Is it possible to contest without a mast and a decent antenna? This is an article I definitely do not recommend to owners of high-quality antenna systems and large power amplifiers.
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How to Start Planning a Contest That Wasn’t Planned
It all started weeks earlier, when Oliver OM0RX began asking how to participate in the CQ WW DX Contest—SSB and possibly CW. Since my QTH currently looks like a construction site, I didn’t take it very seriously. I underestimated his desire to contest, because as the contest date approached, he brought it up more and more often.
The RDM-12 mast under construction
Over the summer, I started preparing the RDM-12 mast. I sanded it down completely, applied two coats of primer and two coats of topcoat, and wished I hadn’t come up with such a silly idea. It’s very labor-intensive, and accessing the inside of the mast is difficult for a steel brush or grinding discs. In addition, five pits were dug. Fortunately, not by hand this time! Three already have their anchor pipes set in concrete; one does not yet. The main pit remains, with its support structure and lifting mechanism.
A makeshift antenna
And since the garden behind the house is still being leveled, Shrek’s swamp is a more pleasant place to be. But a promise is a promise, so I set out to add a second set of arms to the Diamond W-8010 antenna to make it capable of covering 5 bands. Of course, it wasn’t tuned properly at first, and it took two more evenings before I had the antenna tuned to each band.
Diamond W-8010 Antenna
My setup is fairly standard: a Yaesu FT-1000MP. I also have a homemade SDR panadapter for this device and a CAT connection via MicroHAM to a computer running the tried-and-true N1MM+ logger. Since there’s still a lot of work being done inside the house and the youngest HAM recently turned one, we decided that we’d be transmitting from the utility room. Moving the workbench there required the help of a screwdriver and an Allen wrench, but after a bit of a struggle, the table was in place and the entire setup was connected the evening before the contest.
, Oliver OM0RX, before the CQ WW contest
Start of the 2020 CQ WW DX Contest
Oliver, OM0RX, got the contest rolling. In the morning, I just checked in to see how he was doing. It’s no joke—the W-8010 has a bandwidth of about 30 kHz on the 80-meter band. We tuned it as wide as we could. The Japanese designers teamed up with the Japanese antenna and stretched it to about 160 kHz. Paradoxically, it actually transmitted quite well.
Comparison of ED1B and OM0A on the 10-meter band in the 2020 CQWW Contest
On Saturday morning, the signals on the higher bands had a sort of auroral hue. And of course, for most of them, 100W wasn’t enough for that piece of wire. Before noon, however, stations also appeared on the 10-meter band. The lesson learned was that you have to take advantage of every connection like this, because the band might not open up again at all. Overall, things were moving along slowly on this band. It’s strange to contest without having to rotate the antenna. Either it works or it doesn’t. Although I wasn’t able to make any DX contacts on 10m (let alone North American ones), a few dozen contacts were still a pleasure.
The 15-meter band, however, proved to be a bit more challenging. After all, this band offers the opportunity to make DX contacts and earn valuable multipliers. Just because you can hear UA9, JA, or W stations doesn’t mean you can actually reach them! Many other contesters have the same goal, and most of them use more efficient antennas or higher power!
Comparison of ED1B and OM0A on the 15-meter band in the 2020 CQWW Contest
Choosing a Contest Category
Why don’t I like the multi-single category? Because of the 10-minute rule. I’ve seen many logs from this category, and I’ve often found violations of this rule. This rule states that on a different band, you can only make a contact if it counts as a multiplier. But if, say, I make four contacts there, I’ll achieve an average of 0.4 QSOs per minute, and at the same time I’ll be “locked in” for 10 minutes with no chance to increase that number on another band!
Comparison of ED1B and OM0A on the 20-meter band in the 2020 CQWW Contest
On the other hand, it’s a challenge. The challenge lies in knowing how to choose the right band or simply “jump over” to a multiplier. That jump alone can take up to 5 minutes (keep in mind the low power and very weak antenna).
Comparison of ED1B and OM0A on the 80-meter band in the 2020 CQWW Contest
Oliver took over the night shifts on the lower bands, for which he deserves our thanks. Without him, such continuous transmission would not have been possible. While no one dies, is born, or gets married during a contest, your family is still around you, and even a 1-year-old ham wants to do some transmitting too 🙂
Comparison of ED1B and OM0A on the 40-meter band in the 2020 CQWW Contest
Multipliers, multipliers, multipliers!
On the second day, we focused our efforts on boosting our score at the expense of making contacts. That meant calling out multipliers. What a joy it was to make contact with NA on 15m! Or VY2ZM in a pile-up of stations! Fortunately, we didn’t even hear many stations, so we didn’t have to worry about not being able to make contact.
Comparison of ED1B and OM0A on the 160-meter band in the 2020 CQWW Contest
OM0A’s final score in the CQWW DX Contest
In the evening, we pushed our score past 300,000 points. The number of contacts stopped at 1,107. The online contest server https://cqcontest.net/ experienced some outages, so the contest results are no longer visible there.
Breakdown of the number of contacts made by OM0RX and OM0AAO in the CQWW Contest
Score increase by the hour
Thank you to the many who picked up our weak signal in this fascinating sea of signals; thank you to my family for giving me the space to carry out our madness, and here’s to more crazy adventures!
