PACC 2012 preparations
PI4H contest QTH with pyramid 80m antenna on the foreground |
Well, I didn’t have much time to prepare for the PACC this year. A cold period is always a busy time at the job here. Besides that my mother-in-law had a computer that would not do what it should do. I’ve been busy with that too and it resulted in buying a new computer at the end. Probabely another case of a failing motherboard, a waste of time to fix it. I wish I had some time to work HK0NA on other bands, but it didn’t happen. I hope to check if everything is working and set-up the laptop with the latest version of N1MM at Saturday morning. Then I just go for it starting at 10m but not wasting time like last year if propagation is not good enough. I will participate in the low power single operator SSB section like last year, that’s max. 100W. The propagation doesn’t look good with low sunspots and a high A index, but it doesn’t matter as I am at my best then. I don’t have a good 10m antenna and with good propagation that would be a disadvantage. Last year most of my QSO’s were made on 40m and 80m although you need the higher bands for multipliers. Looking at my log from last year I made 552 QSOs with 122 Multipliers, that’s the score before correction. Most multipliers were made on 80m, 40m and 20m. So with bad propagation that will be the bands concentrating on. I had the opportunity to visit the PI4H contest QTH and made some pictures like last year. The guys were really enthousiastic and did made some improvement on the antennas for the contest. The only problem is that the rotor for the 10m beam doesn’t turn as it is probabely frozen. But overall I think they will improve their contest score of last year. Only 14 hours to go for the PACC start.
My first time hearing the PACC. Very nice contest, and LOTS of activity from the host country. I will mark my calendar next year for a serious effort. Cheers.