I wish I would have had more time to participate in the 3 QPs this weekend. Both the MNQP and the BCQP seemed like they had quite a few in-state/province operators active during the contest period. The VTQP, on the other hand, appeared to be lacking in VT operators. In all cases, I'm happy to have made the QSOs that I did and hope to be able to increase my time on the air next time.

It's great to be back in the saddle for 2023, after "retiring" from the NAQCC Sprints and Letter Challenges. I wanted to hold off in participating in the QSO Party Challenge until I could start in a brand new year and compare myself to everyone else. I'm already way behind - hi! Vermont was tough since the few stations are spread out over a 48-hour period. Minnesota and British Columbia much better. I'm more of a "daytime high band" operator and so from here in Kentucky the Carolinas are going to be tough later this month. Will have to stay up past my bedtime and grab them on 40 and 80 - hi!

This was my first time participating in a state/province QSO party, so doing three concurrently was challenging. I created three separate logs in N1MM+ and then continually switched between them as I found new stations to work. The combination of expected propagation based on the band and the different exchanges usually allowed me to have the correct log pulled up in short order. I was surprised by how many of the BC stations I was able to work. The west coast is usually a bit difficult for me with my modest wire antenna. I'm looking forward to working many more of this year's QSO parties, maybe even all of them.

Here is a video on State QSO Party Challenge that I did last week- https://youtu.be/XDGvcsXaFDU and here is the slideshow- http://tiny.cc/stqspc. Please feel free to share with NAQCCers.

RIG Mountain Topper MTR3B on 8AA batteries (10.0V) @ 2W to EFHW INV L up 35ft

My main goal for this first SQP Challenge weekend was to get 2 QSOs for each of the 3 SQPs to make sure I gain the multiplier of 3 . Though it's the closest state/province for me, I knew that the VTQP would be the toughest, since each year so few VT stations are active. I wanted to pad my total with the MNQP contacts only to discover that the http://stateqsoparty.com/ site had erroneously indicated that the MNQP also went into Sunday. So I got 20 Qs for the weekend, but wouldn't call that much "padding."

This is my first time participating in the QSO party challenge. I had contacted the "official" state QSO party challenge about a QRP category, but they were not interested. Glad to see that NAQCC has stepped up to fill that void. I was unaware of this until late last season when my friend KR4AE told me about it...I guess I just haven't been paying attention! I wasn't sure Alan was going to participate this year, but judging by his first week's performance, I think he may be! I was mostly just hoping for the three QSO party multipliers this week. I am semi-planning on combining the QSO party challenge with POTA activities, but operated the first three from home. I was using a K3/10 at 5W to a 100' doublet. My portable rig will be similar, a KX3 at 5W, usually to a doublet or EFHW.

North and South Carolina are close enough to me to go out and do some portable operating - I've been doing some POTA lately and decided to combine POTA with the two state QSO parties this past weekend. I operated from 5 counties representing 5 POTA entities in South Carolina and Sunday I activated 4 counties representing 2 POTA entities. I spent a lot of Sunday riding around aimlessly due to the misting WX and my lack of a plan. I'll do better next time!

I wanted a bit more of a challenge, NC being my home state, so I decided to run rockbound QRPp. I used my Tuna Tin 2 with a 7038 kHz xtal, and my 20m Rockmite (attached pics). Powered by a Bioenno LiFePO4 battery, each rig puts out about 0.3W to one of my regular antennas, a 44 ft doublet at 35 ft. Although I heard lots of 20m signals, and my CQs were spotted, I wasn't able to make any contacts on 20m. However, using the TT2, I had three contacts during the SCQP, and five--count 'em!--during NCQP. The NC contacts included an old friend, Howie N4AF, and one of the Special Event Stations, N4W, operated by event organizer Marc W4MPS from the Wright Brothers National Monument in Kitty Hawk.

My wife and I are down in Florida for a month. For the first three weeks we are staying at a Hilton resort in Orlando, where I worked the South and North Carolina QSO parties this weekend. I am fortunate to be on the top floor where I put up my QRP Guys tri-band vertical antenna. Pictures of the antenna installation and my operating space is included. My QRP rigs are the QCX-Mini for 40 and 20 Meters. This is my first venture into QSO parties. I use the N3FJP log which makes it very easy to work other operators. Looking forward to the other QSO parties coming up.

One of my strategies in the SQP Challenge is to take special note of the SQPs that are in the Top Ten with regard to activity. (See page 4 http://stateqsoparty.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/2022CHALLENGEFINALRESULTS.pdf.) The North Carolina QP figures in the top ten, so I intended to put a bit more time in the NCQP to "pad" my total. Sunday didn't quite work out that way. Besides some prior commitments, other friends happened to stop by. Well, I keep reminding myself this is just a hobby ;-)

SCQP] Total score includes 1000 bonus points ... Fun! Thanks for good ears/antennas copying my 5-watt QRP CW sig from New Jersey! Lots of good activity ... thanks for a great QSO Party! [NCQP] Thanks for good ears/antennas copying my 5-watt QRP CW sig from New Jersey! Lots of fun to make lots of QSOs in my home state of North Carolina! Especially W4NC ... my Dad's first cousin Al Hege W4ABT (SK) was one of the founders, and I think he was the first president. All my activity was limited to 80-20 ... no propagation on higher bands (too close), no antenna for 160. Where was N4T hiding??? [Addendum] Many thanks to NAQCC for putting this together ... it's inspired me to put more into QSO parties, and it's been fun! I missed a couple of opportunities (especially for mults) the first weekend this year, because I discovered this friendly competition just *after* those QPs closed. I'll have to try to make up for it!

SCQP signals heard on Saturday were strong but not a lot of them at my QTH. I was able to work six Stations. On Sunday, working portable from the K-7638 POTA Site, 20 meters was jammed full of NCQP Ops, most of them so strong I had to turn the RF gain way down. I could have made a killing but, after 4 QSOs, I had a much more important function. I invited a brand-new Ham, Ron KD9WKK, General Class License, to join me. He showed up loaded with enthusiasm and questions, but has not been on the air. He doesn't know CW yet, so I demonstrated the process by making another 4 contacts. Ron observed the patience required to get through a pile-up at only 5 Watts, with so many QRO Stations overpowering me. S&P is the challenge for the State QSO Parties. This is a lot of fun!

SCQP - I didn't have a lot of time to operate...maybe 45 minutes total. It was cool to work K5CM at a tri-county location...like getting three for the price of one. NCQP - The NCQP was very enjoyable. I was able to be in the shack at various times throughout the QP. There was always someone to work. It was neat getting K3TD and N4CW in the log a number of times as they changed counties. I am very happy they were able to hear my 4.8W with their mobile stations.

Rig Mountain Topper MTR3B on 8AA batteries (10.0V) @ 2W to EFHW inv L up 35 ft (all 20m) OkQP (Sat): condx seemed good, lots of big pileups, mostly very strong signals (S7-9), managed to catch 3 OMs amongst the flurries; lots of people working other ‘tests (SKCC WES, RSGB Commonwealth BERU, others?) plus POTA OkQP (Sun): condx not bad early, added one contact; later conditions deteriorated—heard a few strong signals (S5-7) but couldn’t catch one; also lots of people working POTA and other ‘tests WiQP (Sun): a few strong WI sigs (S5-7) plus lots of others; initially only one WIQP contact, but during the last hour, I tried again and got two more; same challenges as OK: only hearing strong signals and unable to break through big pileups IdQP (Sun): heard one ID OM but wasn’t able to catch him (only one heard all weekend: effects of minimal antenna?)

I had several things going on this weekend, so I wasn't able to put much time in - I just wanted to make sure I worked at least a couple in each state! I'm trying to figure out now how much time I can put in for the VA QSO party this weekend.

What I especially enjoyed this weekend was seeing so much activity on 15m and 10m. My four ID QSOs were on those two bands. I couldn't put in as much time as I'd hoped, but still was able to "pad" my total a bit with OkQP contacts.

The OK, ID, and WI QSO parties were very different from each other. There were a lot of OK stations on the air, but they all seemed to generate large pileups, which made it difficult for QRP stations to break through. I didn't find many stations in ID, but those that I did find were pretty easy to work. Contestants didn't seem to be taking it so seriously. For me the WI party was the most fun. There were a lot of WI stations on the air, and they could all hear my 2.5 W signal on 40m and 5 W signal on 20m. My Kenwood TS-440 stopped working below 10 MHz on Sunday morning, so I used my Elecraft KX1 on 40m for the rest of the day.

Busy travelling this weekend, but managed to set up on the beach at Tybee Island, GA with the MTR-4B to grab a few OK and ID stations. Propped a 12m Spiderpole against a warning sign for a no-tree, no-guyline Inverted-V. Next time I'm going to the beach I need to build and test a vertical in advance to take advantage of that saltwater ground plane.

In addition to the State QSO Party friendly competition, I was interested in adding some confirms for QRP CW 5BWAS ... got ID done with 15m and 10m QSOs, got 10m for OK (still need 80m), and didn't hear any 10m activity for WI; perhaps a little too close to my NJ QTH for my vertical to hit that day ... will just have to wait for better propagation. BTW, it sure is fun to get those mobile stations on multi-county borders! Thanks NAQCC for the additional incentive to get into the State QSO Parties! I had fun in the following NAQCC Sprint as well, and also recently completed the March monthly challenge. Good stuff!

I tried the same setup I had used for NC and SC: Tuna Tin 2 @ 0.3W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft, and my 20m RockMite @ 0.3W to either the doublet or 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft. Saturday, 40m was in fair condition, but I heard only strong signals. I decided my only chance lay in waiting for OMs to work through the piles, and answering when they began calling repeatedly without reply. This strategy netted three contacts before nightfall. As expected, my 20m RM signal was skipping VA: CQs were spotted in New England and the Midwest, no closer. Sunset opened 40m to weak signals, but I couldn't add any contacts. How about 80m? I don't have an 80m rock, so I broke out my AT Sprint II (4W to the Zepp). WOW! Lots of very strong signals (S9+) and minimal pileups! I added four contacts in the last hour of the Saturday session, but using a DDS VFO and 4W seemed like cheating. Sunday morning I went back to the TT2 and RM. Initially, 40m was fair, and I added one contact, but it closed quickly. 20m remained long. Later, 40m re-opened and I added one last contact. Final total was 5 with the TT2, and 4 with the ATS. Not bad for a weekend spent mostly listening and puttering around, with only a few strategically-timed calls. Did the RM ever work? Not to VA, but I did snag K9G doing POTA in IN. That's pretty short for 20m here, and only ~1,500 mpw. Not bad, but kinda low for the RM, which often gets >3K mpw (my highest is almost 12K mpw--NAQCC 1K MPW #0017 and #0018).

I was only able to operate in short duration shifts during the VAQP. It seemed like there was always someone new to work when I sat down at the radio. It was time well spent in a very active QSO party. Thanks to the VAQP participants for all the QSOs!

Enjoyed just having a single QSO party to keep up with! Less 20m activity than I expected, but 80m worked better than I thought it would with the 100' doublet.

My brand new Xiegu G90 arrived during the VA QP, replacing my Kenwood TS-440S, which has been showing its age and completely stopped working on 40 and 80. I was able to get the new rig set up and working for Sunday's session, and it worked very well.

For each SQP I usually set a goal in terms of the amount of time I want to spend on the air and the number of QSO's I'm aiming for. I spread out my 3 hour goal among Saturday morning, afternoon, evening, and Sunday afternoon, often nabbing different stations or the same stations on different bands. Was only 3 Q's shy of my goal of 50 contacts. The most fun though was catching on two bands Jeff W0ZR/4 who is a friend and neighbor to my son who lives in VA. Turns out that he blew away the competition in the SOAB/CWFixedHP class.

I decided it was going to be too cold up on a ridge in VA to work this one in-state, so stayed home. Got a few on 20m, but most were skipping over me. Biggest problem was running out of new calls to work. I should have kept up with mobile ops to know who I could work multiple times. Kept the radio on for much of Saturday, then a big push working most of them again on 80m in the evening, but not much left to work on Sunday.

I operated "garbage can portable" (see pic in April newsletter) while visiting family in CA. Unfortunately, I only had an hour and could only work one station, so I didn't qualify for the Challenge. But I did qualify for "the trashiest ham" award.

Propagation on Saturday was bad in SE Wisconsin. I heard only one Louisiana station and didn't qualify, and two Mississippi stations...that's it. At least Missouri kept me busy.

The past weekend’s QPs were truly Dickensian. Continuing with my milliwatting quest, I decided to increase flexibility by using a VFO: my Elecraft K1. The K1’s minimum power setting of 0.1W provides 250-300 mW RF output, same as my rockbound power in earlier QPs. Saturday brought electrical storms with strong winds; I disconnected and grounded the antennas and waited. Clearing brought unsettled but clear skies, and propagation seemed good, although QRN was high. 20m signals skipped right over most of MS, and QRN made 40m impossible; I only had one MS contact so I missed the multiplier. I’m not sure what happened to LA: I heard a few signals on 20m, but couldn’t connect with anyone. MO made up for it, all on 20m. I even had my usual pre-QP omen: a nice chat with Fred N9BSO right before the storms set in. As with other QPs, there were lots of strong signals with accompanying pileups, but weak signals, too. The VFO allowed a version of search-and-pounce—search-and-wait to call OMs after they’d cleared pileups but before they moved on—along a new strategy of wandering around listening for signals near the limit of S/N. Both were surprisingly productive. Sunday’s session brought beautiful weather, lower QRN, and many more signals, but fewer contacts, and of course, LA and MS were done. An added game came with the many Special Event stations: a letter challenge, akin to NAQCC challenges, where you use 1x1 calls to spell out SHOW ME and MISSOURI. Yes, “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.” Which will the rest of the month’s QPs bring? rig: Elecraft K1 at minimum power setting (0.1W), 250-300 mW RF output to 44 ft doublet up 35ft Until NM and GA!

It's hardly worth reporting on my past weekend's activity; I got my 3 multipliers plus a few extra points in the MoQP. Looking ahead to the rest of April's SQPs reveals some good opportunities. GaQP and FlQP are in the Top Ten most active SQPs, FLQP rating #2. Time to rack up the points! But the GaQP falls on Easter weekend, and for me, my birthday :-) So between family gatherings and Easter-related events, that doesn't leave me much time for radio :-( But the following weekend the MiQP is pretty active, and my own province hosts the OnQP, so I'll be the "hunted" for a change. Look for me, I'll do some "running," and hopefully the higher frequencies will be open. Based on previous experience it's going to be tough to find stations in the SDQP and NeQP. Keep in mind that for the NAQCC SQP Challenge both QSOs have to be QRP AND CW to gain the multiplier. My goal this year is to work all 47 SQPs, so I've got my work cut out for me with those two SQPs.

Stations in Louisiana and Mississippi were pretty sparse, probably because of the dangerous weather issues. I did work a couple mobile stations. I hope those folks are all safe. I worked many more stations in Missouri. It seemed that almost everybody had a 1x1 callsign. As always, thank you to the event sponsors who put in so much effort to make these QSO parties successful.

I was only planning on making a handful of contacts in each QSO party this weekend to keep the mults up, but I did get a few more in for the MO contest with the 1x1s. I think I've spelled both "Missouri" and "Show Me". Looking forward to going mobile in the Georgia QSO Party this weekend, but the WX does not look so good, so I'm thinking about alternative plans.

LAQP - I didn't hear a lot of LA stations. Worked N0AC 4 times as he changed parishes. MSQP - I picked up a few QSOs as I tuned through the bands during breaks from doing chores around the homestead. MOQP - Had fun chasing K5CM as he changed counties. The 1X1 stations were plentiful and busy...had trouble getting through some of the pile-ups. It seemed like there was a new station to work whenever I sat down in front of the radio. The spotting page was quite useful. Very enjoyable!

For the past year, I had a vague notion to get a 1x1 call sign for operating in the 2023 Missouri State QSO Party and to venture out expedition-style to a park in a rarely worked Missouri county. Well, I got the 1x1 call sign, but just couldn’t seem to manage the rest of the plan. No worries, I operated as W0C from my home in St. Louis County, running 5 watts from my Yaesu FTDX10 transceiver into my usual “multi-band” random wire antenna. I really enjoyed myself, racking up 99 QSOs including very faint DX contacts in The Slovak Republic and Germany. A few folks in our local St. Louis QRP Society club did make it outdoors for the event, and it was fun to work some of them during the weekend. Time now to plan for 2024.

Another good weekend, particularly from MO! I'm learning that QSO parties, at least this year, are not a good source for 10m QSO credit for 5BWAS ... looking on 3830scores.com score breakdowns, it seems that 10m just doesn't have critical mass; who wants to hang out calling CQ with no response? Maybe this will change as the sunspot cycle gains intensity. Good weekend for at least one new band for each state, though ... added 80m for MO and MS, and 15m for LA and MS (MS was W1AW/5, the day after the MSQP). I'll be missing a couple of upcoming weekends (Easter and 6/3), so I am happy with a total of 84 Qs for this weekend, to help make up for a deficit in multipliers. Thanks again for the friendly motivation!

Saturday dawned hopeful for milliwatting to NM with a pre-QP contact with a friend in ME on 20m at 500mw, and later with another friend in CO on 20m at 1W. But nary a peep was heard from the Land of Enchantment, despite near-continual listening through the day. I’m sure they were there--in amongst all the other activity: 20m was hoppin'!--I just couldn’t hear them. More came forth from GA, next door to my NC home. Initially, conditions on 40m were marred by high QRN; inauspicious for milliwatting. Only the strongest signals came through here, and none of them responded to me, even when I increased power up to the K1’s max (5W). Later, when 80m opened, I managed two contacts--including NAQCC member and GAQP organizer John K4BAI--but I had to crank up the ATS to max (4W) for them to hear me. Sunday QRN was lower. Being Easter I didn’t expect to hear many OMs, and at first, I didn’t. But during the late afternoon, 40m came alive and I had five quick contacts, all but one at 1W, with minimal repeats. My good fortune lasted less than an hour until the number and strength of signals, and the size of pileups, increased to overwhelming. I packed it in feeling my effort had paid off, having managed 4 QRPp QSOs of 7 total. Less than half “high power” padding :) The milliwatting quest continues next weekend with QPs in three places where I have had a number of QRPp QSOs over the years (MI, ON, and QC), one place with only two (NE), and one that’s rare as hen’s teeth (ND). Gonna be busy! My challenge is to focus on ND to get my first ever QRPp QSO there, and to pick up enough along the way to wind up with another good handful of QSOs and at least one more multiplier. 20 and 40m: Elecraft K1 @ 0.5-5W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft 80m: AT Sprint II @ 1-4W to 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft

WOW!!! and congratulations to some big-number home-court GA QSO Party NAQCC participants: AA4GA with 646(!!!) Qs, KR4AE with 496(!!), and KI4MZC with 223(!) (sorry about the dupe, Don, I had you in N1MM+ as KI4MQC for a moment, but still fun to exchange 72's!) ... it will be a big challenge to come anywhere remotely close to those numbers when the NJ QSO Party rolls around! ... last year I won first place QRP NJ with ""just"" 70. I expected to be in NC for Easter this weekend, but a bad weather forecast said ""stay home"" in NJ. Grateful to get on the air for the non-Easter part of the weekend. ""Made friends"" with mobile stations KU5B (10 of my 13 Qs in NMQP), AD4EB (19 Qs, hot mobile setup on qrz.com page!!) and N4N (16 Qs) in GA ... between long distance and pileups, these mobile stations get my vote for extra good ears! Thanks for the inspiration!

KX3 to a dipole, 5W. Thanks for participating and tolerating my mistakes, especially initially with some recalcitrant keyboards. DX stations were great, and the QRP peeps (and you know who you are!) were awesome. I got WHIT (White county) on 4 bands, including probably every cw op in the county! 72/73 everybuddy! By the way, White County ops got 3 of the top 4 CW QRP scores, as the claims stand now (that's KR4AE, WC4X, and me). I'm sure you've heard of White County, Georgia, haven't you? As you may know, it is a hotbed of QRP CW-ers. I had a good time for the limited time I was available with family visiting, church, etc., on Easter weekend.

NMQP - Didn't hear many but was able to make 5 QSOs. There was one station I could hear fairly well but he couldn't hear me. GAQP - Quite a bit of activity. Was able to work some fellow QRPers - KR4AE, KI4MZC, and K4PQC. Fun chasing AD4EB and N4N as they changed counties - a couple times I was able to get them early but after the pile-up grew, I had to wait patiently to make the QSO!

Since I'm in Georgia, I was hoping GQP would be a big weekend for me, and while it was, it was less than I was shooting for. My plan was to activate 5 or 6 counties each day from a POTA park, killing two birds with one stone. In the 10-day WX forecast, the meteorologists called for rain all day on Saturday, and they were correct! Since I operate portable, not mobile, using a 40' telescoping mast, I didn't want to keep raising and lowering the mast in the rain, so I decided to operate from my yard on Saturday, all in MADI county, and go out portable on Sunday to activate more counties. So the WX was Murphy visit #1. About an hour into the contest, I realized everyone was extremely weak on my K3/10, so I pulled my KX3 out of the portable pack and hooked it up...and S-9+ signals immediately. Murphy visit #2. I still need to troubleshoot that one. I ended Saturday with 417 QSOs. Probably a bit better than I thought I'd have without changing counties. Probably because I was using a better antenna from my house - a 100' doublet. The doublet works better than the EFHW I normally carry in the field, but it takes so much longer to set up and take down, I don't like to use it run & gun. I may have to re-evaluate that. In the NC & SC QSO parties, I generally worked 50 to 80 QSOs per county, and this is what I was hoping for in GQP. Unfortunately, on Sunday, I was only able to eke out 229 QSOs from 6 counties, for an average of 38. I think part of it was due to the activity being lower on Easter Sunday. I was also noticing that my RBN reports were fewer and worse than I'd noticed recently using that antenna. Condx seemed OK though, as I was working a number of DX stations, as well as contacts from coast to coast in North America. OM2VL and DL3DXX both have super signals...I even worked OM2VL on 80m with 5W and the doublet - not even a half-wave on 80m! With about 45 minutes to go, while running at a decent rate, my telescoping antenna mast collapsed - apparently, I didn't tighten it enough, and with the constant 15 kt. winds we had all day, it gave up. When it collapsed, it broke my trailer hitch mount and the EFHW's loading coil...and left the antenna in a tangled mess. So that ended the contest for me. Murphy visit #3. At least I made it home about 45 minutes earlier than I was expecting! While I didn't do as well as I hoped, I did OK, with 646 total QSOs instead of the 800 or so I was wanting. Either way, it was still a lot of fun, particularly working some of the folks from here in the NAQCC, and working the same folks from different counties. I was able to work exactly two stations (well the same one in two counties) for the New Mexico QP for the mult, and glad I did! This weekend with 5 QSO parties will be completely different - I'm going to try to get at least two contacts each for the mults...it's important not to miss any QPs if you can!

This was the first weekend of the year that I had to be away for awhile. Luckily, was able to grab a couple New Mexico QSOs before I had to leave, then found some Georgia stations Sunday afternoon. Hope to do better next time.

I knew I'd have little operating time this weekend, and I got my two multipliers, so was satisfied. I really love the Pace feature that Brent WT4U devised for our score sheet. As you know, it projects your score at the end of the SQP Challenge season IF you continue at the same rate you're presently going. In my now 3rd season in the SQP Challenge I figured that I'd do well to aim for the 25,000 point--Platinum--level. After all, we're QRP and CW only for this Challenge. Well, some of you are absolutely blowing me away. Three of you are on pace for 100,000 points--Diamond--level. And a good half dozen more of you have a chance of reaching that level should you put in some big scores. Absolutely outstanding! Go for it!

Good Evening. I thoroughly enjoyed the contests this weekend. Not only was I involved in the SQP but was active in the SKCC WES this weekend as well. Looking to grab as many Senator stations to get to Sx4 as I could. I only heard and worked one (1) New Mexico station. I was kind of surprised at that. But the Georgia boys where keeping me busy. I worked about 40 GA stations on Saturday. I was hoping for the same on Sunday but heard most of the stations I work on Saturday, only working tens stations. I see the 1x1 call signs are becoming more popular. My rig for these contests where my Yaesu FT-450D dialed down to 5W feeding a dipole up about 25 Feet. I know this weekend will be busy with five (5) SQP’s. Unfortunately I will miss them as I will be on a backpack/hiking trip this weekend from Friday to Sunday in Harriman State Park in NY. Maybe I can get home in time to work the tail end of some of the SQP’s.

NM was the most difficult QSO party for me so far. After making one QSO with KU5B, I wondered most of the day whether I'd be able to make a second QSO. I heard others working into NM, but I was unable to hear, much less work, them. Late in the afternoon I was finally able to make two more QSOs and keep alive my goal of successfully participating in all 47. The GA party was much easier to hear participants and a lot more fun to work. I worked AA7GA multiple times as he moved around the state. I also worked KR4AE, another NAQCC member. I'm a bit worried about this weekend with five QSO parties (and five different logs) to juggle. It could be quite a challenge.

The Ga. QSO Party was a lot of fun and it gives us a taste of being a rare dx station calling cq! It always has lot's of participation ,but it seemed to be down this year because of it's conflict with Easter. I thought it was down considerably on Sunday which is certainly understandable! I had 375 contacts on Saturday but had to really fight to end up where I did on Sunday along with doing other things.

Good activity for the GAQP. There were huge pile-ups on AD4EB and it was great fun breaking them a few times with 5 watts!

I knew this weekend would be tough with five parties, and several of them small. I only got two CW contacts in three of the five parties this week. In VE2, I got one phone and one CW, which qualified me for the mult in the "Big Challenge," but not NAQCC. And for ND, I only heard one station at all. I heard them on SSB on 40 Saturday late, but didn't drag out my mic. Sunday afternoon I heard them again on SSB on 20 and worked them....and that was it: a single ND QSO. A lot of MM contest activity didn't help either. So, I'm now down one mult in the "Big Challenge," and two mults in the NAQCC challenge. KR4AE is catching up fast!!

Nothing heard from ND or QC, my first goose eggs of the season. Bands did not seem particularly good to me.

This weekend was (mini)feast or (mega)famine for milliwatting. Daytime propagation conditions for 20, 40, and 80m were poor; at first, only a few strong signals on 20m were heard. I did have an auspicious pre-QP QSO @ 0.5W with K4A, a special event station for the IARU World Amateur Radio Day celebration (April 11-25, 2023). Otherwise all my contacts were at 1W, although I kept going back to lower power all weekend. As things began, I had a hopeful early NEQP contact (20m), but it would turn out to be my only one from the Cornhusker State. Later, as the gray line approached, bands came alive, and although QRN was high, I had a flurry (4) of MIQP and one ONQP contacts, all on 20m. Nothing doing on 80m. At the end of the day I added a second ON OM on 40m. During the wee hours Sunday I thought I might get propagation favorable to hear (and work!) NDQP OMs, but no joy. QRN was still high and I only heard a few signals, mostly OMs working the CQMM DX ‘test. Later in the day I heard almost exclusively strong CQMM DX signals, with a few strong NEQP and QCQP OMs. I couldn’t catch any of them. Eventually, I got frustrated with all the strong signals and their pileups and retreated to the upper end of 20m to work a few POTA activators before calling it a day. Not bad. Although I did not get my first ND QRPp QSO as I had hoped, I did wind up with a handful of contacts and two multipliers, so the second part of my goal was fulfilled. Next weekend should be a little less busy, with only FLQP to distract me. 20 and 40m: Elecraft K1 @ 0.3-1W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft 80m: AT Sprint II @ 1W to 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft

I had high ambitions for this weekend, but I have to say that my scores were rather disappointing. I operated the same number of hours as last year, but ended up with half the QSOs. And I'm still trying to figure out why. Were band condx worse? Was it because the CQMM CW contest was going on at the same time, which made it almost impossible for a QRP station to "run" on the higher bands? Were fewer MI-based stations on the air? Though I checked the bands many times during the day and evening, I never heard a ND station (on CW) and got only one QC contact. Judging from scores submitted, it looks like others of you had tough going too. Hey, remind ourselves, this is just a hobby :-)

I nominate KR4AE for a special award for making 2 QSOs with North Dakota! I did not hear a single one, and 3830scores reports a total of about 45 CW Qs in logs, which means maybe a little more than half of that happened ... so KR4AE netted almost 10% of all the CW Qs in the entire NDQP!!

NAQCC has lots of operating events but this is easily my favorite by far.

I had fun in the Florida QSO , but being next door (Ga.) it's pretty much too close for the higher bands. My qso's were limited to 40 and 20m. The skip seemed a little shorter than usual on 20m which enabled me to make a few more contacts than in previous years. I could hear lots of stations working them on 15m ,but could barely hear the Fla. stations , if at all. I was looking forward to making lots of contacts on 80m on Saturday nite, but the static crashes were awful here. I checked the band several times and never heard a signal. Looks like a big weekend coming up-whew!! All the best to everyone and have fun!

I made 150 Florida Qs, most on 20m (85), many on 15m (49), and a few on 40m (16), from here in New Jersey ... 10m was not working for me; I heard the non-FL end of a few 10m Qs, but could not hear FL itself on 10m; too bad, because 10m is all I need for 5-band FL; maybe next time! Happy to have worked 52(!) counties ... counties seemed very well represented in this QSO party. My vote for "good ears" award was AD4EB, mobile station with pileups most of the time; sometimes he heard me when I could hardly hear him! ... I happened to be on his frequency when the contest ended, I sent "tu gud ears," and he responded with a "tnx" and reported over 3400 Qs over the course of his travels. I also managed to spell "CITRUS"!

The FQP was a very enjoyable QSO Party. Propagation wasn't the greatest but whenever I had a chance to sit in front of the radio there was someone new to work, either a fixed station or a mobile. The 1x1 callsigns kept things interesting. The mobiles did a great a job with the pile-ups...it was a little difficult being heard in those pile-ups but patience and persistence eventually paid off. Great job by all the Florida stations...you folks put on a funtastic party!

76 QSOs easily beat my previous record of 50 in the North Carolina QSO party.

15M was the hot band on Sunday for me. I had limited time and had worked about 30 stations Saturday, mostly on 20M as 15 seemed dead. Sunday I was going to just turn in my score as I had little time to operate, but I checked 15M and it was full of signals, most pretty easy to work quickly with 5W.

It looks like the FQP was good for NAQCC members, despite marginal propagation, and storms throughout the SE US all weekend. At last check, a dozen NAQCC OMs had submitted their results to 3830—Kudos to all! Here things went pretty well; all my activity was on 20m. 40m was dead during the day and impaired by high QRN at night, and I never heard anything on 15m. 20m was very active with strong signals and the usual pileups—no weak signals heard. Although my CQs were spotted on RBN at 0.3-0.5W, no one else heard me until I cranked it up to 1W. I made two contacts on Saturday, answering strong signals after OMs had cleared pileups, but before they moved on. Sunday, QRN was still high—still stormy—But I added three more Qs, including a county-line two-fer, before the storms got here and I shut it down. All in all not bad for 1W. Next weekend my milliwatting quest continues with four QPs: the 7th Call Area, New England, DE, and IN, all places I have had numerous QRPp QSOs in the past, so I'm hoping to add another handful of QSOs and a couple more multipliers. Until then! 72, Kevin KI4DEF rig: Elecraft K1 @ 0.3-1W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft

It was fun to be traveling from Wisconsin to Florida for some fun in the sun coinciding with the FQP. I set-up in nearby Lake Griffin State Park for a POTA / Florida QSO Party activation and earned the "Expedition" status while doing so. The bands were not so good and thanks to POTA I made a dozen or so contacts in the 90 minutes I allotted myself. But had a lot of fun thanks to the great hospitality of Chris, NX4N and Chris, W4WF who run the program.

Many, many fruitless transmissions of "AC2YD" were accomplished this weekend from my QTH in New Jersey!! Persistence or insanity??
My Saturdays are often full of non-ham commitments, and this was no exception: teaching music classes mid-day, and playing a jazz gig in the evening. Timing was just awful for Indiana; I managed only 9 Indiana Qs between my commitments (and, to be honest, I was more interested in the more distant W7 states than in IN), and the INQP wrapped up while we were playing our last tune for the evening at 11pm. But there was still time in the W7QP. My strategy was to come home after the gig, and nail a bunch of W7 states on 80m (for 5BWAS credits) until 3am, when the W7QP ended ... they were out there, AZ, MT, NV, UT, WY(?), all the ones I need, but they couldn't hear me at all! I tried and I tried! Not even a "?" came my way. 80m seemed noisy, maybe it's the time of year. Or maybe propagation wasn't all that good. My antennas are fan 1/4-wave verticals (using common set of buried radials), but my shortened 80m antenna (partly helical wound) is not as efficient as my 40m antenna (full 1/4 wave straight wire), which could be a factor in results, too ... Whatever! ... In the meantime, I *did* get the New England states I needed on 80m (RI, ME) during that after-midnight session, and I worked a good number of W7 stations on *40m* (ID, MT, AZ, NV, UT, WA), which is always fun ... Total of 22 W7 Qs, 12 on 40m, 5 on 20m, 6 on 15m.
On Sunday, NE and DE were the remaining goals. Nobody was using 40m or 80m during the day, and NE and DE are too close to me for 20/15/10 (although I did work one station way up in northernmost Maine on 20m), so I had an opportunity to sleep in. 40m started drawing some attention around 2pm, and got more active with NE over time. 80m finally woke up around 7pm. Where was DE?? I heard a couple on 40m, but they couldn't hear me. DE is too close to me, in central New Jersey, for *any* band, at least for my verticals!!! ON 40m, I was in a call-and-response with one DE station for at least 3 dozen iterations of him calling closely spaced CQs, and me answering ... he never heard me, even with nobody else calling him! What do they say about doing the same thing over and over again without success? I finally gave up, but happily was able to raise him later in the contest, along with one other DE station; total of 3 Qs for DE, with the first station on both 40m and later 80m.
Big bulk of this weekend's Qs were with New England. Total 115, with 1 on 20m, 92 on 40m, and 22 on 80m. Similar to Florida, great representation of counties across New England: I worked 50 of the 67 (my count) out there! I would have enjoyed picking up some 5BWAS credits for working NE on 15m and 10m, but I could barely hear a few on 20m, maybe one on 15m, and none on 10m. They couldn't hear me. Pretty cool results on 40/80, but it leaves me wondering if I'll ever be able to work any of these close-by states on 15m or 10m! I'll have to try an NVIS antenna some year.
Thanks again, NAQCC, for inspiration for working the QSO parties!

I was hoping to put in a bigger effort this weekend, but at the last minute, I was called on to help do some tower work. Since I'm relying on these people to help me with some future tower work, I felt I needed to join in! So I was able to work a couple of hours on Saturday, but not the full day I had planned on. I was very surprised to work only two DE stations - but two is all I needed for the mult, so I'm happy! NEQP was active as always, and I think I'd have had a much bigger 7QP total had I had more time on Saturday to operate. I was a little surprised at the lack of IN activity too, but the bottom line is I picked up all four available multipliers, so I'm happy about that. Congrats to KR4AE for a strong showing - I predict he'll pass me before too many more QP weekends. Hope all had fun!

Delaware goes into my "FAIL" bucket along with North Dakota and Quebec. It's not particularly convenient for me to operate at night, so it's possible that I missed some stations on the lower bands after dark.

I was out of town Saturday for a family gathering, so I worked only the first two hours of 7QP. Propagation seemed pretty good despite so-so solar predictions. I’d had an auspicious pre-QP QRPp QSO w/ Jay WS0Y in ND (my first ever). During those two hours, I had three QSOs with OMs in MT, AZ, and WA (on 20m @ 1W). No joy on 40 (very few signals heard) and nothing heard on 15. Sunday, I thought I might catch someone from DE early on 40m. Propagation was about the same as Saturday. Things were mostly quiet, but I did have a good chat with Rick WA4IAR. Later, activity picked up: I heard a few signals on 40 (mostly NewEngQP, only a few DEQP), lots on 20m (all NewEngQP, mostly strong signals), and still nada on 15m (too long here). I tried off-and-on through the day and had two 20m QSOs w/ NH and MA OMs until thunderstorms shut it all down. During the last hour, after thunderstorms had cleared out, I took a final shot at catching someone from DE using my MTR3b, hoping a different antenna and more power might do the trick, but no joy. I did log two more NH QSOs, which I counted even though they're >1W (padding alert!). Not bad for a few hours’ minimal(ist) effort. Next weekend will be the Prairie Provinces, where I have two previous QRPp QSOs (MB). My hopes are high for another successful outing: maybe I’ll move it to the lake as a POTA activation!
20 and 40m: Elecraft K1 @ 0.3-1W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft
40m: Mountain Topper MTR3b on 8AA batteries (10.0V) @ 2W to EFHW inv L up 35 ft
15m: NorCal Sierra @ 0.7W to 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft

I used my Ten-Tec Argonaut 509 with a Cushcraft A3S triband yagi and a B&W BWD-90 folded dipole for 40m. The 509, bought new in May 1977 a month after I received my Novice license WB3GYL, produces 4 watts output on 20m and 2 watts output on 40m. Saturday, 10 and 15 meters were silent...so was 11 meters! So, I switched to 20 meters. I only managed to work one Indiana station (KR9U) so I didn't enter that contest. I did QSO IO9A at 0315Z in the ARI Contest (but I had to flick on my 50 watt Ten-Tec Model 405 amplifier to do so). It was the first Sicily station I had ever heard on CW since I was first licensed 46 years ago and I was not going to miss it. Other than one NEQP QSO on 40m with W1OO in Maine, I made 19 7QP QSOs (11 on 20m and 8 on 40m) in OR, WA, MT, ID, and AZ, including K7C and N7A. I did not hear any Utah, Nevada, Wyoming or Delaware stations. I also contacted a POTA station and a SOTA station (both in WA on 20m) but I didn't want to slow down their activations so I did not ask for their counties; thus I could not score them for 7QP. I worked KL7SB on 20m but later discovered KL7 does not count for out of state 7QP entries. However, it was nice to know my Argonaut's 4 watts made it over 2,000 miles north. Sunday, I managed one NEQP QSO with W1NG in Connecticut on 15m but that was it for a grand total of two NEQP QSOs.

Count me in as one who never heard a DE station this year. Activity was good for the NEQP and 7QP contests. For the NEQP which combines CW/digital, all Qs were CW (no digital).

I love the New England QSO party, near neighbours to my QTH here in eastern Ontario. Always so much activity on the bands. Since at my distance from NewEng 40m and 80m are the only bands I can use to contact them, I appreciate that many stations use 40m in the daytime. The DeQP is quite the opposite story. Maybe I shouldn't grumble here, but with so few DE stations on the air, isn't it time to withdraw as an SQP? And in this coming weekend, let's hope that the organizers of the Canadian Prairies QP have rallied the troops to get plenty of stations on the air.

Not much op time for this one, between teaching Saturday classes and going to family Mothers Day event ... squeezed in a quick afternoon session 2 Qs on 20m, then an hour or two in the evening for 4 Qs on 40m. Hard to hear VE6 in the evening ... finally managed to work VE6TL (my only VE6 Q) around 10:15pm EDT (local), then realized that it probably wasn't even dark out there by then!! I worked W1AW/7 in MT on 40m around 9:30pm EDT, 45 minutes earlier ... probably wasn't dark out there, either!

I was in it this week just for the mult...luckily I picked it up!

The Midwest Propagation Phenomena was at play for this QP. I only heard (and worked) three stations all day.

I was able to more than double my contacts from last yr. (5 , i think??) to 12 this year. For some reason, I don't hear many signals down here . I thought maybe I would hear more activity on 40m the last 3 hours of the contest, but heard very little. Lot's of QRN ,but that's the norm on the lower bands here this time of year.

My impression was that there were quite a few more participating stations from the prairie provinces this year than there were last year. Or maybe it's that my year-ago memory is more sluggish. I hope that the SQPs are being promoted on the prairies, as I wish they'd really be promoted in Quebec as well. This coming Saturday my grandson is getting married! I'll have to squeeze in a bit of ArQP time before the celebration begins ;-)

I like the 10 hour format of the CPQP. I can work the contest on Saturday and have all day Sunday to do other things without worrying about missing some QSOs. My strategy of looking up last year's CW stations and watching for them on DX Summit seemed to work pretty well. A few 40 meter QSOs during the last hour of the contest helped my score.

While operating the ARQP today, I took a look at the scores and soapbox from last weekend and realized I never sent you anything. I was out-of-town and didn't work any of the QP, so you didn't pick up a score for me from 3830. However, I had a great pre-QP 20m QSO w/ NAQCC member Tom VE4AKI in MB (Tom was one of my two previous Prairie Provinces QRPp QSOs). Unfortunately, this one was not QRPp; I had to increase power to 5W for him to hear me, and Tom was QRO. Hope everyone does well in AR!

I didn't have much time to work the ARQP, but I was happy with what I was able to do. K5CM made up the bulk of my QSOs thanks to his ability to operate concurrently from multiple counties.

Very limited op time for AR QP, between teaching Saturday jazz classes lasting from morning well into the afternoon, and a jazz concert starting in the early evening with some friends playing ... I worked a total of two AR stations on 20m in the afternoon ... the first, K5CM, was good for 4 QSOs, being on a 4-county corner; nice! ... wasn't able to work any more (they couldn't hear me), so I turned my attention to His Majesty King of Spain contest ... worked 10 Qs on 20m, and 2 on 15m, then left for the concert ... I had hoped to get home after the jazz concert to get an AR station on 80m before the QP shut down at 10pm ... it was very, very close ... I got back home, rushed to the rig to put on the cans, switched to 80m, heard a K5 calling CQ ARQP ... then pause ... then TU 73 dit-dit ... it was 10pm! After that, I was lulled back into the His Majesty King of Spain contest into the wee hours of the morning ... this was split mostly between 40m and 20m, which was very nicely open even after midnight local time ... worked two ZL stations on 20m that evening from here in NJ! Total 51 Qs in 30 countries; not bad for 5 watts and limited op time! Looking forward to CQ WPX, although I won't be able to operate much in this one, either ... may try run mode as an experiment; I'm usually S&P ... I agree with Don VE3DQN that CQ WPX is a fun contest ... not many "AC2" prefixes in the contest, so I feel like it's worth it (for a multiplier) at the other end when they take extra time to dig me out of the mud!

Conditions weren't the best but it was nice to be able to get some partiers in the log! Hats off to K5CM for 9 of my 25 Qs. Worked WR5P on 3 bands! Thanks for the Qs. 73,

Daytime propoagation condx good on 15, but poor on 20/40 (N0NBH solar predictions; moderate space wx w/ G2 geomag storms and R2 radio blackouts for past and next 24 hrs); nothing heard on 15m (too long; skipping AR); lots of signals on 20m crowded around 14040 but deep/long QSB; nothing on 40m; altho’ CQs spotted @ 0.5W, had to increase power to 1W to make any QSOs, and those took numerous replies to connect; snagged two in the first 2 hrs to secure the multiplier, later got K5CM for a 3-fer; mid-late afternoon tried again: a few sigs heard on 20, all weak (S3-4), and they couldn’t hear me (answered WR5P and K5CM repeatedly but no soap); strong sigs on 15m all SA and EU stns op EA test (His Majesty King of Spain Contest); 15/20m CQs spotted @ 0.5W, but no joy on either band (unless CX2AQ really heard me on 15m—which I doubt); as the sun went down 40m woke up with fair-good propagation (0.3W CQs spotted), but with strong signals and major pileups I never got through, even at 1W; enjoyed chasing K5CM as they drove around the state to other 3-fer points—for a few minutes they were at a 4-fer (JON/LOG/POP/YEL) but no joy (hopefully at least one NAQCC OM/YL got them there); tried to get bonus station WR5P many times, but their pileups never cleared (everyone wanted those bonus points; those guys stayed busy!); during the last 15 mins I tried a last-ditch effort to get WR5P with the MTR3b (different antenna and more power, as I had during DEQP), but still no joy; differences in 20/40m performance likely due to both propagation and antenna directionality (and who was where when); next weekend: KY, a neighboring state where I’ve had many previous QRPp QSOs: hope to snag another multiplier and another handful of QSOs. 20 and 40m: Elecraft K1 @ 0.3-1W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft 40m: Mountain Topper MTR3b on 8AA batteries (9.7V) @ 2W to EFHW inv L up 35 ft 15m: NorCal Sierra @ 0.7W to 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft

Little to report on the ArQP experience. Saturday was my grandson's wedding day. Lots of family in and out of the house. I got my 2 Qs within a few minutes at the opening of the ArQP. That's it. Got my multiplier. Hopefully I can spend a bit more time on the air in the two June SQPs. I'd like to pad my total QSOs a bit as I keep my aim on the Platinum level in the SQP Challenge.

Most of the day the action was bouncing over my head on the higher bands, but I managed 2 contacts on 20m, and 3 each on 40 & 80m. Score bolstered by working KM5G on all three bands and particularly by nabbing the 3-county W5YO club station on both 20 & 40m. Four watts from the MTR-4B into the 80m EFHW which had been gradually de-tuning in recent weeks. I took a break to go out and shorten it back into range and my finals are happier.

Hats off to Brent and Don for an awesome job!!!!! I had fun in the Ar. party and like others, was very thankful for, K5CM, who supplied many contacts/ counties. His mobile signal is always amazing and it was one of the best signals I heard throughout the contest! I had hoped for more action on 80m the last two hours of the contest because the band was pretty quiet here for this time of year! It's nice to have a weekend off so I plan to op a little in the big contest this weekend which is always fun! 72

KYQP: Thanks to all who operated the Kentucky QSO Party. I hope you found enough people to work, always a problem for small states. I have not done much "running" on CW but got over 200 QSOs with minimal difficulty. WVQP: I think N8II is the big gun in West Virginia and sure enough I worked him early on. Got K3JT, another big gun, and also found W8WVA. Three QSOs is more than I had for a lot of the smaller states!

WVQP: Patience, patience and more patience. Nothing heard all day. I didn't give up. Around 9:45 pm suddenly two WV stations showed up just 1kHz apart. I got my two. Shut 'er down. And whistled my way to the next room. Thanks for running the NAQCC QP program and writing up the soapbox. It's fun to see how everyone fares at this. --73--

For WVQP, again very abbreviated op time, with family event and jazz gig during this 12-hour QP, but it doesn't look as if I missed all that much, based on looking at other 3830scores entries ... 7 Qs total, 5 on 40 and 2 on 80, very first Q was W8WVA! See you all in August, and Happy Field Day to all!

Another week of trying to maintain multipliers - I'm looking forward to some more active QPs in the fall!

I got 8 Qs altogether, spending a good amount of time with 7045+/- sounding in the background while I did other chores close-by, and checking 80 and 20 from time to time. Got 1 Q on 80, 7 on 40, never heard anyone on 20m (except WAE, which I've worked in the past, but did not want to jump in this year, due to other distractions/chores) ... but I'm pretty close to MD, so I didn't expect a "big opening", especially with my vertical ... that's my last state for 20m WAS, so I was hoping for a miracle ... not this year. 72!!

I worked every station that I heard from MDC. Looking forward to the next one. 73,

I've been enjoying the weeks off, but am glad I remembered MD! Only got two contacts: one early on 40m, and after a storm delay I finally got a second one late on 80m. There was also a lot of activity in the WAE this weekend, which was a lot of fun. I'm a little concerned about the KH6 party in a couple weeks!

The MDC QSO Party happened to fall on my wife's birthday weekend, with an out-of-town son as a houseguest and an open-house drop-in birthday celebration. So you know what that means ;-) Yes, I managed to sneak in three quick "peeks" on the bands and each time snagged two MDC QSOs. Which makes 6, all on 40m. Surpassing my expectations. Yes, I'm concerned too about the KH6 party in a couple weeks. Hardly a "party" as KH6-land is in shock as we all are. Is there a Q-code for "Be Strong"?

Good Evening. I had family obligations on Saturday. I was only able to work the last two hours of the contest. There was not a lot of activity as I only worked Six (6) QSOs but got Four (4) of those valuable multiples before the thunderstorms rolled in. I'm looking forward to more State QSO parties, especially the NJ one in September, as I want to nudge up into the Silver category and possibly beyond. See you all on the air.

It's good to be back to working the QSO parties. I'm still hoping to successfully work all of them that remain. MDC worked out pretty well for me. 20m skip must have been too long for me. I heard others working MDC stations on 20m, but I couldn't hear them. All of my QSOs were on 40m. 72/73

Great activity this weekend, especially from OH and KS. KR4AE blasted by me with impressive showings in both. I took time to go to HRO for a new radio, and to the movies with Mrs. AA4GA, so I didn’t get to put in as much time on these active parties as I needed to.

The Kansas QSO Party was just amazing. Great participation. With the exception of KS0KS, everyone seemed to be using a special call. Best small-state QSO Party that I've seen so far.

In this phase of the final 40% of the SQPs for 2023 I've been doodling to find realistic goals for each weekend's parties with the objective of reaching my overall goal for the end of the season. I know, I know, I'm overthinking strategy. But for me it's part of the fun. It does mean, however, that I need to put in some operating time in the evening especially for Qs with nearby states (e.g. Ohio), and with family activities, etc, it's not always easy to carve out evening operating time. Fortunately I did reach my KS and OH goals plus a little padding. I hadn't counted on scoring HI, but I decided to pull myself out of bed at 0500 EDT and try 40m. Score! KH6LC superstation pulled my tiny signal out of the ether. AH6KO couldn't hear me on 40m, but a couple hours later we connected on 20m. Bingo! So now HI has provided me with a bonus multiplier.

This set of 3 surpassed my expectations for yet another time-constrained weekend, between jazz gig Saturday night (totally clobbered night-time activity for KS and OH), and massive household cleanup for upcoming visit of daughter with her new husband and stepson, to meet family on East Coast! I was going to be happy with just qualifying for the mults (especially for OH, which is too close to New Jersey for much high-band activity), but ended up with 70 Qs altogether. HI yielded 12 altogether, most on 20m soon after the beginning of the contest (at midnight local time Friday night) ... I went to bed before the start, but checked the bands every time "nature called", and was pleasantly surprised by good conditions on 20m during wee hours of morning, also got one on 40m, which is usually good for HI in dawn-ish hours here in NJ; a little surprised not to get more than one, but maybe "nature's" timing was a little off! Also checked sporadically other days/times during weekend, and ended up with 1 on 40m, 6 on 20m, 3 on 15m and 2 on 10m. Grateful for some good ears out there! You can really tell who has good (perhaps great!) antennas aimed your way, vs. not. With some stations, a single call was all it took, while some never heard me after dozens of tries ... this happened one time with two HI stations on 15m just a couple KHz apart! Reaching HI on 5 watts through 1/4-wave vertical is always fun! KS was generous, as well. Total 38, all on 20m and 15m. Nice to have a second day, but I focused on the house much more than the QSO Party on Sunday. Fun to get 6-in-1 with K0S handing off to spouse W0A on 3-county line ... that was a first for me; it took a few iterations of them working other stations, and a lookup on qrz.com, before I really understood what was going on! OH fortunately had plenty of activity on 40m during daytime Saturday, which yielded 20 Qs (1 was on 20m), so I was happy with that before jazz gig called me away.

OH QP - Lots of activity...always someone new to work when I sat down at the radio. KS QP - The mobile/rovers, especially the ones on county lines, did a great job. HI QP - Worked every HI station that I heard! Thank you and 72,

After several months away working on Hurricane Ian recovery in FL, I resumed my milliwatting journey through state QSO parties with CO and TN. Saturday N0NBH predicted fair-poor propagation conditions on all bands for the CO QP. However, during the first two hours my CQs on 15 and 20m were spotted on both bands in KS, AZ, and WI. During the same time, I heard a few weak signals on 20m but none on 15m. I was able to work 2 OMs on 20m for the multiplier. Propagation improved Sunday for the TN QP, but 40 and 80m remained fair-poor (TN is too close to my NC QTH for higher bands). During the first few hours, my 40m CQs were spotted in MD NC and PA, and I heard a few weak signals but was unable to work any. 40m opened briefly later in the afternoon, but despite a sudden flurry of signals, strong and weak, I couldn't catch any using my usual strategies for 300 mW rockbound. As the sun set, both 40 and 80m came alive, again with both strong and weak signals. My CQs were spotted on both bands, but I was unable to get through on 40m. With more power on 80m I did better, working 2 for the multiplier. Minimal results, but not bad for minimal propagation and minimal power.
Rigs:
15m: NorCal Sierra @ 0.7W to 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft
20m: Elecraft K1 @ 1W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft
40m: Tuna Tin 2 w/ 7042 kHz xtal @ 0.3W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft
80m: AT Sprint II @ 1W (6AA 7.2V) to 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft

I waited too long to go after any Colorado stations. By the time I got on the air, there was a CWOps contest going on, and I couldn't find any CO stations. When it was over at 0Z, I discovered the bands were pretty shot, and felt lucky getting two stations.
I was hoping to make up for it in Tennessee with a road trip to activate a couple of counties, but woke up with a bit of a stomach bug, so I stayed home. Too bad, as it seemed there was a lot of good activity and an opportunity to add to my QSO count.

Both Tn. and Co. were lots of fun! Tn. , being a border state for me , can be a problem being too close except for 80m at night, but the middle of the day skip was shorter on 40m compared to last year which contributed to more activity and fun!
Looking forward to Al. this weekend which can also be a challenge being too close except for 80m at night. My goal this year is to improve my number of contacts compared to last year in each party. So far , so good!

Abbreviated op time this weekend, with big family event going on here at our house in New Jersey. At the few times I broke away from setting up for the (family) party on Saturday, CWOps contest seemed to clobber any chance for even hearing a CO during day, but I got 1 Q on 20m around 8:15pm local time (showed that Q to my daughter's new husband), and a nice bunch of 5 Qs on 40m in 25 minutes, starting at 10pm local time, then back for another on 20m around 11:15pm(!), total of 7.
TN was the day of the party, so snuck away for a couple of Qs in as many minutes around 6pm (showed that to my brother, who lives in TN), then back around 10:40pm local time to finish up the (TN QSO) party with an additional 11 Qs in 20 minutes, total 13, all on 40m except for one on 80m.
Exhausting weekend!

My home state QSO Party started a few minutes late while I worked on a last-minute plan to adapt the little solo 18650 battery booster I'd assembled for Spartan Sprints to give me variable power from my 12 shack batteries so I could keep the MTR-4B close to 5W on all bands. Not sure if I crossed something up in my hurry, or if the board wasn't made for 12V input. Did I bother to go back and look at the specs? No, I did not. Anyway, it got rather warm and didn't want to play anymore. I set that aside and resigned myself to lower output.
The first reply to my CQ TQP had to ask for my county because I sent "599 TN" out of habit. Then I gave the next few stations a three-character character county abbreviation before realizing it was supposed to be four. After those flare-ups, my incompetence settled to normal background levels and I spent most of the afternoon and evening letting perseverance pick up the slack. Highlights included several familiar NAQCC member calls, the usual propagation-defying antenna farm of Laci OM2VL, who worked me on 20m and 40m from Slovakia, and another two Qs from Dick K4XU, the former RF Chief for Ten-Tec, now out in Oregon.
The pocket-sized MTR-4B is missing a panadapter (and dual VFOs, and a volume control), but I did it one better. It can be hard to carve out a space to run with 4 watts on a busy contest weekend, and harder still when most of the other runners are in your skip zone. In previous events I've figured out I had company only after it became clear that the station I thought I was talking to was working someone else. WebSDR.org lets you tap into waterfall displays from around the world. I picked one in Utah and another in Georgia to help me find free space and monitor my puny signal.
QSOPartyHub.com is an underutilized resource for reporting spots. Tennessee's rules didn't prohibit self-spotting, so I'd put myself up there when I changed bands knowing that doing so tended to anger the radio gods to send a plague of QRM forcing me off the frequency I'd just advertised. I tried to keep within 500Hz and hoped people would still find me.
Thanks to stick-to-itiveness and last year's QRP CW winners slacking off, I was able to nab first in the category on 3830scores.com. More importantly, it let me (temporarily) leapfrog over Don VE3DQN and buy some breathing room to avoid scrambling the final weekend for enough points to push into Platinum.

I operated portable from my sister's backyard in Poway, CA using my Elecraft KX1, which limited me to 20 and 40 meters and less than 2.5 watts. I was able to get the high end of my homemade EFHW antenna up about 30 feet. Colorado was fairly easy to work on 20 meters during daylight hours, but due to other commitments, I wasn't able to try 40 meters during the evening. For the Tennessee contest, 20 meters was almost dead for me most of the day. I barely heard a few stations but couldn't work them. The band finally opened in the last hour or so of the event, and I worked the only two stations I heard.

Op time was limited to daytime, before another jazz gig took me away for the evening. Every Q was on 20m ... I heard one station on 15m very faintly, and one or two on 40m faintly, but not enough propagation from here in NJ at the time for them to hear my QRP sig. 40m probably would have been fun in the evening, but music called me away.
Worked AA4GA twice on 20m, nice signal both times ... thanks for the info on 3830scores about how you travel from county to county; got me looking at half-wave-end-feds again ... I might be tempted to do some traveling in future years; NJ is not all that far from a number of states, especially DE(!).
To all: Give me a shout next weekend during NJQP!! I'll be at home here in Hunterdon county.

I was hoping to catch KR4AE with a trip to Alabama to activate a few counties in the AlQP. Unfortunately, the activity was much lower than I had hoped for. Looking forward to a busy QSO party weekend coming up!

I had hoped to rack up a few points in the late afternoon and evening, but heard only two AL stations. Noise levels were high and my attempts were limited by frequent small thunderstorms. Last year I blanked completely (forgot?), so I should be happy with the multiplier. Next week will be nuts.

I was hoping for a bit more activity out of AL, but maybe it was low for the times I was able to get on the air. And I gather that some AL stations had to shut down because of thunderstorms, or maybe competition from the NA CW Sprint discouraged others. Anyway, I worked the stations I heard. That's it.

Working 5 QSO parties in a weekend was a strain on my brain, but I was successful in all of them. TX was especially active and accessible from central OH. I worked WI0WA several times on multiple county borders, which accounted for most of my IA QSOs. NJ must have been too close for 20m skip during the day, but I was able to work them on 40m during the late afternoon and early evening. NH CW stations were rare but boomed in on both 20m and 40m when I could find them. I was a bit worried about WA, but I was able to work most of the stations I heard. All in all it was a fun weekend.

Nice to have a lot of activity. Five QSO parties at once is kind of a pain, but N1MM takes care of switching logs pretty easily. I'd rather have that than one QSO party with low activity! I thought I'd never find any NH stations - only six hours during the day each day wasn't a lot of fun, but with some spotting help from KR4AE and RBN, I was able to bag exactly two contacts! TX, IA, and NJ were great. WA was a little tough for me - it's not a good direction for me, especially at that distance, and I made a lot of unsuccessful calls. And enough has already been said about NH! Looking forward to a couple weekends off before PA, which should be a good one.

Busy weekend, but for once, I was free to do radio almost all weekend, so I set up on the back deck on a beautiful day (and evening) with laptop (running remote Quisk), bug, and straight key, connected to my rig-in-a-box (Hermes Lite 2 at base of "maple tree vertical") via WiFi.
My main goal was to put in a good effort for my home state of New Jersey, and beat last year's total of 70-some QSOs; happy to say I reached 123! ... Nowhere close to the amazing numbers achieved by AA4GA and KR4AE earlier this year, but lots better than last year. And, my thanks go to both of those fine operators for giving me calls this weekend, as well as other NAQCC folks I worked! Also wanted to draw some DX into NJQP, and got SP6JOE on 15m, and OM2VL on 40m and 20m. There were definitely some lonely times calling CQ, though; in late afternoon, I kept thinking 40m would open up and give me some good runs, but I had to be patient ... actually got discouraged about reaching my personal goal of 100, but some nice runs on 40m and 80m starting around 8pm local time gave me some good encouragement, and I ended up beating my goal. I'm contributing my NJQP score to local club Delaware Valley Radio Association, W2ZQ; perhaps you were able to work their KW station with big tower (I hope they were able to blow my score away with all that muscle)! I enjoy using that station for phone contests and 160 CW (I don't have a 160m antenna here ... yet?).
Secondary goal was to get over 200 QSOs overall, and get all 5 mults. I began the IA and TX QPs soon after they started, 2 hours before NJQP started, and worked at least enough WA (started at same time as NJ) to get the NAQCC multiplier, then focused on NJ, as well as looking around for a couple NH! My 3 NH QSOs were all on 40m in mid-late afternoon Saturday (before 40m would have opened up big); actually one of them was in NJQP, but I asked his county and he responded, so I logged it in NHQP as well. I use N1MM+ contest logger, and toggled between the 5 contests using Alt-F/Alt-(number) keystrokes (hold the Alt between keystrokes!); Alt-F brings up the "File" menu, and the Alt-number selects one of the 5 contests at the top of the list of most-recently-accessed contests ... even with practice, though, it can be confusing, especially when I'm tired. But, in addition to Cabrillo and .adf files, N1MM+ provides a nice summary file breaking down QSOs by band and mode, good for entering into 3830scores.
After NJQP ended at midnight local time, I stuck around for a few minutes and worked some WA stations on 40m; W7DX, the WA bonus station, couldn't *ever* hear me on the high bands (I tried many times during the span of the contest), but heard me on 40m! Speaking of high bands, I was happy that 15m and 10m showed some nice activity and conditions; most of my S&P calls got through first time!
Sunday felt like "extra credit", but I didn't have quite 200 at the end of Saturday, so got back on the air and worked another 40 or so, for a total of 232. Always fun working those mobile/portable stations in 2-4 counties at once! Worked TX from 10am - noon, then took a break for some family time from 12-2pm, came back for TX/WA, then stopped altogether around 4pm local time. TX was done, WA had another 4 hours, but it was getting tedious and I was tired, so I quit and did my logging! Lots of practice with the bug this weekend (especially calling CQNJQP), switching to straight key when my signal was weak or ears were slow at far end, and I needed to be slow and clear.

Don, I worked you as my 81st QSO out of 86 QSO’s I had for the NJ QSO party. I was able to get some practice in before the NJ QSO party by working a few Q’s in the Texas and Iowa parties. Not much action in the Iowa, but the Texas boys were out in full force. I did not hear any other contestants from WA, or NH.
It was such a nice day I took my QCX-Minis for 40 and 20 out the back yard to work some NJQP contacts. Got my QRP Guys Tri-Band vertical up I use for POTA wanted to work 20M but OH NO, NO POWER OUT!!! So I had to go to 40M which was not very active during the day, as expected. Stayed out about an hour then went into the shack to finish up the NJ QP.
Looking at the remaining QP schedule and mine, looks like I’ll only have time for the NY QSO Party.
Hope to C U on the air. 73

Well, with my limited time available I did my best. I'd move slowly up or down the band, try whoever was calling CQ and record the QSO in the appropriate N3FJP logbook. At least I was able to reach the QSO number goal I'd set for myself. But completely wiped out on getting an NH station. The limited hours--stopping at 2200Z on each of the two days--disadvantages those of us who live close to NH, unless NH operators are willing to go on 40 and 80m during daytime hours.
I'm really looking forward to the CAQP in less than two weeks. Not only is it the most active SQP, I have special affinity for it because CA is my home state. But this year is going to be different for me, and I don't know what to expect. In the 7-8 years I've participated in the CAQP, this is the first year I'll limit my operations to QRP and CW. (I had to skip it last year because of a family trip.) In the past CAQPs I'd been so intent on gaining the coveted WACC (Worked All California Counties) award that I generally operated at higher powers and SSB at times to chase counties I still needed. I achieved the WACC certificate in 2021, so now I can focus on CW and QRP only. And now I have to keep my calendar clear to give me radio time :-)

CAQP - I made a few contacts during the day but once the sun went down I was able to make S&P contacts to CA. All were on 20M using a 1/4 wave ground mounted vertical antenna with a counterpoise. The antenna is surrounded by trees, a 35 foot berm and the stucco walls of the house.

CAQP - Well there is nothing better on a rainy Saturday than working a SQP. Such was the case for me. I managed to scratch out 30 Q's while working around the shack and the house. This QSP taught me to be patient as my puny sig from NJ took many calls before I could be heard in California.
My wife and I will be in Aruba for the QSP for, NV, AZ, PA, & SD. The final weekend for NY, & ILL will be sketchy as we will have our grandkids over for the weekend. Hope to hear you all on the air.

CAQP - The CQP has traditionally been the best overall state QSO party and it sure didn't disappoint this year. Maybe the fact that you can win bottles of California wine helps boost participation - hi!
My 2023 QSO count is now at 911 so obviously my goal will be to get to 1000 before the end of this season. There are some big states coming up, but we're close to finished with the year.
Obviously I didn't operate in-state California but I can sort of answer your questions from the Kentucky QSO party: Of course, keeping a frequency is not that difficult in a small state. As far as managing the pileup, it's PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE. I've used MorseRunner and RufzXP for years to practice copying calls, and the hundreds of hours of practice prepared me well.

CAQP - Having 6:46 hrs invested, and the Prop Princess playing nice, made the CA QP a fun time. This was all S&P, with an extended double zepp for 20m used with an auto tuner.
Conditions were good, I was answered usually with one call. I should have spent time studying the mobile routes. to improve the multis total. Being quick to tune across the band, and from band to band seemed to help. Hope to see you in the next test too!!

CAQP - As usual, I didn't have a lot of time to party but when I did, there was always someone new to work. Lots of CA operators and good propagation were key. Congrats to the CQP folks for making it all happen. TU and 72.

CAQP - What a wild weekend! There were QSO parties, contests, and operating events galore! At one point I realized I had tried operating QRPp in: 1) the Collegiate QSO Party; 2) the CQP (California QSO Party); 3) the SKCC Fall QSO Party; 4) the QRP ARCI Fall QSO Party; and 5) the beginning of our own week-long NAQCC Anniversary event.
I decided to operate 15 and 20m, since I was mainly after the CQP multiplier and I figured those bands would give me the best chance from NC. Conditions were predicted to be fair or good with G1 geomag storms (N0NBH solar), but 15m turned out to be excellent! At first, I was running the Sierra on both bands (0.3W). Many, many signals were heard, both strong and weak, and my CQs were spotted all over (AB, KS, MN, OR, etc., but not CA), but no joy. Early Saturday afternoon a package arrived from my son John K1QLN with my old K1, which has 15m. So I hooked it up to see what 1W could do. Boom! Two quick CQP contacts (18-19Z). But that was it--no further CQP contacts. Oh, well... I got the multiplier anyway, and at QRPp.
What about those other events? I never did hear anyone operating the Collegiate, SKCC, or QRP ARCI events. However, at the end of my Saturday ops, still running the K1 on 15m at 1W, I caught Dave WG0Y in UT--at a BLM rest stop along I-15 not far from where I used to live--for a brief chat. No points or anything, but fun dreaming about his and wife Lori's KO4YIN life on the road.
In the wee hours Sunday morning (04-05Z), taking refuge from the 'test craziness by shifting to 30 m--my favorite WARC band--I had a great, fast--for me, 22-25 wpm--head-copy chat with another refugee, Ed NA5G in LA (Louisiana, not Los Angeles). Soon after that, still on 30m, I caught superstation V31XX in Belize (0502Z) and Rostislav ZL/UR5AI in New Zealand (0520Z), altho' I had to increase power to 5W for both. Both are very unusual for me: I'd caught V31XX once before, a few weeks ago, and another V31 in 2005, but Rostislav was my first ZL.
Sunday also began the NAQCC Anniversary event. I operated N3A/4 for an hour (16-17Z), now back on 15m at 1W. There was a lot less activity and I spent the whole hour calling CQ at 21060 with no contacts. Later I did make a couple of 15m POTA contacts using my own call with old friends, Jim WB0RLJ in NE, and Kevin K0TTW in CO. I had to crank the K1 up to 3W to get Jim, but managed contact with Kevin at 1W.
All-in-all a very rewarding weekend. The bands were great! I managed QRPp where it counted: a new multiplier for the Challenge, some road trip dreamin' from UT, a great WARC chat, two unusual contacts at "high" power, and two POTA contacts with old friends for good measure.
Special thanks to all the NAQCC members who have encouraged my minimalist dreams over the years, especially Tom WY3H and John K3WWP in the early days--all this was done with simple wire antennas. This has been the kind of weekend I can usually only dream of!

CAQP - Ten meters was where almost all of the action was for me. I heard a few CA stations on 20, but most could not hear me. As usual, nothing on 15. I don't know why.
I noticed an interesting (to me) phenomenon on 10. I'm not sure I can adequately describe it, but I'll try. I saw semi-periodic "waves" of noise on my Elecraft PanAdapter. Each wave would grow to maybe 10 dB above the noise floor and then diminish again. The width of the waves varied from about 5 kHz to maybe 15 kHz. The waves moved from right to left on the display (decrease in frequency) all at the same constant rate. The width and amplitude of each remained constant as the frequency shifted. The spacing between waves varied (hence semi-periodic). I didn't notice whether the pattern was continuous during the weekend, but I did notice it multiple times. While the waves were covering the CW contest signals, all but the strongest ones disappeared into the noise. Because I could watch the noise on the display, I could shift my operation to stations outside of waves, which helped me be a bit more productive in trying to make QSOs. I'm curious about potential sources. Any ideas?

CAQP - When I see the scores posted, I know the CAQP didn't disappoint. My QSO rate early into the contest was pretty low, and I wondered if I had antenna problems. The folks in CA weren't hearing me as well as I was used to, even when they called multiple CQs. 15m was the daytime money band, and 40m in the late evening. I didn't reach my QSO goal, but in hindsight I think it was more because of the limited time I had to operate and time slots available to me. It's still my favourite SQP.

I was short on operating time this weekend. Grabbed some QRQ stations on 15m to get the multiplier and remind myself how I need get around to adopting K3NG firmware for the aggrevating keyer I made.

I had a difficult time finding NV and SD stations, but persistence paid off for both. AZ was more active, but PA was both active and easy from my OH QTH, so I concentrated on doing as well as possible there. Both 20m and 40m were good both days, and I bounced back and forth often. Near the end I made a few contacts on 80m, which is very unusual for me. My new KX3 can tune my G5RV Jr to an SWR of 1 to 1 on 80m, so I decided to give it a shot and was pleased with the results.

[AZ/NV/SD/PA] I got distracted this weekend by Oceania DX ... It's cool to work Oceania from New Jersey using QRP CW! Got up early Saturday morning around 5:30-6:30am local time to see what I could reach on 40m; made 2 QSOs with Hawaii, but nowhere else ... I can often reach VK and ZL on 40m in that pre-dawn time during contests (when the best antennas are listening), and was optimistically hoping for maybe even a new island country (not this time). I kept looking for OCDX stations during Saturday, reaching a total of 9, all HI on 40/20/15/10, except for 2 VK on 20m.
I also spent a lot of time searching for the elusive NV QSO ... worked W7ZR on Saturday on 15m, but unfortunately he couldn't hear me on any other bands during the contest (and I tried many times!). Finally got my 2nd Q on 40m a little after midnight on Saturday night / Sunday morning with WB2AWQ/7... a "just barely" Q with many repeats by me, and moments of suspenseful silence, but finally a "gTU" from NV! Total of 2 from NV.
SD exceeded my expectations with 6 Qs on 4 bands 40/20/15/10, but nothing on 80 (which would make SD a 5-bander for me).
AZ gave me 2 QSOs on 80m!! If confirmed, that makes AZ a new 5-band state for me! AZ was way more active than NV; I had 32 QSOs in 21 AZ band-counties, so pretty satisfying, even if I didn't make an AZ Q on 10m.
PA, being right next door, and traditionally very active, made for easy hunting on 40m/80m once I gave up looking for the "gDX" on high bands ... 81 QSOs altogether. 80m (34 Qs) helped a lot in the later evening, when 40m (46 Qs) "gwent long" for the closer counties. Got 1 Q on 20m on Sunday, but it was a struggle, and I was too tired to try more. Tried 15m a few times, but they could not hear me, and I don't think I heard any PA on 10m.
I'm pretty sure OCDX and the elusive search for NV took a number of SQP QSO opportunities away, including the fact that I was pretty fried over the weekend after getting up early on Saturday ... however, it's all OKAY, because in searching around for OCDX, I came across a warbly signal on 15m from BH7FFR (not in the contest) ... took me a few times to get his callsign right before calling him, and it took well over a dozen repeats for him to get mine with any confidence (I'm grateful for his patience, and the fact that he heard me AT ALL), but when it was all over, I had worked CHINA on 5 watts CW! Confirmed in LOTW! Physics and nature are amazing!

Another wild weekend! AZ, NV, PA, SD QSO Parties plus SKCC WES, Oceania DX ‘test, and the last day of N3A/4 Anniversary ops (not to mention the usual POTA/SOTA/IOTA/whatever-else-TA).
Sat started with an early N3A/4 QRPp session on 30m but no takers despite good propagation predictions (N0NBH solar) and spots from NH to WI. Switched over to 15m trying to get AZ/NV/SD for one or more multipliers, but no soap all day despite continued good propagation and regular spots in AB, AZ, KS, OR, UT. The band seemed pretty dead altho’ I did catch George NE5A in OK op SKCC WES (using my Kent straight key). I tried 20m for a while—same thing… hmm… Taking a break on 30m had a nice chat w/ Dennis WD9DWE an old friend in IN, then op a final N3A/4 session on 30m late, but still no takers. As the sun set and 40m improved caught 2 PA OMs for my sole QP multiplier. I also heard a lot of WES stns, ao I switched back to my Kent hoping to catch a few, but no joy.
Sun wee hrs tried to catch AZ/NV/SD ops again on 20m but still no go despite continued good propagation and western US spots (band still pretty dead, altho’ I heard several JH stns—Oceania DX ‘test?—but they couldn’t hear me). N0NBH solar predictions continue good at night, fair during day on 40/30/20 (night and day. both good on 15). I continued listening on 20m before sunrise, but there was minimal band activity, some QRN. Aa the sun came up I fired up the Sierra for the Sun 11Z activity period (listening, occasional calls on 10116 spotted in KS). After sunrise, 15m came up and, I began hearing EU stns but none in the US. WHOA! heard OK2VWB Vasek calling CQ WES and caught him—altho’ I had to crank it up to 5W to do so—and in quick succession also got DL4FN Peter and F5UQE Duc. I backed power down to 1W when I started hearing western US stns: caught N5G, a WWFF Get Your Park On! Special Event stn (celebrating Earth Science Week Oct 7-15) running POTA from TX (Trinity County)—wait! there’s others! K5G, moving around, heard from Bastrop County, TX, and others spotted but not heard (K8P in MI, N1G in MA, N3I in NJ, W0G in KS, W4G in NC …) And so many DX stns! 9A CO CT DE DJ DK DL DM DY E EA EE EW F G HA I II IT IU IZ JF LA LB M MM OH OM ON OY OZ PA PG PP R SM SP SV TF TI TO TU UR UT XE YL YO … not to mention W8S (Swains Island—Olohega) and T2C (the German DXpedition to Tuvalu) … incredible! But no more NV or SD… oh, well. Not much chance for my peashooters among the big-dog DX’ers, even if I was to go back to 5W. Everyone’s awake now. Time to quench my burning ears (and smoking fingers) on the WARC bands. Rag chew, anyone? Just listening to one is a relief! . . . late in the day (21Z) tried again on 30m: crazy QRM pileup after I called CQ... what is that, other refuges from the last hour of the PA QP? A quick look at all bands on RBN shows hundreds of OMs banging away (just those heard by NA RBs). Too much! Turned off the radio.
15m: Elecraft K1 (LiFePO4 13V) @ 1W to 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft
20m: Elecraft K1 (LiFePO4 13V) @ 1W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft
30m: Sierra (PS) @ 1W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft
40m: Elecraft K1 (LiFePO4 13V) @ 1W to 44 ft doublet up 35 ft

[NYQP, ILQP] What a fine finish to the States QSO Party Challenge. NY flooded my waterfall on 20 meters and a few also showed up on 40 meters. Thanks New Yorkers for making it exciting to work you. Because of my close proximity to IL, only 40 meters was at play, so that was slow going until evening, then the waterfall filled again. Thanks to my Midwest neighbors for working until the final minutes. This was my first time in the States QSO Party Challenge. It kept me engaged throughout the year and I learned a lot about the "culture" of each event. Loads of fun!

[NYQP, ILQP]This weekend featuring New York and Illinois was a great finale for the season. Lots of activity for both QSO parties, and they didn't overlap, which is a huge plus! I would like to have spent a little more time working the ILQP, but had some other activities in the way - but still happy with my results for the weekend...and the season.
Congratulations to KR4AE for an excellent, consistent, showing - he worked hard for the top spot! He will most certainly finish in the top 10 or 12 in the overall State QSO Party Challenge - and that's for QRP power and wire antennas vs. some of the biggest stations in the world!
And thank you to Don, VE3DQN and Brent, WT4U for promoting this event for NAQCC.

[NYQP, ILQP] There's no QP like the NYQP...of course, I'm biased being from NY! It's nice to be able to run QRP and have stations call you at a pretty decent rate. Most of the 12 hours I spent running, which is a lot of fun. I did S&P looking for counties as multipliers and found some. I missed some that I would consider easy...but that's what keeps us coming back. Ditto, with some states...never heard a peep from some I work pretty much every week. I recognized some fellow NAQCCers calling in and I really appreciate those calls. The NYQP organizers did a great job as did all of the participants! 72, Will, NQ2W

[NYQP, ILQP] As I look over my notes from the past weekend, I find myself reflecting on the whole experience rather than just these two QPs as I usually would. So maybe I'll do a little of both. As you said, there were lots of folks on from both states. Band conditions seemed very good both days, despite mostly so-so (fair-good) solar predictions. Because both NY and IL are states I often reach with QRPp, I decided to go back to where I'd begun in March and operate rockbound (40m for NY, 20m for IL). I wasn't disappointed: on both days I made two QSOs to get the multiplier using my usual strategy of listening until I heard someone who'd been doing a land office business hit a lull. Then, unless someone else came along, they'd be willing to take a minute and listen hard even if it took many repeats to get me in their log. Thanks to all for their persistence!
15m appeared to be very active with EU stns, so I decided to listen in, even though I don't have a 15m rock (in keeping with the rockbound milliwatting spirit, I turned the K1 down to min pwr). Many were D stns; the Worked All Germany 'test was going on. I decided to try my peashooter strategy with the big dogs, and snagged DQ1V in the last hour (his nr 479, my nr 1).
Rounding out the weekend of milliwatting I also had a nice 40m chat with an OM in TN, and caught two OMs working POTA (MO and AR) on 15m.
All in all an astonishing weekend: eight 300 mW QSOs, five—count ‘em—five, rockbound. Multipliers for both NY and IL, which brings my total for the Challenge to 20, plus four "extra" QSOs: a chat, two POTA, and a WAG contact.
So what's the overall total? Of my 86 Challenge QSOs, 65 were QRPp (77%), 17 of them rockbound (20%). Looking back at my log, I see that ~20% of all my QSOs are QRPp, but that this year it's been 40%, probably due to the Challenge (thanks, NAQCC!).
And as I said in my report on the CA QP, many, many thanks are due to my fellow NAQCC members for encouraging my minimalist tendencies over the years. Special thanks to Tom WY3H and John K3WWP who were especially encouraging at the beginning, to Don VE3DQN for shepherding us, and to Brent WT4U for keeping the newsletter flowing. This past weekend, the whole of the year's Challenge, and my entire time as a ham has been more than a bit of a dream.
this weekend’s rigs:
40m: Tuna Tin 2 w/ 7042 kHz xtal on LiFePO4 (13V), 0.3W to 44ft doublet up 35ft
20m: RockMite on LiFePO4 (13V), also 0.3W, to same ant
15m: Elecraft K1 on LiFePO4 (13V), 0.3W to 135 ft end-fed Zepp up 40 ft

[NYQP, ILQP] Both NY and IL were a lot of fun due to good participation within those states. I was so glad to see , Lee, AA4GA, achieve the Diamond level. He is a much better cw op than me, but he has a busy life where mine is kinda boring so I have more time to devote to the hobby! It's been a great year and lot's of fun, but gladly, no more QSO Parties for awhile!
But, there are some great contests remaining this year that are a lot of fun using QRP including the CQ World Wide DX Contest the weekend after Thanksgiving. I used to hit these international contests pretty hard going for a good QRP score and have had some success, but I don't have enough gas in the QRP tank to operate a lot over two days anymore . I never did op overnight because I need my beauty sleep! I hope to participate some though just to enjoy these great band conditions. Sunday afternoon will find more dx stations begging, so it's a good time to work a lot of good dx with QRP! And, there will be some rare ones to to add to your QRP dx total, if that's of interest to you!
I would like to thank, Don, Brent and everyone at NAQCC that made the Party Challenge possible along with everyone that works so hard to make this such a great Club! 72, Alan KR4AE

{NYQP, ILQP] I need not have worried about getting the 15 QSOs I needed to hit 1000 for the year, as the band was wall-to-wall New Yorkers and Illinoisans. For next year, my goal will be 50000 points which will depend a lot on multipliers. I want to thank Don and all involved at NAQCC for their great work tabulating everything this year. Last but not least, I hope everyone has a joyous holiday season and I'll see you in February!

[NYQP, ILQP] I kinda "coasted" in on this final weekend, but still ended up with some decent numbers, due to geographically/propagationally (is that a word?) friendly locations of both NY and IL relative my home state NJ, as well as great participation from both states. Saturday was a day packed with non-ham obligations (teaching jazz classes and playing keys in 2 jazz/rock gigs) ... between classes and gigs, I jumped on for a couple minutes, and got my 2 Qs ... after all was done, I came home a jumped on the air for about 40 minutes, racking up another 25 Qs ... not a bad rate for S&P! I think jumping in toward the end of the contest really sped things up, as I rarely had to compete with other (stronger) stations for that next Q. Sunday brought music participation (bass) at 2 churches, but after I came home, I set up my laptop and key on the front porch, and enjoyed 88 Qs from IL. Nice, fun way to wrap things up!!!
I may take it easy next year; SQP has taken some time, this year, away from a design project for a "4-square transceiver", using DSP to phase 4 antennas. I have a long way to go on this project, both hardware and software ... making progress slowly, but it's been fun and exciting. This year's SQP participation has set a nice benchmark to compare with the new rig, "once I complete it" (may still be a couple[?] years in the future).
Thanks and 72 to those of you whom I worked (or even just heard, or even just saw on 3830scores) over the year! It's been very enjoyable expanding my personal list of "hey, I know that callsign!"

Originally I hadn't expected to be so active on this final weekend since I'd already achieved my Platinum award. But when I heard so many NY (and later IL) stations on the air, I set my goal to a higher score. Propagation was great, and activity was high. Loved those IL stations on the county borders: two-for-one QSOs. The other excitement this weekend was watching the scores come in to 3830scores.com. (Almost like staying up late to watch the election results!) Several of you moved up into the next awards category because of this weekend. Way to go!!