CQ WW RTTY 2012 "Grani Style"

Introduction

Over the last decade, we have been taking part in various radio amateur contests from our radio club. HF and V/U/SHF contests. CW, SSB, FM and RTTY modes. Single operator, multi-2 and multi-multi. All goes, 59(9) you know. Operators have been Hessu OH2LNH, Juhani OH5YU, Petri OH2KHX, Niko OH2LZC, Rauno OH2GFY, Niko OH2GEK, Weltto OH7JEV, Hessu OH7LZB, Saku OH2PU/OH6PU, Petri OH2KNU, Mikko OH2FLO, Jouni OH2BZP, Erik OH2LAK, me (Simo OH2LRE) and many others. Originally, we used OH2NRG call, and later the more handy OH2K. All in all, we have made tens of thousands of QSOs and have had lots of fun J Contests have been another nice part of the hobby, forming up a short concentrated period of activity and stretching the limits in every sense.

CQ WW RTTY 2012

Between 29-30. September 2012, was the biggest annual RTTY contest and I thought to give it a try. CQ WW RTTY 2012. The intention was only to have a few QSOs and enjoy the nice conditions we have had on the bands the previous weeks. But, as always, when the log starts to fill up and the engaging QSO-flow builds up, it is hard to stop and you just have to continue.

Saturday 29. September 2012

I started working on 10m on Saturday afternoon. The band was open to the Western Hemisphere. On 10m we have 4 el yagi in our tower. Later, I switched to 15m where we have 5 el yagi. 15m usually is the best band from our club, but not always. 15m was offering South America, Caribbean, US. Late Saturday evening I went to 20m (4 el yagi) and stayed there quite a period of time, 2000-2330 UTC. Some US stations, later strong west coast and Canada too. The band was open relatively late, past midnight, and I decided to stay at the club over the whole night. Usually, the band closes around midnight here and it is more convenient to go sleep and rest for the next day.

Over the night, I was periodically monitoring upper bands 15m and 10m for possible openings. First there were only EU and South American stations, and then, around 2330 UTC (02.30 local time) 15m Surprised. Good signals from west coast US, Canada and Alaska straight over the North Pole. No aurora or nothing to kill the band. The Alaskan stations were really strong like Polar Bears, S9, and I worked the following stations: AL7L, AL1G, NL7G, AL9A. 

Sunday 30. September 2012

All openings last some limited time and then it is time to move on, like chasing cheese in the maze (story by Sniff, Scurry, Hem and Haw). 15m signals weakened around 00 UTC on Sunday and it was time to move to 40m. There we have 2 el yagi. 40m from our club is another favorite of mine, it performs really well. This time I got US, Canada, South America and some nice Caribbean calls with rum & Habanan cigar flavour in the log. One DX to mention was a big contest station in Kolombia HK1T, have a look on their qrz.com page and Big Antennas. This station was one of the loudest on 40m, 59+20...30dB.

Around 03 UTC 20m showed some nice signals again and I moved there. Turning beam again towards US, more to the west coast and the band was full of nice, strong fluttery signals. K7, VE7 etc. Log continued to fill up nicely.

Later that morning was time to move finally to 15m, 06-08 UTC and even 10m 08 UTC onwards. Quite early, around 0530 UTC, I was monitoring Conway Reef, 3D2C, from Pacific on 10m CW. Signal was building up and it meant that 10m would perform really well that day. So, it was time to fill the log with Japanese calls. JAs were really strong S9 + 20dB and more. It had been several years since I worked JAs on 10m. Great! The Band is open again!

Claimed Score

Sunday afternoon and evening offered more QSOs on 10m, 15m and some more on 20m. All in all, the contest yielded following result (claimed score):

If you want to have a look on the log, you can find a limited version here.

What’s next then? 13-14 October 2012, we will be QRV from the club in the SAC SSB test. And perhops someone will take part in the CQ WW CW & SSB this year, ARRL DX contests next year and some more contests the next decades to come J More contests can be found on the fabulous SM3CER contest calendar. Thanks for the QSOs to everyone! Hope to catch you again on the bands in contests or while rag chewing! J