![]() | NAQCC News |
Aug 11, 2007 | NAQCC Web Site | Issue #052 |
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In this issue: 1. August Sprint. 2. July Challenge Results 3. Latest Bear Hunt News 4. General Club News 5. Member News |
1. SPRINT: You've asked for it, and we've done it. We now have an on-line autologger here. It may be easier than using email or regular mail to submit your log. It's still in its testing stage, and there will be bugs to work out, I'm sure, but with your help we can make it work. Give it a try and report anything confusing or any bugs you find. You will be notified within a day if your log was received OK via this method. We are continuing our prize giveaway this month. For the second month now and continuing indefinitely we're giving away a set of books in CW on CD and a CW course on CD to the highest scoring MEMBER who hasn't won the CD's previously. Club officers (WY3H, K3WWP, W2LJ, KD2MX, K5DUZ, VA3RJ, and AA4W) are not eligible, nor are previous winners (K4BAI). The CD's are generously donated by Chuck K7QO. Thank you Chuck. In addition to the CD's we also have our usual array of goodies. Our Special Award certificate this sprint goes to the one making the highest score whose log contains calls beginning with each of the 4 letters assigned to the USA - A,K,N,W. For example working AF4LQ,K3WWP,N3IJR,WY3H would qualify you. Then of course, our usual certificates for 1st place in our two categories, or 1st and 2nd if we only have entries in one category. We also offer a nice certificate to the one making the highest score who has never won a certificate in any of our previous sprints. Those of you who have never won any kind of certificate in our sprints probably don't know what they look like, so here's an example. All the sprint certificates are similar with different wording for each achievement. ![]() So there is a lot to shoot for in this month's sprint. Let's see if we can break our record for number of logs submitted this month! If you use paper logging during the sprints, we have a log and summary form available for you to download and fill in with your text editor or you can transfer the info to our on-line form mentioned above. Download here - Form - Instructions. If you're entering one of our sprints for the first time, we welcome you and hope you will be a regular participant from now on. Full Sprint info here. ![]() 2. JULY CHALLENGE RESULTS: If you were on the bands at the right time, making 5 QSO's on 5 different bands was a very easy challenge. In fact it wasn't even a challenge at all. One member (VE3HUR) completed the challenge the first day of July and another (K3WWP) on the 2nd of July. If K3WWP hadn't been fishing and caught the 10 meters opening in the RAC contest on July 1st there would have been two members complete it the first day. W2JEK and K3WWP went above and beyond the call of duty. W2JEK made 5 QSO's on 7 bands, K3WWP on 6 bands. Others completing the challenge were KD2MX and KS4L. We welcome KS4L as a first-time challenge participant. Full challenge info here. ![]() 3. LATEST BEAR HUNT NEWS: From our Bear Master Ron, K5DUZ: If you have plans for operating portable during these last few days of summer, now is the time to sign up for the NAQCC Bear Hunt. Your fun in the woods will be increased by having Bear Hunters looking for you to appear on schedule. Just let us know the times/frequencies of your planned operations and we will line up the Bear Hunters for you! Thanks, Ron Full bear hunt info here. ![]() 4. GENERAL CLUB NEWS: - Tom has a very interesting concept for the club. He is still working on it as of writing this item, so all we can say is tune in to the next newsletter for details. It's something completely different and could be very beneficial to club members. - K3WWP ![]() Another thing you can do to publicize the club is to be sure to include your NAQCC number proudly in any signature you have for your ham radio related emails. Also of course on your QSL cards. Don't forget your eQSL card as well. - K3WWP ![]() If you want to share that fun with me and the other officers and AE5BH, let us know before the end of August or you may be left out in the cold come October. - K3WWP ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Aug 3 - KC9LZK - eliminated Aug 12 - AE5BH Aug 14 - WU7F Sep 11 - NT9K Nov 30 - N3IJR The following submitted a guess but are not eligible to win or have requested we donate the CD to someone else if they win. Since we have enough qualified participants, we'll simply eliminate the following from the contest while still noting and appreciating W0CH's kind offer. Aug 14 - W0CH (donate) Aug 15 - WY3H (officer) Aug 31 - K3WWP (officer) Now we just have to wait for that memorable date to arrive. The three winners then will be notified via email as well as announced in the first newsletter after the date. The CD's will be sent as soon as possible after the date. - K3WWP ![]() ![]() I'm very proud of you, our members for getting us off to such a great start in our sprints. If we only required number of QSO's to be reported (and we never will) instead of complete logs, we probably would be even further ahead. That's very encouraging for the future, and I hope to see the day when we regularly get 80-90 or even more logs submitted as the ARS is doing now after 11 years of the Spartan Sprints. - K3WWP ![]() 5. MEMBER NEWS: This is YOUR section of the newsletter. We want to know what our members are doing with CW and QRP on the ham bands. We will only present POSITIVE news here. Brag about that new rare country you worked last week. Tell how you finally worked KL7 to finish your 40 meters WAS. Share your excitement in working halfway around the world to Australia with 100 mW. Tell us how you built that new little QRP rig or keyer paddle from scratch. Give us the URL to your brand new CW/QRP web site so we can all take a look. Do a review of your K1 you just finished building. I think those are enough examples to let you know what kind of news we want here. Basically anything POSITIVE that concerns CW and/or QRP. Nothing about other modes or QRO please. Send your news items to our news editor Paul KD2MX at ![]() ![]() I live in Texas, and I don't have Nebraska, nor Arakansas, nor Utah, nor Nevada. I am also missing most of New England, although I do have Maine. Now, I am a patient person, so I am not in a rush, but I do enjoy "hunting" stations. I really enjoy knowing when somebody is on the air and trying to work them... even if I have their state. I imagine it is the same thrill of chasing DX. It is the satisfaction of trying to work a station that I know is on the air. For me, in this sunspot minimum, every new state is like trying to work a DX station. I've learned a great deal of operating skill from hunting states. I've learned to listen! I've learned a bit more about propagation, which bands are open, and when. These skills are valuable and would only be obtained if I had a goal of working certain stations in certain areas. In a contest, you take what you can hear or hear you. But when you are hunting, you are trying to find that "rare" station. At least it is rare for you! I was a bit discouraged about the potential fate of the WAS Bear Hunts. It sounds like such a neat concept and one I am planning on taking advantage of. I don't have UTAH and UTAH is going active this week, hopefully that will make it 38 and growing! For those ops who do activate, remember, just because it's stateside, doesn't mean it isn't a hard to get state that somebody has been trying for. For those in the East Coast, Maryland might be your workhorse state, but for some of us a bit further down the interstates, it is a tough to get state! I thought for sure TX was an easy state to get, after all, we are huge and we have lots of hams... but then again, TX might be to you what Arkansas is to me! So, I am going to be a bear and do my part. Look for my call on the Bear Sked sometime in the near future. Even if I get one QSO from somebody who even has my state, then I'll consider it a success! Remember too that WAS is something that a lot of new ops, like myself, are after. What better way to help along a new operator than to help them make those long distance or rare Qs that are only acheiveable with the beautiful mode we call CW! I know for a fact, that if I were using SSB, I would not have been able to dig out a 2x QRP 419 QSO with Maine on 20m at 9pm like I did that one night.... ![]() |
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