Re: [AOCC] ARRL Sep VHF K7HP Single Op LP


Bill Mader, K8TE
 

Sadly, the same is true on HF now!  There will be lots of FT8 signals on the bands and few, sometimes none, SSB and CW signals.  We operated the WAE SSB Contest from VY2TT as VY2AT this past weekend.  There were many times our CQ's went unanswered because there were no new ops to work.  

It's far worse on a weekday for example when I'm running a county, chasing parks or SOTA, etc.  These smaller groups often have more activity than the bands in general.  Although, it seems a lot of County Hunters have "drifted" over to FT8.

One of our team members here this weekend who is just short of the DXCC Honor Roll operates FT8 almost exclusively.  He chases DX entities with that mode for missing band-slots.  Often, FT8 is the only mode that propagation supports.

Another old friend, and now former contester, skips contests in favor of operating FT8 exclusively!  Just a year older than I, I hope I never get to the point where all I can handle, or all that interests me, is a couple of clicks to make a contact.

I will likely wait for the dust to begin to settle on WSJT-X contesting.  I think it's great that Joe and his team plus others are working hard on making those modes work.  However, it will require an incredible amount of training and education to make them work among the masses.  I will briefly cover some of these concepts at HF University at the DCHF this coming weekend.

Good luck in the contest!

73, Bill Mader, K8TE
W6H NM Coordinator, Route 66 On-the-Air 7-15 Sep 2019
ARRL New Mexico Section Manager
ARRL - The national association for Amateur Radio
Duke City Hamfest BoD www.dukecityhamfest.org 20-22 Sep 2019
President, Albuquerque DX Association 

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