From what I remember, the January contest started because a couple of eastern VHF clubs (Pack Rats, Mt Airy, ect) wanted a event to get guys out winter mountain-topping.   It was scheduled in January to take advantage of the seasonal minor peak in sporadic E that is normally centered on the northern hemisphere winter solstice.  Why it's so late in January has probably been lost to history.

There are VHF single band Sprints in the spring, which are a blast, if you're in tropo country.  Out here, they are usually worse then the January test because you only have one band worth of noise to listen to.

-W9RM

Keith J Morehouse
Managing Partner
Calmesa Partners G.P.
Olathe, CO

On Mon, Jan 21, 2019 at 1:56 PM Steve London <n2ic@...> wrote:

Glad I wasn't the only one with an amp issue. I have a decrepit SB-220,
converted to 6 meters only. Started hearing a rapid tick-tick-tick sound in the
receiver late on Saturday. New local QRN ? Very local - inside the amplifier.
Something going on in the power supply. Date code on electrolytics is 1979. It's
time, along with new resistors and diodes.

W5UHF was very strong on 6 meter FT8. Solid S5 on the meter.

Why isn't there a springtime contest on VHF/UHF ? Or would it be as
propagation-free as January ?

73,
Steve, N2IC
DM52XT

On 01/21/2019 01:32 PM, Bill wrote:
> Hi Keith,
>
> Good write ups and thanks for being there the whole contest.  We did not meet
> our goals.
>
>   * 2 meter contact off the moon
>   * 1296 FT8 contact
>   * Improve on last year's score
>
> Largely these were not met because of factors beyond our control.  We operated
> for 26 hours.  I worked the bands 144 and up, and Mike WB2FKO worked six meters
> only.  I was glad we had WSJT on all bands.  Mike worked almost exclusively FT8
> and MSK144 on 6 meters.   I won't duplicate Mike's report but notably Mike used
> the reverse beacon network as a useful tool in finding and predicting small
> openings on 6. The six meter station performed smoothly until Sunday morning
> when the amplifier went snap, crackle and pop..... and tripped off. I pressed
> the KPA500 into service and we soldiered on.
>