Radio Society of Great Britain. Official HF Contest Results
Results. RSGB Commonwealth Contest 2009
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The full writeup for 2009 together with a vast amount of background information, statistics and photographs related to the Commonwealth Contest may be found at www.beru.org.uk SOAPBOX: 5B4AGN This part-timer thanks the HFCC once again for maintaining this great tradition. I enjoyed a thoroughly entertaining 12 hours, conditions being rather better than anticipated. 5X1NH Great fun but poor condx - esp on 10 and 15. African power cuts and thunder struck again big time. Only 50W on solar power for 14 hrs - not helpful. Great to work so many VUs and VKs. Just love those British Empire wanabees! 6Y8XF Operated from the magnificent 6Y1V contest site near Montego Bay on the north coast of Jamaica. 20m was the main band (374) but with 40m close behind (342). Fifteen was thin and only VP8KF made it into the log on 10m. The 80m UK opening on Sunday morning was worked through to 0705z, well past sunrise even in the west of the UK. Having huge antennas made running BERU stations great fun. Unfortunately over five hours of power outages put a severe dent into the claimed score! 9H3JT Thanks to Malta ARL for use of club station and super hospitality. IC7400 400w HB amp , tribander for HF dipoles for 40/80 Asus PC 9M6XRO No UK stns heard on 10 or 15m so it got very slow towards the end. 10 was open to OC/AS/AF but few gave it a try unless requested to QSY from 15m. Always an an enjoyable Contest. Tnx agn to the organisers. AP2NK Condx very poor. I enjoyed using SDC and found it is very easy to use it C4Z Always good fun, some good low band contacts made up for poor hf condx. Incredibly loud sigs from 6Y8XF on 40/80. It was a thrill to work 2 VK's on the lightning brief openings on 10M. G0BON Nice to get 5 new countries wrking QRP without having to compete with EU stations, and was able to find how good my antenna perfomed. Recommend SDC as contest logger. G0FYX Patchy band condx. Super Duper SDC logging program used post contest and worked well. G0GDU FT1000D 200w with W3DZZ centre at 35ft. First attempt at BERU with only time for a very limited entry, looking forward to a more serious entry next year, must try to get the HF beam back up in the air G0HVQ Icom IC7400, 100w, Hustler 4BTV trap vertical plus dipole for 80m. My 2nd BERU, great fun again, LF condx excellent plus a few surprises on the higher bands, such as VK and VP8 on 15m. G0IBN Work commitments made it parttime but very enjoyable DX with 100w. Would have been easier with higher power but maybe next time. G0PSE Nice to see so many Commonwealth DX stations QRV G0RPM First time for a CW novice, really enjoyable, a few new entities worked. Yaesu FT897D, Alphha-Delta DXCC antenna G0UYG fantastic 24hrs lots of good dx,thank you all G0VDZ Great fun, But missed a few. Only done a few hours. Must get the prioritys right next year. G2JL Poor condx; & Hw mni I & UA in Commonwealth ! G3BJ Predictably poor HF conditions, but fairly good on LF. Excellent levels of activity from VU/AP and ZS compared with past years made the contest even more fun this year. Nice to hear so many G's "out and about" around the world. Am at last managing to get the hang of SO2R, and this made it easier to grab a few extra multipliers. Most people seemed very willing to move bands for me, which helped a lot. Great signal from Nigel, 6Y8XF on all open bands. And a new beverage helped a lot on the VK/ZL path. Just a terrifically enjoyable contest - but a lifetime's learning opportunity ! G3GLL sdc worked fine. G3GMM TS520S (100W) Doublet up 18ft. G3ICH IC7400 & multiband trapped dipole G3JJG Apologies for a far from error-free log G3JKY I think all the Canadians were huddling together for warmth in Ontario. TenTec Corsair II (70W) - 132' doubet and 18AVT G3JRM great to be in amongst the real DX just wish i had more stamina. only my second beru , better late than never had a great time G3KKP Great event - abysmal condx. Nice to qso BERU travellers and regulars. Restricted section is great for the low pwr vertical entrants. G3KMA Only the second time I've participated since the 1960s! Conditions worse than last year on 15m. G3KZR Great show from VK2 but not one VK3 heard. ZLs fantastic on 40 & 80 but tough on 20. VE's not hearing well after 2200 on 80. Missed anything that was going on 10m - for the first time ever while 15 was pretty poor too. Add the grim start condx and it was a very mixed bag - Just one more QSO than in 2008 but a few less mults! G3LDI Beam stuck NW, no 80/40 DX antennas so just a dabble! Some nice DX about, frustrating antenna situation though. Thanks to a couple of VK's for their patience with the exchange. Makes the 599 seem silly! Not sure if the exchange should have had a leading zero or not. Also, the scoring is suspect. Could only spare 5 hours, but was determined to have a second attempt at BERU, perhaps longer next year... G3LET Probably the last opportunity for a while to savour such excellent LF conditions. With 40 open all day and good short and long path openings to VK/ZL, this was one of the most enjoyable I can remember. As this is a 12hr entry, far too little time was left for the morning! G3LHJ Very hard slog, conditions worse than last year - but still enjoyed it - good to pick up a few new band slots G3LIK A real struggle with lots of QSB. Always in a queue behind the QRO & beam boys. Nice to see some familiar faces. Always a pleasure to take part in BERU G3LVP My small beam puts me in the open section, perhaps it's time for an 'Unlimited' section for stations with antennas higher than 60ft and/or possession of any amplifier capable of more than 1kW O/P (of course I'm not suggesting for a moment that any UK station would run more than 400W!) As far as possible I sent realistic reports not pointless 599's. 5 other stations taking part within about a 1 mile radius might make this the most active area in the UK? G3MIR poor condx. SDC makes life easy G3MXH Operating from the new QTH in S&P mode due to my low power and simple antenna. Great fun working some good DX and enjoyed pile ups for the rarer ones! Found 20m very good throughout the daylight hours. G3NKS Busy elsewhere for much of Saturday so very limited entry. Nil on 10 and 15 but 40 and 80 in good form. G3OAY Used 400W again this year to a Butternut HF6V. G3PHO Very enjoyable contest in spite of 40m being drowned out by local S7 noise level from 2300-0600. Quite pleased to increase my score over last year but with simple antennas (100ft inverted V doublet at 30ft for 80/40 and A3S @ 32ft for 20/15/10m) G3PSM Conditions were good and I improved on last year. Worked everyone I could hear. G3RFH Very noisy on 40 and 80.Conditions pretty good given state of sunspots. Was thrilled to qso ZL on 80m- first time for me. G3RSD This is a unique contest long may it continue G3SJX Enjoyable as always. G3SVD This year for my second attempt I was able to spend a bit more time at the rig than last year, but still only 7 hours total Thus my entry is a 12 hour entry. I had to attend a St. Patricks Day celebration so that put a stop to any activity on the Saturday evening/night. I must say I was impressed by the high level of activity from the little island of Cyprus. I heard at least 2x 5B4s, 1xC4, IxP3 and 2xZC4s. Maybe there were even more about. G3TVW FT950 (100W), inverted-V dipoles at 30ft G3VDB First experience dabbling in BERU. I quickly regretted not planning a proper effort. Great fun and unexpected to work VK and ZL on 40m and 20m with less than optimum aerials TS570D 100W, 26m Zepp, 80m Inverted U dipole at 8m. G3VIP FT301S + PA 150W - 40M LW & 20M 2 EL BOBTAIL - homebrew logger - just dabbling not a serious entry, too much rugby on TV G3VKW My first entry in Beru - Sadly A busy weekend, So little time to Operate. IC 7800, 2el Quad up 15m, LF Verticals G3VYI Poor condx at start, then good on LF. Great to hear so many BERU Dx sigs Good to work such polite ops. SDC was great G3WW SDC worked flawlessly G3XSV First entry for a few years. Very enjoyable and a great opportunity to fill in a few DXCC slots. FT1000 running 100W. 80m dipole, 40m Delta Loop on the other bands G3YMC This was going to be a check log since I had (correctly) decided that conditions were going to be dire. But I ended up working a bit more than I had expected. But as always on QRP it is hard going in this contest. For me the complete absence of VK/ZL on 20m at dawn and the lack of even VE's on 80 put things into perspective. Lets hope we have some sunspots back for next year's event. G3ZGC Good fun. Conditions were poor for my half sized G5RV. But still managed many VK and ZL on 40m. On 80m its like a yearly sked with ZL, they are there every year. I ran 200W as condx too poor for me in restricted. G3ZQH First BERU for me and only 2nd CW contest entered. Nice to have a restricted section for 100W and wires and the option for 12 hours. Found it very hard going with the HF bands so poor. Having only recently re-learned CW I stuck entirely to S&P- maybe next year my speed will be good enough to call CQ! G3ZRJ Health was bad so did as much as I could. Glad to give some points out. Glad to work several VK/ZL stations. Thanks for your work on the contest. G4ARI Great fun, wish I had entered the 24 hour section. G4AXX Used SDC for the first time. Condx were dreadful to start with but improved later and some good dx was worked. G4BUO Conditions even worse than last year, which hardly seemed possible! Made just two VE QSOs on 15m and GB5CC was my sole 10m contact. Therefore pleased to make 20 more Qs than last year, a testament to increased overseas activity and it was especially good to see a VU/4S7 team competing for the first time G4CKH Spent a couple of hours on the radio to see what's about. Not a lot unfortunately. Although VK and VP8 was worked. Surely conditions will start to improve soon? G4CZB Used K2/100. Nothing heard from Africa this year on 10m, so thanks to GB5CC for the one QSO on that band. 80m even better than 2008, band noise much lower. G4DDX Conditions not good for me however score up on last year. I enjoyed the event but the sun won on sunday so went sailing instead!! G4EBK Better effort than last year but thats not saying much. G4FKA Any chance of a competitive score was dashed after about 75 minutes when an S9+ hash, not experienced before in around 6 years of HF operation from this QTH, descended on 20m and stayed there for the rest of the contest. It vanished shortly afterThe rest of the contest was therefore damage limitation and fortunately 40m had excellent propagation to VK, ZL and generally to the east. The various world travellers helped to add 5 new ones to my 40m DXCC count and 3 new ones on 80 so it wasn'2 more QSOs than last year but raw total slightly down as I missed all the "bread and butter" QSOs on 20m because of the high noise level. I managed to keep going until around 0600 but then hit the concentration wall due to rather long hours. Station was the usual wet string wire antenna farm of a 30m inverted V doublet at 10m, 40m quarter wave vertical and sloping dipole for 10/15. IC756ProIII at 100w doing the business in the shack with Writelog and the microHAM interface box. Nice to work everyone and well done to the travellers for keeping the contest interesting. Hopefully the noise will have gone by next year! G4IUF Good contest, conditions kind on Saturday G4LMW My first BERU and great fun. Lots of opportunity to work what would otherwise be rare stations. FT-2000, 100w, 80m dipole. G4LMX First commonwealth contest. Won't be my last! G4PIQ Once again, very little time to play, just grabbed a few minutes where I could. Thought conditions poorer than last few years and pathetic antenna very ineffective! Enjoyable as ever though. Hope to return to a serious entry sometime when more free time available! K2/100, 100W, G5RV, one leg @ 8m, other wrapped round garden fence. G4RCG Could only spend a few hours in the test enjoyed what I did, conditions not the best but stations were there to be worked, Highlight was ZL on 80m with a real 599 signal. G4RYV First time entry ,good fun, try again next year. G4WGE Slow start, but ended up 50% better than last year. Finally bagged ZL from the home QTH! Big thanks to all those who whizz off to activate those obscure places. It is appreciated. G4XPE Rig IC-7200 100watts RF output. Antenna 40mtrs: Trap dipole inverted vee apex approx 3.8mtrs agl Antenna 20mtrs: HF5 trap vertical ground mounted G6CSY Running IC7400 @ 20W and a trap vertical. Gottaways were VU2 and ZL3. Grateful for the new DXCC's though! G8MIA Low signal strength on higher bands. 40m gave good signals Sunday morning from VK/ZL. Didn't manage VP8 or ZS this year. Entered MO as used CWSkimmer to read the CW. GB5CC Hard work - high local noise level made things difficult. Conditions on the HF bands pretty awful! GI4BQI IC756PRO3 (100W) 160ft doublet up 30ft GM0NAI Only managed a few hours operating as I had to work on Saturday. Some great signals from VK ZL on 40m. Thanks for the QSOs GM3CFS Only 3 bands usable due to poor conditions GM3JKS No QSOs on 10M & 15M. Good to work so many VK/ZL stations on 80m. SuperDuper worked well throughout GM4FAM Great fun as always GM4SID I could only fit in a few hours this time but I think propogation is on the up - at last. GM4UBJ Thanks to all who worked me, work commitments meant I had to take an off period between 16:30 and 21:30 so I missed my greyline time. However I did manage some choice DX. 80,40 and 20 all open at some time but not a dickie bird on 15 and 10, SDC worked fine as usual 73s GW0ETF Strictly part time effort from Wales. Still sulking after having to leave The Gambia (C5) 5 days before the contest. Next time I'll make sure I'm in charge of booking dates...! GW4BLE Just a token 50 Qs! GW4HBK Worked ZL and VP8 early in the test, brilliant! GW4XXF I went outside to see if my aerial had fallen down because it was so dead on 21 & 28! The lower bands were very noisy. I could hear some juicy DX being worked by other DX stations - but I could not hear them at all. The quietest CC for many a year! Rig: Alinco DX99 (100W) + Long Wire J38CW Rig was the FT857, SPE Expert amp and antennas were the YP3(beam in a bag) and J79WR Disaster from day-1 when the computer psu quit. Lost my first antenna an OCD in a storm.then in a repeat overnight Friday lost all my wire antennas due to another storm, had palm tree branches adorning the wires like Xmas tree toys. Loaned computer allowed manual logging using SDC. No computer CW/Winkey all manual hiccupy cw.. Must remember to take alternative parallel keyer. J88DR IC-7000 + SB-200 Amp = 400 Watts Logged on N1MM as "DX SeriaL" and scored after event. HF Condx even worse than last year - are we ever going to see any sun-spots? 80 & 40 were very good, but I had some QRN at times during rain. Planned to operate full 24 hours, but crisis at the treadmill meant I spent an hour on the telephone! M0CEF Rig QRP+ (5 W), Ant 22 m wire. Hand-typed log. Convenient activity to bag some DX without the pile-ups. M0CNP A very gentlemanly contest, and as usual, thoroughly enjoyable. Long may they continue. M0DHO Conditions on 20m in UK were poor, especially to the East. Some nice conditions to VK and ZL on 40m. Activity could have been higher, quiet at times. Had fun and worked some nice DX. M0NQN First time entrant and my results exceeded my expectations M0PCB Must admit that this one felt to be slower than last year, though looking at my previous scores it was in fact the best year for me yet. Some nice surprises in the log, certainly worthwhile getting up at 0600 on Sunday morning. Most enjoyable. M6FBK First time entrant and enjoyed it immensely. Many thanks to all those operators worked. MM0GPZ Tremendous noise on low bands made it difficult from this QTH. Very enjoyable test that I dipped into over the weekend. MU0FAL Very hard to compete with the packet pile ups. Seems a shame that the DX Cluster spoils the slow friendly nature of BERU MW0RZC good contest only able to operate short time P3J As usual a great contest, and thanks to all involved in organising it, and to all participants for the QSOs. No problems with the WX this year. Conditions generally poor, I have never heard 15m so bad in BERU. V47CD For me this was a second Commonwealth Contest from the Caribbean paradise of Rawlins Plantation Inn, St Kitts, where again the staff were extremely helpful. This location is free of overhead power cables - the curse of the Caribbean - and is on the northern slopes of the active volcano Liamuiga. We hiked to the rim on Tuesday after the contest and saw a little puff of smoke in the crater! Good conditions on the low bands compensated for poorer conditions higher up. Highlights were 5-band contacts with J88DR and VP8KF - I had no 10m contacts with Beru contesters last year. Aerials were an R6000 Cushcraft vertical plus 20, 15 and 10m dipoles on a common centre and 80 and 40m dipoles on a common centre. The radio was an FT897 barefoot. V51YJ FT-2000 running 100W, Hygain Patriot Vertical for 40-10m, Inverted Vee for 80. Thunder storms disrupted activity, Very high QRN levels up to S9 on 80 & 40M VA3DX VK9AA answered my CQ, that was neat! VA3DX only operator , but used packet system. Thanks to VY1EI for the Yukon multiplier ! VA3GML My first contest and thoroughly enjoyed it VA3RJ FT-890 100W, Hamstick vertical - 4th floor apartment balcony VA3RKM K2, 5 watts, verticals and wires. Not as good for QRP as the last two years. My appreciation and admiration to the Gs who copied my signal on 80m. You really deserved those points! VA7MM Equipment - ICOM IC-740 at 100 W Output Antenna - multi-band dipole VE1EP Although now aged 93, still enjoy the BERU Delighted that so many of the DX gang have such good ears! Elecraft K2 (5 Watts) + 80m Half Delta-loop. VE3EJ What a contrast from last year - Calm and sunny all weekend. QRN level very low. LF conditions were very good but HF is still hurting from the lack of sun spots. VE3EZP In 3 1/2 hours had a great QRP BERU from an 1867 wood house using the Hydro/Mains ground wiring as an antenna Heard G's many Carribean but no X Pond QSO- heard ZL4CT at 5/5/9-called until blue but only got a tantalizing QRZ?!-Must patent Mains Wiring Antenna!One for the book VE3QAA Conditions not too bad but didn't dig enough for 25 pointers. Rig Yaesu FT1000D and Alpha 87a amp. All-band wire antenna VE3RZ Tried SDC for first time - very easy to use VE3VHB I'm always amazed at the high QSO numbers reached by UK stations! Where do they find them all? Conditions far from good, very noisy here on all bands. With VE on Daylight Saving Time, made it even easier to be on at the start of the contest. Don't change a thing! VE4EAR My first entry in BERU. Tough conditions due to high Aurora levels on all routes with a bearing leass than 60 degrees, Only managed 12 hours before my neighbor severed my feedline due to RFI issues with his stereo. VE5CPU Am hour of S&P effort before family commitments dragged me away. VE6LB Activity was poor as seen from VE6. Athough I am a single op using only vertical antennas, I had to enter as Multiop. No problem. VE7BQO I enjoyed participating in this contest very much. Thank you for organising it! VE7RAC Used SD for logging. Always an enjoyable contest, and meeting familiar calls each year. Rotten propagation! VK2BJ HF conditions poor - 10 and 15 worse than last year 20 about the same. 40 quite good. 80 spoiled by QRN Used SDC for logging. Worked perfectly as ever. VK2EL FT897 (100W all bands) operated from retirement village - antenna Mag Loop and loaded dipole on small balcony. Thanks to the many operators who struggled with my weak signals! VK2NU Condx not great, but great fun....... ELECRAFT K3,MONOBANDER 10-15-20, Dipole and wire beams 40, Dipole 80... VK4BUI 10m disappointing, short 15M opening LP to SA 0530. Need a better antenna for 40m & 80m. Should stay awake for 24 hours instead of sleeping for 5!!! VK4TGL Thanks for the contest. Had good fun and worked some good DX. Some contacts were in the John Moyle contest and I've included them for completeness only. VK4WIA G'day to all others SDC programme by EI5DI worked very FB VK4XA TS870 (100W), Dipole & 3-ele yagi VK5MAV SDC software is just fantastic ! VK5SW First time in the contest, enjoyed it VK6AJ FT2000D, 6-ele log periodic, 7MHz dipole VK6BN Higher band condx not good but managed a few qsos on 10 SDC worked well although I am not very familiar with it Abt 40C in garden shack Sunday pm. Qrx for a dip. VK6HD Hearing 6Y8XF, V47CD & J88DR on 80m, great DX from VK6, and being unable to break the JA wall calling them! VK6HG enjoyable time, look forward to it every year VK6LW Improved score on last year thanks to performance of the beam on 40, new beverages cut down the QRN on 40 and 80 which made a big difference with our QRN here VK6RZ ICOM 7400 and BiggIR vertical VK6VZ Very poor HF conditions made up for by some nice prop on 40m and 80m. Too much work meant time spent was more limited than usual. Just love the team event - the comradery is great and unique. VK7GN A thunderstorm passed over just before the contest so had unbelievable static. Apologies to those who thought I might be going deaf! Conditions were not good - bring back the sunspots! VK8AV enjoyed using SD as usual poor condx did not help on the lower bands VK9AA First ever Commonwealth Contest for me. Only managed to get HF antennas up before contest started VO1TA The best contest of the year Look foreward to it every year.Always nice to work old friends. Once again used SDC logger without a problem. Thanks again to Paul Hope to see everyone again next year VP8KF Asked at last minute to run with ROW baton for Mike VP8NO who was unable to commit 24h to the effort. Had great fun again and thanks to VP8LP for the use of his fb station and antennas. Hard going with not so good conditions and S9 QRN on 40/80m all night. VQ9JC Yet another fantastic contest! My only regret was having to work on Sunday. VU2BGS condx were not so good but very glad the other stations could hear my small stn. I am one of "Team South Asia-2009" VU2HFR My first contest thanks to VU2UR. Learning experience. HF condx abysmal. 10M hardly opened. Still great fun. I hope to be QRV next year as part of TEAM INDIA Finally thanks to EI5DI for SDC a truly marvellous software. VU2LYX Came on as a HQ station this time. Enjoyed the contest as always. TS-140S; 50 W; Multiband inverted vee VU2PTT Rig: Icom 746-PRO + SB-200 Amp (400 W). Force 12 C3/S at 60', 40m Inv-Vee at 55', 80m Inv-L GP w/1 radial. MicroHAM MicroKeyer II (CAT, Winkey, Amp keyer, sound card). Thanks ZL2IFB for the scoring tool, N1MMLogger hopefully will be fixed. Another BERU goes by, one of the real fun contests for me :) It was good to work a lot of friends/familiar call signs and am just waiting to hear how it sounds when the Sun is more benevolent to us all. I nearly topped my previous best in BERU 1998 exactly 11 years ago as AT0PTT with 4385 points when I only had a G5RV antenna. Score was about 30% better than last year but conditions were worse this time round. Should put it down to station improvements and no energy expended in putting up last minute antennas and station wiring which was the norm in the past. Thanks to the XYL VU2AQB for a very functional operating desk (see QRZ.COM/VU2PTT for a picture). Missed all of the Carribean save 8P0P on 40m, that really underlined the poor conditions overall at this end. I was hoping to work them all at least on 40m, but the Sun God said NO! 80m - Back on 80m this year but with just 13 QSOs, need to improve the antenna system. Did work some of the big 'uns from UK and of course ZC4/5B4 and also VQ9JC. A RX loop is in the works. 40m - Played fairly well but I guess it could have been better. Couple of VE QSOs improved the feel good factor. 20m - The money band these days out here but I guess the VE opening was not good enough. 15m - Had some expectations on this band, but it all fell flat. Towards the end ended up working Africa & VK and trying to move stations to 10m. 10m - Although practically dead showed some surprising signs of life with huge signals from 9J2BO, VK9AA and VK6-LW, BN, AJ that should be heard to be believed - and people say 10m is dead, NO I say, at least to some parts of the world signals are HUGE. HQ Stations - Only three heard and worked this year - VU2LYX (5 bands), GB5CC (2 bands), ZL6A (2 bands). Thanks to Arasu VU2UR for motivating a whole group of people to sign up for Team South Asia - some of you must have been surprised to hear several VU2 stations calling CQ. It was a new experience for me to hear at least five VU2 stations calling CQ BERU on different parts of 20 m all at the same time! All QSOs in the contest were recorded like last year, and if you want to hear any particular QSO just ask and I shall send it out. VU2TS Have taken part in earlier BERU contests, but sending in the log for the first time! TS-480 hooked to a W5GI antenna - 100 Watts out ZB2EO Icom 735 - 100W (max) - longwire running N to S. ZC4LI Thanks to all concerned in running the contest. ZC4VJ TS-870, Acom 1000, Hexbeam, 40m vertical, 80m inv L. ZD8RH FT857 100 watts to a modified MP1 vertical Regretted not having packed an 80m antenna My first entry in BERU from ZD8 - most enjoyable ZL1MH In the team cometition, would like to see a mandatory requirement for each team to include at least one op using 100W, as I feel this might be a good encouragement for others to participate. ZL2IFB As the electrons settle on another BERU, I'm in a good mood so must have done OK this year! There were the usual ups and downs though ... Ups: - Finally got the tribander up on Saturday, just in time - FB Hawke's Bay QTH - so nice not to live in a valley! - Worked lots of old pals on 80-40-20 and can still remember most of your names! - Worked VE7RAC, VK4WIA, ZL6A, plus GB5CC on 20m, for HQ bonuses - Was called by ZS2DL on 20m at 11:02z, for my very first CQ Zone 38 QSO here in ZL - Had a "spare" (4th/non-bonus) VU QSO on 20m for once, though no 4S - Borrowed a spare rig but didn't need it (thanks for the insurance ZL2AL!) - Not too much QRM, just enough to remind me why I bought those IRC filters and where the Reverse-CW button is - Polite callers, willing to persist until we completed - Hand-logged QSOs with around 70 Johnny Foreigners who evidently hanker to join the Empire and refused to copy repeated hints that I was working "BERU RSGB TEST VE VK G ZL ONLY"! Managed to faze some by sending their call once with ENN in the hope they would buzz off. - Filled some more band-spots (thanks J88DR, H40FN, 6Y8XF, 9H3JT and VQ9JC) Downs: - Only had time to rig up the 80m inv-Vee at 11m off the tower, running N-S - Had to hand-rotate the beam with a rope as I'm 10m short of rotator cable (doh!), necessitating a dozen dashes up the little hill and causing a few missed Qs - Missed 9J2BO completely (DXcluster would have helped I'm sure) - Tired from climbing the tower and hill, needed 3 hours kip on Sunday morning and lost the will to contest for the last half hour of BERU - Had to hand-score in Excel since N1MM hasn't a clue Equipment: TS850, Amp Supply Co LK550, Cushcraft A3S at 14m, 40m roach-pole vertical, 80m inv-V at 11m and my trusty Morse Machine PS I don't know how to show the 2 dupes (VK6AJ and ZL1ANH), nor whether I am even supposed to show them these days. Hope this is OK! ZL3NB Running Kenwood TS2000/500W/Yagi/Inverted Vee's Contest started well till local EMI QRN started...Very Frustrating! 40 Meters best band when I could hear through the QRN. Great to catchup with Jim VQ9JC on both 80/40 again this year. ZL4CT Excellent conditions from the south of NZ to the UK on 80 and 40m. Worked 283 G stations = 55% of all QSOs. Thanks to everyone for the QSOs. ZL6A Band conditions can only be described as slightly getter than poor. Hopefully the 2010 event will experience the expected upswing of solar 24 conditions. The Beru continues to be a most friendly contest with a number of 'old faces' appearing annually ZS1JY One of my first CW contests, getting used to high speed Morse as well as getting used to a homebrew NB6M paddle key! IC706MkIIG plus dipoles & half-size G5RV ZS4JAN Thunder storms and lightning made band conditions very difficult and the antennas had to be unplugged on a few occations. BERU is getting better every year and is now one of my priority contests on the calendar. See you next year in my log. CW is still the best contest mode. ZS4U Very bad start due to QRN ZS6KR Started off with midday thundershower and high QRN levels followed but pressed on regardless |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||