This contest has been circled on the calendar since moving to the Cayman Islands in March of 2014. My family and I will be here for the next two years so it should be easy for everyone to get the ZF multiplier into their logs. I knew the big club station was already reserved for most of the major contests so I needed to find a location to operate from. I’ve experimented with multiple setups from all over the island and one thing is clear. If you are directly on the water then you will have a good signal.
I decided to keep things simple and built a clone of a butternut all band vertical. The antenna is 26′ tall and uses coils to resonate on 160, 80, and 40. It sure is great to have such a supportive wife (the two kids are supportive but they don’t have much of a choice) for all of my ham endeavors. Our apartment has been turned into a quasi antenna assembly warehouse with aluminum tubing, wire, tools, and all other things strewn all over the place.
A couple of weeks before the contest I decided on a location located about 30 minutes from our apartment on the Northside of the island. This location had a water shot in the three major locations: NA, EU, and JA. When operating from here reports were excellent into EU and NA. Japan just isn’t very strong from this part of the world even when using big antennas. The downside with this setup however is that I would be operating off generator power and have no access to running water. Basically a field day setup, all though I would be operating out of our mini van. My main concerns going into the contest were dealing with any public that came by during the operation and potential failure of the generator. The trade off though was having an outstanding location to operate from. Coming from Arkansas, I’ve always been enamored with the thought of a vertical stuck out in the salt water. Believe the hype. It works great. All though I know the prefix adds at least an S unit to the signal reports! At the same time though everything written about the difficulty of achieving a good and stable ground when having a vertical located direction in the water is also true.
The Monday of the contest I received an email from Phil, ZF1PB/ZF35PB about some different potential operating sites. All of the sites were more isolated than my planned location which was good from not having to deal with any potential problems from the public. However, they still lacked power and amenities. Phil then had the brilliant idea of a house that I could use that would provide running water and a stable power source. The house was located on a small finger shaped parcel of water. Fortunately the long part of the finger was jutting out towards Europe. I would have a water shot for a thousand feet or so then it would be over land to Europe. The shot to NA and JA would be nearly totally over land except for the 30′ that the dock jutted out into the water. I decided that having some safety and stable power would be worth the trade off of a near and far field shot over the water. I’d still be operating in my car though as the coax runs to the house would have been to long for my taste. I also wanted to keep the equipment out of the elements as much as possible. After seeing my new location I decided that since I was giving up a few S units in operating location that those missing dB needed to be gained back. Going into the contest there was a good chance that around 70% of my contacts would be made on 10 and 15 meters. A quick email to my dad and I had a design for a dual band 10/15 meter Yagi on a 10′ boom. The plan was to mount the antenna vertically over the water in order to get a really low angle of radiation. Alternatively an antenna oriented around 45 degrees would give both low and high angles with a small sacrifice in gain. The real word rules and I wasn’t able to mount the antenna vertically so I got it as close as possible with the tips of the 15 meter elements about a foot above high tide.
Stimulating contests always seem to go by in a blur and this one was no different. Apparently there were some flares. I was totally oblivious to them. The contest was dominated by incredible EU and NA runs during the day time and incredibly high winds, rain, and lightening during the night time. The all band vertical fell over into the water three different times Saturday night. Trudging out into the wind and rain to re erect and secure the vertical on no sleep was tough but at least it gave me an opportunity to stretch! I do not recommend operating inside an enclosed vehicle for 48 hours. My butt hurts! There is also a nasty body odor type stink that permeates throughout the vehicle. Add our van to the list of things I need to clean up right after the ZF2DX antenna staging facility otherwise known as our spare bedroom.
160 and 80 were horrible, but I attributed that to my extremely inefficient antenna. The second night was better on the low bands and I was able to work EI7M on 80 meters. Amazingly, I had IW1CAB call me during an 80 meter run at 5:30 in the morning local time. I had him repeat his call and then told him that I must be hallucinating. The next U.S. caller confirmed that he heard him. I also had KL7RA call on 80 meters during this run which was a double mult that I missed on 20. 40 meters seemed decent and I was able to have some short lived runs into Europe. Going into the contest I had vision of big EU runs simplex in the DX portion of the band but those never happened. The second night I had a brief EU/JA run simultaneously when operating split. 20 meters was a real disappointment. That is the one band where a lot was left on the table. Many easy European mults were missed here. There was a nice opening into Europe the second night at their sunrise but I was never able to get anything going. Joe, ZF2AH, did a single band 20 operation and this probably helped to quell the need for ZF on this band. 15 and 10 were non stop rate fest.
Lasting inside that van for 48 hours sure was an endurance test. I alternated between a typical sitting position to having my long legs draped over the passenger side seat in order to give my back and butt some relief. I took two 30 minute naps during the contest, both on Saturday night. My first nap was precipitated by noticing the SWR go high on 20 meters during some torrential wind and rain. I turned the headlights on and saw the vertical taking a swim out in the water. The wind and rain were so high and my rate was so low that I decided a sleep break was in order. My hope was to take a quick nap during which the storm would pass.
Given all the uncertainties going into the contest, my main goal was to not quit. Given good conditions and no catastrophic failures I felt like 5500 Qs would be a good goal. It’s hard to think of terms in winning contests from zone 8 given the point different between here and prime zones like 33 and 9. I knew that P40W would be low power all bands and I thought that having a Q total around John’s would at least be a moral victory. I know that I missed a lot of workable mults on 10 and 15, but it just didn’t make sense to pull away from the big runs to tune the dial (only had one radio).
The toughest part was taking off the headphones at 0000z and looking outside into the dark abyss and realizing that I was now faced with dissembling and packing up the entire station. Operating portable like this has sure helped to increase my patience. I’m greatly appreciative of the support of my wife for this crazy hobby. It’s also nice to have an antenna guru on call when needed. Having a private location with a stable power source was huge and I’m really appreciative of the help that Phil gave me. The hams here on the island are a great group of guys and are very supportive of all of the contesters that come and visit the island. After building some of the biggest antennas of the world, it is incredible to think that I was able to fit my entire station inside my vehicle and be highly competitive.
73,
Kevin ZF2DX
Cabrillo Statistics (Version 10g) by K5KA & N6TV
http://bit.ly/cabstat
CALLSIGN: ZF2DX
CONTEST: CQ-WW-SSB
CATEGORY-OPERATOR: SINGLE-OP
CATEGORY-TRANSMITTER: ONE
OPERATORS: ZF2DX
————– Q S O R a t e S u m m a r y ———————
Hour 160 80 40 20 15 10 Rate Total Pct
——————————————————————–
0000 0 0 0 11 73 0 84 84 1.5
0100 0 0 9 27 8 0 44 128 2.2
0200 0 1 1 141 0 0 143 271 4.7
0300 0 0 0 126 0 0 126 397 6.9
0400 0 6 4 40 1 0 51 448 7.8
0500 0 1 59 6 0 0 66 514 8.9
0600 0 7 74 4 0 0 85 599 10.4
0700 0 31 95 0 0 0 126 725 12.6
0800 3 5 38 2 0 0 48 773 13.4
0900 0 4 36 5 0 0 45 818 14.2
1000 1 40 22 4 0 0 67 885 15.4
1100 0 13 5 0 41 0 59 944 16.4
1200 0 0 0 0 215 0 215 1159 20.1
1300 0 0 0 0 80 160 240 1399 24.3
1400 0 0 0 0 0 233 233 1632 28.3
1500 0 0 0 0 48 64 112 1744 30.3
1600 0 0 0 0 0 228 228 1972 34.2
1700 0 0 0 0 0 225 225 2197 38.1
1800 1 1 0 0 19 9 30 2227 38.7
1900 0 0 0 3 5 211 219 2446 42.5
2000 0 0 0 0 5 153 158 2604 45.2
2100 0 0 0 2 256 1 259 2863 49.7
2200 0 0 0 18 33 94 145 3008 52.2
2300 0 0 0 0 24 135 159 3167 55.0
0000 0 0 1 8 72 0 81 3248 56.4
0100 0 0 1 30 0 0 31 3279 56.9
0200 1 0 71 2 0 0 74 3353 58.2
0300 0 0 1 5 0 0 6 3359 58.3
0400 0 0 7 54 0 0 61 3420 59.4
0500 1 3 53 1 0 0 58 3478 60.4
0600 0 2 7 25 0 0 34 3512 61.0
0700 0 0 48 0 0 0 48 3560 61.8
0800 2 6 2 0 0 0 10 3570 62.0
0900 0 0 14 1 0 0 15 3585 62.2
1000 0 79 38 0 0 0 117 3702 64.3
1100 0 6 1 78 1 0 86 3788 65.8
1200 0 0 0 6 81 101 188 3976 69.0
1300 0 0 0 1 2 212 215 4191 72.8
1400 0 0 0 0 1 210 211 4402 76.4
1500 0 0 0 0 5 130 135 4537 78.8
1600 0 0 0 0 1 200 201 4738 82.3
1700 0 0 0 0 0 136 136 4874 84.6
1800 0 0 0 0 143 25 168 5042 87.5
1900 0 0 0 8 118 1 127 5169 89.7
2000 0 0 0 0 115 25 140 5309 92.2
2100 0 0 0 0 2 164 166 5475 95.1
2200 0 0 0 9 99 0 108 5583 96.9
2300 0 0 0 145 32 0 177 5760 100.0
——————————————————
Total 9 205 587 762 1480 2717 5760
Gross QSOs=5813 Dupes=53 Net QSOs=5760
Unique callsigns worked = 4085
The best 60 minute rate was 279/hour from 2107 to 2206
The best 30 minute rate was 326/hour from 2130 to 2159
The best 10 minute rate was 378/hour from 2132 to 2141
The best 1 minute rates were:
9 QSOs/minute 1 times.
8 QSOs/minute 3 times.
7 QSOs/minute 33 times.
6 QSOs/minute 88 times.
5 QSOs/minute 215 times.
4 QSOs/minute 359 times.
3 QSOs/minute 402 times.
2 QSOs/minute 370 times.
1 QSOs/minute 511 times.
There were 154 bandchanges and 29 (0.5%) probable 2nd radio QSOs.
—————– C o n t i n e n t S u m m a r y —————–
160 80 40 20 15 10 Total Pct
———————————————————————
North America 7 193 391 573 763 1043 2970 51.6
South America 2 7 26 52 49 54 190 3.3
Europe 0 3 156 104 621 1517 2401 41.7
Asia 0 0 6 10 28 75 119 2.1
Africa 0 1 6 8 16 20 51 0.9
Oceania 0 1 2 15 3 8 29 0.5
————————————————————–
Total 9 205 587 762 1480 2717 5760
Number of letters in callsigns
Letters # worked
—————–
3 37
4 2276
5 2179
6 1248
7 8
8 5
9 4
10 3
—————— C o u n t r y S u m m a r y ——————
Country 160 80 40 20 15 10 Total Pct
——————————————————————-
3B8 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
4O 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
4X 0 0 0 4 1 6 11 0.2
5B 0 0 1 2 1 4 8 0.1
5H 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
5W 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
6Y 0 2 1 0 1 1 5 0.1
8P 0 1 1 1 1 3 7 0.1
9A 0 0 5 2 13 18 38 0.7
9H 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0.0
9K 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0.0
9M6 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 0.0
9Y 0 0 0 1 1 1 3 0.1
A6 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
A7 0 0 0 1 0 1 2 0.0
C3 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0.0
CE 0 0 1 6 2 2 11 0.2
CE9 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
CM 0 3 2 1 0 0 6 0.1
CN 0 1 3 3 4 3 14 0.2
CT 0 0 3 8 6 11 28 0.5
CT3 0 0 1 0 2 2 5 0.1
CU 0 1 1 1 0 2 5 0.1
CX 0 0 0 1 2 3 6 0.1
DL 0 0 24 8 100 293 425 7.4
E7 0 0 0 1 2 5 8 0.1
EA 0 0 15 12 33 65 125 2.2
EA6 0 0 1 1 1 3 6 0.1
EA8 0 0 2 2 6 8 18 0.3
EA9 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 0.0
EI 0 1 2 1 7 13 24 0.4
ER 0 0 0 0 2 3 5 0.1
ES 0 0 0 0 3 5 8 0.1
EU 0 0 0 0 7 10 17 0.3
EY 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
F 0 0 19 5 32 86 142 2.5
FM 0 0 2 1 1 2 6 0.1
FY 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
G 0 0 11 10 46 116 183 3.2
GD 0 0 0 1 1 1 3 0.1
GI 0 0 1 2 4 12 19 0.3
GJ 0 0 1 0 0 2 3 0.1
GM 0 0 3 1 12 18 34 0.6
*GM/s 0 0 0 1 1 1 3 0.1
GU 0 0 0 0 2 0 2 0.0
GW 0 0 1 1 5 17 24 0.4
HA 0 0 6 4 9 22 41 0.7
HB 0 0 1 0 6 14 21 0.4
HC 0 0 1 3 1 2 7 0.1
HI 0 1 1 1 2 0 5 0.1
HK 1 1 3 2 5 1 13 0.2
HL 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0.0
HP 0 1 1 0 1 0 3 0.1
HZ 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
I 0 1 8 11 45 131 196 3.4
IS 0 0 0 1 0 2 3 0.1
*IT9 0 0 1 2 8 15 26 0.5
J3 0 0 1 1 0 0 2 0.0
J7 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0.0
JA 0 0 5 1 9 52 67 1.2
K 4 160 328 527 669 940 2628 45.6
KG4 0 0 0 1 2 1 4 0.1
KH0 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 0.0
KH2 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0.0
KH6 0 1 1 1 1 2 6 0.1
KL 0 1 0 0 2 3 6 0.1
KP2 1 2 3 2 4 1 13 0.2
KP4 0 2 6 5 5 3 21 0.4
LA 0 0 2 0 6 13 21 0.4
LU 0 0 1 9 8 14 32 0.6
LX 0 0 1 0 1 5 7 0.1
LY 0 0 2 1 7 15 25 0.4
LZ 0 0 1 1 2 12 16 0.3
OA 0 0 2 4 3 2 11 0.2
OE 0 0 3 0 4 21 28 0.5
OH 0 0 6 4 30 32 72 1.3
OH0 0 0 1 1 2 2 6 0.1
OK 0 0 6 2 16 42 66 1.1
OM 0 0 0 1 4 15 20 0.3
ON 0 0 6 1 15 43 65 1.1
OZ 0 0 1 1 6 18 26 0.5
P4 1 3 3 2 3 2 14 0.2
PA 0 0 5 1 23 62 91 1.6
PJ2 0 1 1 1 1 1 5 0.1
PJ4 0 1 2 3 1 1 8 0.1
PY 0 0 6 11 15 14 46 0.8
S5 0 0 5 2 11 25 43 0.7
S7 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0.0
SM 0 0 3 2 16 30 51 0.9
SP 0 0 5 2 32 85 124 2.2
SV 0 0 0 2 4 11 17 0.3
SV9 0 0 0 1 1 2 4 0.1
TA 0 0 0 1 0 2 3 0.1
*TA1 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0.0
TF 0 0 1 1 2 2 6 0.1
TG 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0.0
TI 0 2 2 0 0 0 4 0.1
TK 0 0 0 1 1 2 4 0.1
UA 0 0 1 4 54 97 156 2.7
UA2 0 0 0 0 3 2 5 0.1
UA9 0 0 0 0 13 5 18 0.3
UN 0 0 0 0 2 1 3 0.1
UR 0 0 1 1 18 61 81 1.4
V2 0 1 1 0 2 1 5 0.1
V4 0 1 1 0 0 1 3 0.1
V5 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
VE 0 13 32 27 63 78 213 3.7
VK 0 0 1 5 1 1 8 0.1
VP5 0 1 2 0 1 1 5 0.1
VP8 0 0 0 1 1 1 3 0.1
VP9 0 0 1 2 1 1 5 0.1
XE 0 0 3 2 4 5 14 0.2
YL 0 0 2 0 4 14 20 0.3
YN 1 1 1 0 1 0 4 0.1
YO 0 0 0 0 5 22 27 0.5
YU 0 0 1 2 6 14 23 0.4
YV 0 1 6 6 5 6 24 0.4
Z3 0 0 0 0 1 2 3 0.1
ZD8 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
ZF 1 1 1 2 2 2 9 0.2
ZL 0 0 0 8 1 0 9 0.2
ZP 0 0 0 1 0 3 4 0.1
ZS 0 0 0 2 1 1 4 0.1
——————————————————————-
Total 9 205 587 762 1480 2717 5760
———— M u l t i p l i e r S u m m a r y ————
Mult 160 80 40 20 15 10 Total Pct
————————————————————-
05 3 116 218 318 381 496 1532 26.6
14 0 2 101 57 323 827 1310 22.7
04 1 45 101 184 269 410 1010 17.5
15 0 1 51 37 202 468 759 13.2
03 0 11 42 54 84 112 303 5.3
16 0 0 2 5 80 172 259 4.5
08 2 15 21 14 19 16 87 1.5
20 0 0 2 11 14 60 87 1.5
09 2 7 15 15 17 13 69 1.2
25 0 0 5 1 9 52 67 1.2
11 0 0 6 12 15 17 50 0.9
33 0 1 6 5 13 16 41 0.7
13 0 0 1 11 11 18 41 0.7
10 0 0 3 7 4 4 18 0.3
17 0 0 0 0 12 5 17 0.3
06 0 0 3 2 4 5 14 0.2
07 1 4 4 0 3 0 12 0.2
12 0 0 1 6 2 2 11 0.2
32 0 0 0 9 1 0 10 0.2
02 0 1 2 1 1 2 7 0.1
21 0 0 0 2 1 3 6 0.1
38 0 0 0 2 2 2 6 0.1
31 0 1 1 1 1 2 6 0.1
30 0 0 1 3 1 1 6 0.1
40 0 0 1 1 2 2 6 0.1
01 0 1 0 0 2 3 6 0.1
18 0 0 0 0 4 0 4 0.1
29 0 0 0 3 0 0 3 0.1
27 0 0 0 0 0 3 3 0.1
39 0 0 0 1 0 1 2 0.0
36 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
28 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 0.0
19 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
37 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.0
——————————————————
Total 9 205 587 762 1480 2717 5760
Multi-band QSOs
—————
1 bands 3085
2 bands 574
3 bands 246
4 bands 124
5 bands 53
6 bands 3
The following stations were worked on 6 bands:
K3LR P40L NQ4I
——- S i n g l e B a n d Q S O s ——
Band 160 80 40 20 15 10
———————————————-
QSOs 0 56 177 329 664 1859