Sunday, December 06, 2015

ARRL 160M Contest

Yesterday, we went and bought our Christmas tree. Decorating will happen today, and I'll post pictures later.  In the evening, Cara attended her high school Cotillion. I dropped her off around 8:00 PM, and went back home to wait for the text to pick her up.

What's a Dad to do with a few free hours?  If Dad's a Ham, then the ARRL 160M contest, that's what!

I was hoping against hope, because just two weeks ago, on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, the QRP Foxhunt group performed a little impromptu 160M Foxhunt. That night turned out to be a bust as I had an S9 noise level all evening, and was not able to hear anyone all night.

Last night, I turned on the KX3 and found a noise level of about S1, and the band was bursting with signals. Hot chocolate!

As I've enumerated before, the only thing I have for 160M is my W3EDP antenna. The KX3 matches to it quite nicely. After tuning for a few seconds, the SWR was about 1.2:1, and I was in business. I began to twiddle the dial and began making contacts, as a "Giver of Points".

Two hours later, I got the text from Cara to come pick her up. In the meantime, I had made 68 QSOs. I worked up the East coast as far down as South Carolina. Towards the West, I worked IN, IL, IA, MO and WI. Not bad for an antenna that was really never designed to work on 160 Meters!

After I came home, I tuned around for a little bit and worked a few more. It was getting close to Midnight, and it was time for me to hit the sack. I pulled the "Big Switch" and turned in, quite content to have a bunch of new 160 Meter contacts in the log.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP  - When you care to send the very least!

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