LA8W – LN8W

LB8IB working SO2R in CQ WPX RTTY 2006
I started preparing for this contest in the beginning of January. I decided to go SO2R for the first time on RTTY after reading some very interesting articles by AA5AU on operating strategies and by WA9ALS on how to use two soundcards with Writelog and MMTTY.

Background

How to set up Writelog for SO2R is straightforward and explained very well on the excellent K9JY website. Another great resource is of course the RTTY and Writelog reflector archives on contesting.com

Preparation
I started out with building a new computer from scratch.  My decision was to have a computer with 2 sound cards, 4 Com ports, 1 LPT port and a graphic card with support for two monitors. I ended up with an AMD based motherboard containing two Com ports, one LPT port and integrated sound. I added a PCI card with two extra Com slots and a second 16 bit sound card. After putting it all together in a regular desktop cabinet I installed Win XP Pro and fired up writelog. For running SO2R I use a DX doubler that connects to the LPT port.
I installed a program called direct IO, which adds support for the LPT port under Win XP. After testing all the ports I was really sad to see that the Com2 port on the motherboard wasn’t working.  I didn’t have time before the contest to return the card so I installed a regular USB to serial adapter which works fine for RIG control but not for keying FSK.  I tried to prepare everything I could at home before leaving for the contest. I programmed all of the Function keys and also made some keyboard shortcuts for specific SO2R actions and marked the keys. I arranged the layout on the screen and also pretended I was working a contest to verify that everything was set up correctly. I even feeded my two soundcards with a RTTY sample signal to verify the sound was routed correctly to the two different RTTY windows within Writelog.

Just to tell you how serious I am about this contesting stuff I started on a low carbohydrate diet in the beginning of January for controlling my blood sugar. I also try to exercise regularly to improve my physical form. The benefit for being fit together with a low intake of sugar should not be underestimated during a long and hard contest. If you find this interesting I highly recommend reading the article “a sleeping strategy” by K5ZD and some other good postings related to this on the CQ-Contest reflector. Ok, I admit I didn’t start with all this just because of working contests but it surely helps.

The contest:

I had plans on going to our contest station early on Friday but because my wife had the flue I had to take care of our children. At 1800 GMT I was finally on my way to Rakkestad, which is a two-hour drive from my home QTH. I still had plenty of time to set up the stations before the contest I thought J.  I was well prepared so the set up went quite smoothly and I was ready for take-off about one hour before the contest started. Then I made the fatal mistake to restart the computer. After the restart it just wouldn’t fire up windows again and all I got was the Windows logo start up screen. I tried to disconnect all the ports and finally 5 minutes before the contest started it loaded Windows again. Even if I had saved my configuration I had to set up the ports again for FSK keying, Rigcontroll and routing of the sound.  The setup for basic SO2R operation with one computer on RTTY with Writelog is well described by WA9ALS on his home site. Back to the contest again I was finally ready to go at 0005z.

I started with S&P on both radios because I couldn’t find a good running frequency. When I called the first station I got my second surprise. My right RTTY window was reading fine from the right radio but when I tried to transmit the typing went into the left RTTY window L. I went through the setup again but couldn’t find anything wrong. I was now in a state of panic and kept looking at my bag, which contains a small bottle of Whiskey in case I should get problems to sleep during my off periods. I breathed deeply a couple of times and took a drink to calm down. I closed both of the RTTY windows and started all over again and finally got it working. The first couple of hours were not good and my lack of experience in SO2R operation was obvious. I didn’t find any rhythm at all and just kept S&P with both radios which is a waste of time. I don’t know if it was the Whiskey or something else but I finally settled down and got into a nice rhythm with run on one radio and S&P on the other.

I took the first break and went to bed at around 0900z on Saturday.  I slept for about three hours and was up again well in time before US sunrise. My strategy was to work as much low bands as possible because of the higher qso points. I also wanted to run during the prime time opening to US on 20m. With the low solar flux I didn’t expect much from 15 and 10 and was right. No contacts on 10 and just a few on 15. On Saturday evening the third surprise came in form of a power shut down in the house. I had a flashlight on the table and with the help of my host LA7SL we changed the main fuses. The power came back and we never experienced the problem again. However again I got the same problem with the computer so I had to take another break for one hour. I pushed the low bands on Saturday evening for what it was worth until I pulled the switch (not on the computer J) and took another break at 0100z.

I started early on Sunday hoping to get a good run into Japan with lots of new mults. Unfortunately the propagation to JA was not good and I only worked about 20 stations. Luckily the band was wide open to US on both Saturday and Sunday. Later on Sunday I got my fourth surprise in form of a sudden restart of the computer with no warning? Luckily it came right up again and I could continue on the same running frequency.

When running on 20m. during the brightest hours of the day there actually wasn’t much to do with the second radio, which I found very confusing. 10m. were dead and going up and down with the second radio on 15m. just resulted in hearing the same stations over and over again. Eventually as I approached sunset I moved the second radio to 40 and started picking up stations again. I finished the contest at 2100z after 30 hours of operating time.

Conclusion
I see know afterwards that the panic start easily could have been avoided. I should have started the contest with a one-hour break, but because I was so desperate to start on time
I didn’t think clearly enough. After a couple of hours I finally settled down and got into a nice rhythm, which actually lasted for the rest of the contest except for the power shut down on Saturday. I am very pleased with the result and looking forward to the next one. I will continue to improve my SO2R skills and try to be even more prepared next time.

Claimed Score:

Band   QSOs   points    prefixes

80m:    441     1848      196

40m:    403     1734      135

20m:    663     1729      235

15m:     32       94        9

10m:      0

Totals 1539    5405       575    =  3107875

Hardware setup
Radio1: Icom IC 765 with ACOM 2000A
Radio2: Icom IC 756 ProII with Ameritron AL1200
SO2R hardware: Dx doubler by top ten.
Dunestar band pass filters
PC:  AMD XP 3000 with 1GB RAM and a 20 inch Dell Wide screen monitor.
Working SO2R with one computer on RTTY Requires you to have lots of windows open so a big screen is a major advantage. The next upgrade for me will be a second monitor for adding more band maps and other helpful things on the second screen

Antennas:
10m. 6 el. Yagi
15m. 5 el. Yagi
20m. 4 el. Yagi
40m. 4 square
80m. K8UR array and beverages for receiving.

See you in the next one!

73 de Olaf LB8IB@LA8W