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2010 CQ WPX SSB (March 27 and 28, 2010) Overview The final weekend of March is reserved for one of the very biggest of all radiosport contests -- CQ Magazine's Wierd Prefix WPX SSB contest. More than 30,000 stations will participate. The goal is to contact as many stations from anywhere in the world as you can, operating up to 36 hours out of the 48-hour contest period. Points vary for each contact, depending on the frequency band and whether the other station is on your own continent or another continent. (For me in British Columbia, Canada, contacts made on the high bands of 20, 15 and 10 meters score 2 points within North America, and 4 points outside NA; on the low bands of 160, 80 and 40 meters contacts in NA score 4, but outside NA they're worth 6 points each). Now, take all those points and multiply them by the number of unique "prefixes" you've contacted. VE7 (British Columbia) and VE4 (Manitoba) are two different prefixes. A prefix is basically the first part of a callsign up to the last numeral -- DL2006BC would have a prefix of DL2006, for example. It's a great competition because everybody can work everybody, every contact is worth valuable points, and every contact is potentially a new multiplier. Contest preview (notes from before the contest) One of the intentions of this series of features is to share with others how I prepare for an upcoming major contest. Everybody does that differently, but I think we all want to get ourselves excited for the upcoming action, and set goals that are both realistic but challenging. My first steps in preparing are to review as much information as I can about my previous performances in a particular contest. The 2010 running of the CQ WPX SSB contest will be just my third attempt at this event. Looking over my 3830 postings, I see that my best-ever performance was in 2008. As the chart above indicates, I made a lot more QSOs in 2008 (black line) than in 2009 (red line). The expectation is for a much better result in 2010. Here's how I've done in recent years:
2008 story | 2009 story | 2010 story Check
out my contest scores for more history 2010 strategy going in I figure this one's all about rate -- contacting as many stations per minute as I can. So in making a prediction, I'm only going to adjust QSO counts from 2008. Here are the raw 2008 totals on each band:
Using an average of 2.82 points/QSO (which is what I had in 2008), this weekend, my goals for 2010 will be:
This doesn't take into consideration the higher prefix count I'll see if I hit the higher QSO totals, especially on 15M, which provided zero new prefixes in 2008. As well, the higher QSO totals on 80M and 40M will hopefullly include more 6-pointers, which will increase the average per contact, which I haven't factored in. I have a strange feeling that 10M is going to be a factor this weekend, despite being dead so far this season. If the 10M doors blow open, it could be an incredible ride from out here to the Southeastern states, Caribbean and South America. Improvements since last time The frequency-agile Steppir setup will be very interesting to compare to the old trapped tribander set for CW. I found it pretty good in ARRL DX SSB this month -- on 20M I went from 312 Qs last year to 640 all-DX Qs this year. So 800 domestic and DX Qs is probably conservative. If I put in the time, I could potentially be in the 1,000 range this weekend on 20M (up from 362 last year and 594 the year before). The Steppir dipole should give me better handling on 40M SSB comparing it to the half-squares I used last year. In WPX SSB 2009 I had just 78 Qs, and I'm hoping to boost that to 300 this time out. In ARRL DX SSB last March with the phased half-squares, I had 41 Qs for 28 countries on 40M vs. 46 for 27 this year with the dipole despite missing the first 2.5 hours of prime time for 40M work. The dipole should be better for North America if I get started on time Friday evening. I am not nearly as confident about 80M (75M), as the twin verticals lose gain and the pattern becomes far more omnidirectional above 3.600 Mhz. I might use some after-work daylight to adjust the wires (loop 3 feet of each vertical wire back around at the feedpoints) to raise their resonant freq. by 200 khz and return the gain and pattern. Could be great for some JA 6-pointers. I don't think I'll bother at all with 160M. Noise on that band is atrocious for some reason. It's not local line noise as the noise blanker has no effect, and the Beverage isn't much better than the TX antenna. All I'd gather are a few nearby-state Qs anyway, so I'm better off concentrating any late-night time running 80M as long as they keep coming. I shattered my previous best performance from 2008 -- indicated by the Athena graph:
There's nothing quite like a sunspot or two to change conditions as the solar minimum slowly abates and moves toward solar maximum. The WPX SSB contest saw one big group and flux of 88 at the start, slightly falling to 86 by Sunday afternoon, and conditions on 20M seemed very good. However, I failed to take full advantage of the 20M openings to Europe and was not able to run on 20M to the U.S. as I had intended -- the band was too crowded, and there simply was no place to run. Result? I didn't reach my 20M goal, but thanks to 15M being open to North America, I handily beat the total score goal, finishing with just over 2 million points:
As the chart reveals, I did far worse on 20M than my 2008 performance -- a total shock to see after the contest. In fact, the only marked improvements were on 40M (where 4-pointers are key) and on 15M. It could be argued that the bands, not the station or operator, get the credit for the almost doubled score this year. That will change next time, as I was simply too timid finding a place to run this year. Bad break on 20M In addition to failing to finding a place to run North America and Europe on 20M, my other big mistake was the Saturday afternoon nap I took. This was a four-hour break (noon to 4 p.m.) after the peak of the European opening. It is indicated in yellow in this graph of my 20M QSO progression:
The story Here's an expanded version of the report posted to the 3830 contest archive: Call:
VA7ST
* FT-2000 and
SB-221 2010 -- SFI
= 88 A = 7 K = 2 Expecting to see some very impressive scores after this one. The bands are awakening! Sunspot group
1057 helped keep the flux "elevated" at 86 to 88 for this 15M was not good for rate, but provided leg room when 20M was un-runnable due to overcrowding. I could find what appeared to be good slots on 20M, but after being waved off time after time, when I did park I was always worried about what I might be doing to the guys on either side. Eventually, you just have to settle where you can between the titans, set the skirts and damn the torpedoes, but it sure will be great when we can spread the congestion over 15M and 10M as well. Real-time log analysis With Livescores
still in upgrade mode, I used PC5M's Athena contest score The production black-hole: 20M Was disappointed with 20M production. In ARRL DX SSB I made 640 Qs on 20M, all DX, and expected to get 800 to 1,000 in this one if Europe opened wide. Couldn't even get to 500, despite the easy domestic Qs to be had and Sunday's all-day opening to Europe. The top tier was very strong, but the lower tiers weren't very workable at all. Band congestion was so bad I spent a lot more time on 15M, as up there I could make contacts and even find a spot to run a few. Low bands 75M activity was disappointing. Still, I managed to improve very slightly over previous years. Adjusting the two vertical wire elements shifted the array's sweet spot up from the CW/RTTY part of the band, but I overshot the mark with a setting for 3.800 -- will note that for next time and set it for 3.700 instead. 40M was quite solid with plenty to work. The low Steppir dipole is a dream from a bandwidth standpoint, but it takes some gain to really rack up 6-pointers, and I only got a few of those. I had just 78 Qs on 40M last year. With the new dipole up, working 300 on 40M seemed achievable going in this year, but it did take some work to hit that goal. Overheard Heard some neat episodes of sportsmanship and DXer acumen. One was from WX3B in the wee hours of Sunday morning on 40M. I ran across him just as he was called by a VK8 that I could not hear off the far side. After several overs, he had the VK8's call, then said "now comes the fun part. What's my number?" After many attempts,
trying various permutations, he quipped, "it might be I doubled my previous best score, cracking the 2M-point and 1,000 Q barriers, added 160 mults more than ever before, and am pretty happy with how everything unfurled over the 32 hours I was on. I heard VE7 stations handing out serial numbers so high they sounded more like frequency checks, so I figure I'll be an also-ran. Big numbers from British Columbia Looking at the WPX SSB records for VE7, 2M points would have been 5th-best ever in the section, and far above anything in the past decade. That will change after this one as I am sure several stations from B.C. had outstanding performances. And next year will move the bar even higher. Note: Lee VE7CC had a huge score from the VE7SV Chilliwack station, operating VX7CC single-op, all-band. He was in the same category as me, but in a whole different league, working 2,941 contacts and scoring nearly 8.8 million points! Here's his writeup on 3830. Expecting high winds, I had the yagi at 27' on Friday night. The winds didn't arrive, so I was able to crank up to a soaring 47' for the Europe opening on Saturday morning through to the contest close on Sunday afternoon. Cranked things down at 0020z, and severe wind hit at 0040z. Timing is everything. Best DX: Kuwait for a new one on 20M. Heard many Asian stations, including 9M6 and YB, on 40M Saturday morning but could not get their attention. JAs were very, very scarce on the low bands -- too bad for us West-coasters, as those few 6-pointers help to offset the Europe advantage from out East. Had a lot of fun. Thanks for the Qs. -- Bud VA7ST |
