couldn't get the CW sidetone to work. What I heard was so choppy I
had to turn it off. I know I sounded like a lid when I interrupted my TU message
before resending my callsign when I knew there was another caller waiting. By
chance, I noticed Saturday night that the problem didn't exist using speakers
instead of headphones and went away in the headphones if my CW speed was slowed
to 34 WPM.
My radio and amp remote internet connections were solid the entire contest.
Latency was not an issue, although noticeable at times. Unfortunately, the same
can't be said for my antenna and rotator control apps. I have a HamPlus antenna
switch that allows any of 12 antennas to be used on any of 4 radios. The app for
the Hamplus couldn't keep a connection. I also have a MOAS (Mother of all
Switches)that has an antenna and rotator control app. That app was intermittent.
My South America antenna is not available on that app. It is available on the
MOAS app, but since the MOAS was unavailable most of the time, I'm sure I missed
mults not being able to use the SA antenna.
I had anticipated this would be a shake out of the remote system and that I
would be taking a number of frustration breaks, so I didn't bring food to the
shack. I wound up taking a few short breaks when the band was open to make lunch
and get snacks, so I probably operated about 25 hours.
This experience convinced me that remoting is in my future. I'll definitely be
VY2TT for shorter contests like CW Sprint and NAQPs remotely.
As to the contest itself, the pileups were so bad on CW I had to move frequency
and start again a few times. Stations kept calling even after I gave a partial
call three times. I aggressively tried to move mults on Sunday. Only 4 agreed to
move and 3 mults were successfully logged on the other mode. Most didn't
understand the request on CW and just sent the exchange again.
73, Ken, K6LA / VY2TT Everett Curry W6ABM "A" Sorter - Sixth District QSL Bureau Former Section Manager/Oregon ARRL, the national association for Amateur Radio? Phone: (503) 522-7142 Email: ?w6abm@... __________________ Think about this: 63.74% of all statistics are made up on the spot. |
W6ABM