The AM Forum

lotsa ducks quacking CQ contest on whatever frequency you're on.  ::)

Good weekend to go to a hamfest or make some improvements to the shack.

Some of them will probably be bitching about AM squeals on 75...But, hey, "If you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen!"

Ya Know, there's nothing in the rules that says you work the contest using AM.  It just says make as many contacts as you can on the bands used.  Didn't see anything restricting the mode. 

Maybe I'll try it.  Ya think I can get double points if I work em on Upper and lower Sideband at the same time?

:)

That's an excellent idea Ed. Just jump right in and join them! I'll betcha many of them won't even notice your carrier. Chances are you will be no wider than many of the hyper-processed-flat-topping-surpressed-carrier-single-sideband rigs churning away on the bands.

Unlike the ARRL contests that say Phone, the CQ Contest says: "The WPX contest is based on an award offered by CQ Magazine for working all prefixes. Held on the last weekend of March (SSB) and May (CW)"
However, I just worked 5 different stations on 20 meters while using AM on my end. No one on the other end uttered any comment about anything unusual with my signal.  I'll be contesting most of the weekend. Flea markets in March don't excite me.

I am glad CQ at least does not defile the good name of radiotelephone or phone by confusing it with SSB.  As AM is the only true phone by tradition, a distinction needs to be drawn.  When speaking of SSB I refer to it as SSB so as to not associate it with genuine radiotelephone.  :-X  :-X

OK  Calling  all SBE's  time to fire those SBE's up!!!

Not to froth or fulminate about QuaRMfests; to each his own.  But there seems to be so many of them lately. I believe there has been a major QuaRMfest on HF or 160 every weekend but one, for the past month or more.

Even outside of contests, the majority of QSOs I hear on CW from DX stations might as well be corn-tests...Most just want to hand out a signal report, and it's on to the next guy...no QTH, no name, no conversation.  A good rag chew is hard to find, especially on bands above 40 meters.   Ironic that those with the technology to talk to anyone anywhere anytime have so little to say, and so little interest in really communicating.....Some of the problem on DX QSOs might be the language barrier, but there are lots of stateside stations of the same mindset.  Sad.

Not only are there too many but thay last too long.  I feel sorry for non-contesters who work for a living.  The entire weekend is lost to howling savages exercising a perverted way of proving their manhood.

After spending several hours getting my 810 rig back on 20, I felt like a caged lion.

I finally got my jollies by exercising my new fully automatic robot by running the following .wav for 30 minute intervals during the day. 

CALLING CQ CQ CQ

THIS IS K9ACT CALLING CQ ON THE OFFICIALLY DESIGNATED
AM CALLING FREQUENCY OF 14.286 MHZ

K 9 ALPHA CHARLIE TANGO CALLING CQ AND STANDING BY

5 sec pause/repeat

It must be official because my PwrSdr display says so as soon a I get to that freq.

Other than venting my spleen, it was a totally useless exercise.  I listened on USB and during every pause I could hear several stations acknowledging contacts.  Anyone who thinks you can drive them away with AM is nuts, particularly on 20 with the propagation effects.

I gave up and switched to RTTY down the band and made a bunch of DX contacts but that's not much more exciting than a contest.

Jack K9ACT





 

Wanna have some fun?  Operate the QuaRMfest and tell every contact you are using AM, and then give an honest signal report to every station.   ;D

Contest Corral 2010 Schedule:
http://www.arrl.org/contests/months/jan.pdf
http://www.arrl.org/contests/months/feb.pdf
http://www.arrl.org/contests/months/mar.pdf
http://www.arrl.org/contests/months/apr.pdf
Most have been around for years.

WPX and DX contests attract  world-wide participation which is why they are so popular and a lot of fun. Even the little guns can add to their DX total. Takes the boring out of the typical rag-chew QSO and generates a lot of competitive spirit among amateurs.

I've known a lot of competitive contesters over the years and a lot of them were manipulative a-holes.  I once attended a meeting in Nov. of the local ham club.  I walked in when this guy was down in front of everyone yelling at them about some contest related topic--I dimly recall it had to do with using computers, or using a 2 m. HT to call in for permission to take a bathroom break.  In November, they were planning for Field Day which takes place in June.  It turned out they went to some hidden place where they would not be bothered and brought with them computers for logging, towers, beams, all the contest accoutrements one would have at home.  And this is supposed to be about emergency preparedness.   The whole thing had been taken over by huge competitive control freaks who, obsessed with "winning" (whatever that means in this case) had, as usual, managed to remove every last particle of fun from the event.  Now we were all getting yelled at by this guy who seemed to think he was a Company First Sergeant.  I left and went home and didn't go back for several years.  

If you have a boring rag chew QSO you have yourself to blame for you are doing something wrong.  Work on your conversation skills.  I concede some hams are hopeless.  The worst hams I ever worked from a conversation standpoint were the ones operating 10 meter FM.  These guys seemed to have spent their lives on desert islands never talking to another human.  But AMers?  You can't get them to shut up  ;D  I have read the occasional contests v. no contests threads that flare up on the more widely popular ham internet forums and what eventually comes out is that contesters contest because they don't know how to, or enjoy, ragchewing.  In other words, their people skills are lacking.  Maybe they have only tried 10 m. FM.  

When does this stupid thing end anyway?  It is not okay to seize and dominate an entire popular ham band for a 48 hour period.  While this may be an old contest there are a lot that have come up not too long ago that make it seem like there are too many contests.   Some that come to mind are these North American QSO Parties, that seem to happen every few months and are bigger than the average ARRL section QSO party.  Fortunately they do not blow out an entire weekend.  Then there are these "Sprints" whatever they are.  These are all relatively new, as if there were not enough all ready.

73

Rob

I agree that SOME contesters are definitely over the top but it can be a fun way to spend a weekend if you keep things in perspective.   I have operated quite a few over the years but I no longer try to do the whole "no sleep all weekend thing".  The first time I did this I was a very young ham.  After a couple of months as a novice I had gotten my general ticket shortly before Field Day and my strongest memory of that experience was hearing everything sending Morse after I got home; the refrigerator was particularly bad.

Most contests avoid the WARC bands so those are an alternative to consider.  Much of the vintage gear like the Viking 1 and 2 (and your HT-20) will cover pretty much anywhere from 1.8-30 Mhz.  A lot of the contests are phone one weekend and CW the other and vintage gear is fun to operate on CW when the phone bands are trashed.  I operated CW last night using my Sargent 11-MA regen and homebrew dual 807 rig and had a lot of fun with low tech radio.

Serious contesters spend a lot of money on their gear and they grow very upset with RFI raising the noise floor so they are most definitely allies and not enemies on what is becoming the biggest problem facing amateur radio.  Not everyone has a big signal in the contest and I enjoy working the weak/near the noise floor CW on 160 and 80.

As to Field Day:  it can be the most fun of any contest but a lot of clubs ruin the experience.  Going to an already set up Red Cross or county emergency site and operating does nothing for me.  We had a lot of fun in the mid 70's on the MS gulf coast going out into the woods and setting up.  Families were involved and the food was great.  For a real emergency simulation the ARRL should stipulate that Field Day will occur one weekend in May or June and the actual start time will be announced one hour prior.  Of course some people would probably be hurt or killed in the rush to set up but it would be a better simulation/preparation for the real thing.

I agree on 10m FM.  I could not copy it on my 75A-4 or any other receiver,  but back during the last sunspot  cycle I bought a little Radio Shack 10m transceiver, as they went on sale near the end of the cycle when RS decided to discount them to get rid of them before the cycle fizzled.  It is little more than a modified CB rig, but runs 7 watts on AM, 25w peak output on slopbucket, and 25w on FM (but no CW).  The idea was to have something to use to hear the FM activity, since what little I could decipher trying to copy slope detect mode had sounded kind of interesting. I was thinking especially of the possibility of European DX, that seemed to be coming in on FM while nothing was being heard on other modes.

I think I worked a grand total of 6 stations on 10m FM before I threw in the sponge.  Absolutely nothing of interest to me.  It was like I was on a different planet from all the other 10m FM ops.  I think I used it on slopbucket a couple of times, but didn't find that much better  than FM.  It worked on AM, but with space shuttle audio, so I stayed with my Eico 720 @ 40 watts carrier output & good audio.  The thing is still collecting dust on the shelf.  It's the closest thing to a SSB rig that I have ever owned, and probably hasn't been in transmit mode more than a total of a dozen times.

"Competitive spirit" is a substitute for the intelligence it takes to make a QSO interesting.

It is also frequently a substitute for physical stature, AKA "short people syndrome".

In other words, they are sick people who infringe on the rights of others and as with so many sick groups in this PC culture, they are encouraged by exactly the people that could help them get well.

I cringe when hams pine over the shrinking ham population.  It is my humble opinion that there are already far too many hams.  The vast majority of new hams contribute nothing to the hobby but QRM because they are too uneducated and unskilled to carry on a conversation.

Other than that, contests are a lot of fun.

Jack K9ACT

p.s.

I suppose I should confess that I "worked" a station in Portugal on 20 AM last night.  It was a very stimulating conversation.  I was number 428 for him and he was 7692 for me.  He asked me to repeat the number several time and I guess I spoiled his day.

jjs

 

Rodger said:
Well, they can do me and alot of others a big favor and avoid 160 as well. Crap-tests they are.

I also purchased one of those 10 m. Radio Shack rigs.  I think I got mine at Dayton in 2000.  Radio Shack must have been blowing them out at the time because I recall I got mine at some discount.  I got it for 10 m. SSB.  It was a little flaky to operate there with the supplied hand mic but for a year or two I ran it off a cigarette lighter in my car and a mag. mount roof antenna and worked hams in Europe and South America while driving around town.  That was kind of neat but then the band folded and it has been sitting on a table collecting dust for the past 7 or 8 years.  If 10 m. ever picks back up (I have heard about openings lately) I may fire it back up and try it out again.

I tried 10 m. FM with a Ten Tec Omni 6 transceiver I have that includes that mode.  I probably spent a total of 2 hours on it spread out over a few days.  I remember working some ham not too far away from me, maybe around 15 or 20 miles away, through a repeater in Montana, which struck me as kind of crazy.  In all of the QSOs, it was impossible to get anyone to open up and discuss anything.  All the usual tactics failed.  I'd ask about their station.  They would be running some cigar box sized rig to a mobile antenna clamped to a balcony.  That's the sum total of their entire ham station so that topic would quickly be exhausted.  Everything else was met with one word replies.  There was no overlap between my world and theirs--it was like 2 m. FM people had made it to HF but were still operating 2 m. FM (which was true in a sense).  Also the audio was always this flat dull telephone audio.  It didn't take long for me to decide I had "done" 10 m. FM and I went back to the low bands.

How soon we forget - back in February, we had three AM related contest activities on three consecutive weekends - AM Rally, Classic Exchange, AWA AM QSO party, and also, not to forget, the December Heavy Metal Rally. Even AM'ers are not immune to the "fun" and competitive spirit of these contest related type activities. As someone asked here on the board several weeks ago, "when's the next one?".

I think the operative dislike is for slopbuckets. I, for one, love AM contests and will actively operate in each one.

When the mode is right, it's all good.  AM contests, check. AM field day, check. AM moonbounce, check.  AM Ultra Highs, check.

Speaking of which.......ummmm... warez the AM rally results ??? I am a native, and I am getting restless.

I just wanna know how much UFU won by, thats all.  ;D

But we didn't take over the entire phone band to do it. Plus, our QSO's actually involved talking to the stations we contacted, not just exchanging bogus signal reports.  I participated a little on 75m, but didn't feel that it was a QuaRMfest at all.

If we had 10 thousand participants, we might have taken over the entire phone band. In the AM related "contests", contact exchange varied depending on the "contest". If contacting participants wanted to engage in dialog beyond the required exchange, that's their call. Over the years, I've also noticed some AM'ers actually have trouble actually ending a QSO and moving on to the next contact. Maybe it's the brain function of "I need to get the last word in".

Pete said:
Wrong again Pete! All the AMer's I know enjoy the art of conversing not the typical slopp-bucket practice of "Wham, Bam, Thank you man!"

15m was hot today.

I was calling CQ on 21.215 AM phone for a ragchew in between the SSBer's contests today, but alas, no takers.

Phil - AC0OB

You're not kidding! I try to search for an opening to call CQ this evening just for a ragchew on 40 and 20 and can't find an opening anywhere! It's silly IMHO!

I like rag-chewing! Sometimes I meet some interesting folks on the radio!

Contests? Blah, not for me.

73s, geo

Here is a strategy worth trying, when there is a QuaRMfest on.  Most QuaRMfests end promptly at 2400 GMT Sunday evening. Just as soon as the Q-test activity shuts down, there is usually a short lull in activity until the non-QuaRMfesters get fired up or the QuaRMfesters take a breather from operating, leaving many open frequencies to choose from. I was still tuned up on 7160 from earlier this afternoon, so promptly at 0000Z I started the automated CQ and snagged an AM station in SC first try. After we ended our QSO another AM station, in Utica, NY, called, and we carried on for a few more minutes.  The frequency was still vacant as I left the shack to take my own break from radio.

Please, those AM operating events are hardly "contests" in the conventional lizard brain sense of the word.  They are more like Straight Key Night.  Whatever "competitive spirit" existed in the AM events was genteel bordering on quaint; hardly the manic desperate rabid lunacy on display with every contest rage weekend.   Nothing was forgotten, there was nothing to forget since the AM activities were friendly and collegial.  If the raging caffeinated all knobs clockwise nub-head events are the Olympics, then the AM operating events (for which the term contest is a misnomer) are shuffleboard on the deck of a cruise ship.  

The whole formula for the modern day contest defies reason and logic.  It was long ago established that with the right equipment and antennas and the right frequency, a radio signal will reach every square inch of surface of the earth.  It is no longer necessary to prove this with a contest (partly the reason in the very early days of radio when hams were not so ubiquitous and "all hands on deck" on certain weekends made it easy to establish communications ranges for stations).  

Then there is the absurd exchanges which are predictable, and pointless.  What on earth is the reason for giving everyone 59, or 599?  The answer is usually "emergency preparedness."  Okay, then exchange a real simulated message, sort of like what is done in the Sweepstakes, but why not make it more authentic, with randomly generated real sounding messages?  the software to do this would be easy to set up.   Or at least have a set of 20 emergency texts programmed, each one two or three sentences, that would be randomly cycled through, one for each QSO.  Or just do away with exchanges entirely since they are pointless and harmlessly insane, and have a CQing station simply say "W9--- I hear you calling me, do you hear me?"  "Yes I do, this is W9---"  "Okay thanks, QRZ...."  That would at least have a bit of logic to it.  

Field Day has really become a joke.   It is high time the ARRL de-contest that event by issuing the start time and weekend a few hours ahead of it (Rodger's suggestion I believe) and they could also award points for everything except numbers of QSOs and multipliers.  They should establish metrics for emergency preparedness and emergency efficiency and versatility, and de-prioritize the contest angle as much as possible.

Rob

I noticed that too. Everyone gets the best signal report? Impossible! I thought the whole purpose was for honesty in gauging one's own transmitter and antenna efficiency.

I've never given a signal report with the RST system, it seems to relative and ambiguous to me, subject to the receiver operator's mood and hearing ability.

I just read what comes off the S meter and tell it honestly. Even sometimes when someone is coming in at 10 over S9, the signal may drift up and down in strength, so even with a signal measurement from a meter it's still not exact - but should never be 5 9 or 5 9 9. That seems to be intellectually dishonest to me.

Oh well, what do I know.

73s
geo

I did the same as Don but didn't know when it ended.

Took a look at 0600 local, saw nothing, said testing 1 2 3 and had a one hour rag chew with KF5CD something and later, W9AD joined.  This was on 14.286.  The 5 was running 32 W and booming in at 10 over for the whole hour.

The mushrooms had all  deliquesced.  How's that for a word?  Any mushroomer will know it.

They pop up like mushrooms and dissolve into a splotch of ink when it is over.

Jack

Yep, and probably just as exciting. I can just feel that team spirit blowing "in" the wind.

A year or two ago there was a thread on this subject on QRZ.com. Several of the QuaRMfest regulars said that it is "bad QuaRMfest etiquette" to give any other report than 5/9(9) because most serious QuaRMfesters use logging software, which is set to enter 5/9 by default.  If a station receives anything other as a report, the op has to stop and manually enter the correct numbers and this wastes precious QuaRMfest time.  The op could just ignore the non-5/9 report, but he doesn't know whether or not the other station is submitting a log, and if there is a discrepancy in entries, that contact could be disqualified, and in some QuaRMfests, there is a penalty for excessive errors or discrepancies in the logging data.

In other words, it supposedly pisses QuaRMfesters off if they receive a report other than "five-nine".

I have entertained the idea of stealthily participating in a slopbucket QuaRMfest, running AM, and intentionally giving everything but a "five-nine" report, then submitting a log for the few contacts I make, but ultimately, I decided that I have better things to do with my time.  But imagine the havoc it would raise if a large number of anti-QuaRMfesters conspired to do just that.  ;D

I have occasionally participated in the 160m CW contests in the middle of the day, near high noon, just to see what I could work.  When I do that, I always give honest reports, and likewise, I have received honest reports from other stations. I recall once working a W2 in NJ at noon local time, running 100 watts to an inverted vee, 40 ft. in the air. Neither report in the exchange was 599.

I always thought one of the purported objectives of a QuaRMfest was to see how well your signal gets out and what kind of signals you could receive.  Averaging out the signal reports over an entire weekend or throughout an entire QuaRMfest  season would help you determine the overall effectiveness of your station and your antennae in different directions at various distances.  This fine-nine nonsense defeats that purpose, which should be close to the number one valid, significant objective of QuaRMfesting.  I seem to recall hearing exchanges of honest signal reports as recently as the 70's or 80's, perhaps even the 90's so maybe this really is a recent phenomenon that came with the advent of widespread computer usage. But it must be an "unwritten" understanding amongst QuaRMfesters, because whenever I look over the rules in CQ or QST in a QuaRMfest announcement, they just mention "signal report" as part of the exchange, but nothing about mandatory "five-nine".

As for the logging entries, I can't imagine the people who make up a QuaRMfest committee receiving hundreds or thousands of paper logs and checking each one for the least discrepancy in any single logging entry.  This has to be done 100% by computer to-day, but back in the 50's and 60's when QuaRMfest activity was at its peak, with probably considerably higher participation than to-day, paper logs were the only option.  Those people must have really had time on their hands. How could they possibly have had any kind of family or social life or hold down gainful employment?  ???

The main objective is point count. The more contacts, sections, states, countries, zones, etc., the more points. As long as the exchange is sent both ways and acknowledged, you're done to move on to the next one. Whether you're buried in the QRM, or with a signal at the noise level, as long as the exchange and acknowledgment is made on both ends, you're done. The signal report exchange is meaningless for most contest operators. It's been a carry-over from the "good old days". Most, if not all, VHF contests have eliminated the need, or make it optional, to give a signal report. Generally, all we pass is Grid-Square info.

Most of your major contest logging is done electronically and submitted in a standardized electronic form depending on the type of contest.

Pete said:
Yeah, right! I find that their QRMtests are meaningless!