P40L-P49Y Contest Summary Information

On Thursday afternoon seeing the A index above 20 and the K index between 4 and 5 I made the decision to go High Power Assisted. I'm now quite happy I did since conditions during the first eight hours of the contest were rather dismal, even from a geographically advantaged location like Aruba. Happily surprised to find some life on ten meters including a fair number of EU...but just two USA contacts....strange conditions for sure.

Overall all the bands were quiet (perhaps too quiet). QRN levels were summertime elevated as expected but tolerable on the lower bands all weekend. 20M gave me a 190 first hour (by far the contest best), but after that never played as well as hoped. 15M was terrific to EU in my late afternoon about 2100 UTC. 40M was just OK and I probably spent far too much time on 80 and 160. 80M was very good early evening, 2330 onward, which is several hours earlier than what happens here during winter conditions. The time spent on 80 was twice what I expected....and so is the Q total. 160M was open to EU several times but for the most part stations could not hear me calling. Tried to work W1AW/9 several times on Top Band but got no further than hearing the dreaded dit dit dah dah dit dit for my trouble.

Overall this was a great way for me to spend the first half of my 67th birthday....among many life long friends around the world doing what we love to do.

Thanks go to Andy AE6Y/P49Y and John W6LD/P40L for allowing me to use their terrific station on this visit. See www.arubaqth.com for station details. The 'real' P40W will be back on the air for CQWW PH and CW in the fall.

73, John, W2GD

Rig: Elecraft K3, Alpha 91B, 1.0 KW. Win-Test Logging Software