2024 ARRL DX CONTEST CW Review

ARRL DX CONTEST CW Review

Aiming to beat last year's score, I participated in the limited SO28MHz Low Power category.

I had the impression that recent conditions were the same or better than last year, so I was hoping to break the record.

At the start, 100Q/H at 100W was an excellent start considering that I participated from the western end of Japan.

In the first leg of the 3-hour duration, which started at 9:00 a.m. Japan Standard Time (JST), 161 QSOs were made, an increase of 60 QSOs from last year.

The second leg, which lasted five hours from around 7:00 a.m. to noon on Sunday, also got off to a good start, recording 100 QSOs per hour. However, after an hour, I was no longer called, and although I alternated between S/P and RUN, I was unable to increase my score as much as I would have liked, finishing with 395 QSOs.

I tried to make a hope in the last two hours from 7:00 a.m. JST, but there were many duplicate QSOs, and I could not make up the score well.

The final score was 477 QSOs and 52 multis.

IC-7610 6ele Yagi N1MM

Inside the band just after the start of the contest

Turn on the 7610's dual-watch function,

Monitor only the band scope without the sub's audio

Set the upper part of the band scope width to 10 kHz,

By always displaying the operational frequency of 10 kHz with auto-scrolling when the left and right frequency edges are exceeded,

This makes it easy to keep in tune and to find open gaps.

It was as crowded as 40m CW in a domestic contest in Japan.

The lower band scope can be set from 28.000 to 28.150, which is very convenient because you can look around the entire CW band and monitor the band openings at the same time.

In a World Wide contest, the bandwidth would be closer to 150, but for this ARRL CW contest, it seemed to only need to be expanded to the lower end of FT8, around 28.070.

2023 CQ World Wide DX Contest CW

I participated in the CQ World Wide DX contest CW, the biggest event of the DX contest, with non-assisted, 10m band and low power.

Conditions had improved before the contest, and I stood at the starting line at 00:00UTC 09:00JST, hoping for a big 10m open.

I started running at as much as possible, free space at the higher end of the band, thinking that since I was on 100W, I would not stand out in the QRM, busy signal, and I spend a moment in the pile, but soon stopped, so I started picking up running stations as S/P from the lower frequencies one by one. This, too, soon ran its course and was sluggish. I achieved 150 QSOs in 3 hours in the morning, which was less than expected.

I am looking forward to the opening of Europe in the evening. As expected, the European area gradually began to open from noon, and the peak continued from around 16:00 to 19:00 Japan time in the evening, recording 100Q/H. 460 QSOs achieved here!

The next morning, I expected the opening of North America, but the conditions were not as expected due to a magnetic storm, so I could not increase the number of stations. However, Europe was good in the evening, and I were able to increase the number of stations. 840 QSOs achieved here!

On the last day of the contest, from around 7:00 am to 9:00 am on Monday morning in Japan, I wanted to increase the number of multis, so I finished the contest repeating Run and S/P. As a result 941QSOs.

The result was a satisfactory number of stations for me, but the number of multis was low.

Zone

S/P(False) and Run(True)

2023 CQ World Wide DX contest SSB on 10m band

Over the weekend I participated in the CQ world wide DX contest SSB on 10 meters low power, non-assisted category.

Conditions on 10mband had been down for a while, but I had high hopes for the US East Coast and Caribbean stations as they were sounding good at the beginning of the contest week.

However, only certain stations could be heard at the start of the contest, 9:00 AM Japan time on Saturday morning, and even, RUN, running at 100W, few were called. Moreover, the stations that could be heard were soon exhausted. Since the contest started under such conditions, I hoped for QSOs with European stations in the evening. Europe started to open around 3:00 p.m., and although I was calling , S/P, around at first, by nightfall I was running and getting called. 400 QSOs achieved here.

I expected to be in North America the next morning. However, conditions did not rise and were similar to the first day. I expected Europe in the evening on this day as well. It opened as expected and the time to RUN and be called seemed to be longer than the first day. I achieved 800 QSOs here.

The last time zone, Monday morning Japan time. Normally, I would have more multis for North American and Caribbean stations, but conditions did not increase and only 4 multis were recorded. Still, I were able to enjoy a strong 10-meter band from the past few years. Next up is WW/CW.

IC-7610, 6ele Yagi, N1MM

By the way, if you have ever looked at a map of the Japanese archipelago, you know that the archipelago is an island from northeast to southwest. From the continental United States, this means that the archipelago stretches almost straight from Area 8, which is located in the northeast, to Area 6, which is located in the southwest. In other words, Area 6, where my station is located, is 2,000 km further away than Area 8 when viewed from the continental United States, and is 1,000 km away from Tokyo, the capital of Area 1, which is located in the middle of the Japanese archipelago. So, QSO with North America is more difficult than 8 Area and 1 Area.

JA area map

2023 OC DX Contest Phone and JA domestic contest

During the weekend I was scheduled to participate in the OC DX contest Phone on 15m band during the day and a Japanese national contest on 80m band at night. 

I drove up the mountain about 600m and set up the HB9CV for 15m and the inverted V antenna for 80m at a height of 8m in a square with the sea in front of it. I started OC DX CW at 3 p.m. Japan time and was able to exceed 100 QSOs in about 3 hours. 

150 QSOs was close to breaking the record, but the sun was setting and it was getting cold on the mountain and rain was forecast for the next day, so I had to retire from OC DX CW at this point. I will try again this weekend to break the record for OC DX CW. 

By the way, I still hold the phone records for 15m and 10m.

Unfortunately, the direction looking down the sea was northeast and opposite to Oceania, as I was aware of the domestic contest in Japan.

Final results of 2023 CQ WPX contest SSB

 The official results of the 2023 CQ WPX SSB held in March are now available on the web and awards can be downloaded. This final result confirms my first place on the Asia continent, following ARRL DX CW/PH. 

I participated on 15m band until last year and achieved 1st place in Asia for both SSB and CW in this contest, and since the conditions on 10m band started to improve, I moved to 10m band this year and aimed for 1st place in JA with low power 100W. 

I am really happy to have won the first place in Asia.

2023 WAE contest SSB on 10m

Over the weekend, I participated in the WAE contest sponsored by The German Amateur Radio Club (DARC e.V.) on 10 meters single band at 100W. This contest only has a multi-band category and no single band. Therefore, I participated in this contest in order to check the band conditions and to contribute points to the European stations.

The conditions for Europe start to improve around 3:00 p.m. Japan time,06:00UTC, so I operated from that time until nighttime.

After the start of the operation, I was able to confirm a European signal there in the waterfall, so after calling a few stations, I started running. It did not become a pileup, but it was called bobbing. 

After a certain number of contacts, I can send QTCs, so I send QTCs in response to requests from European stations. Then, the European stations would spot me in the clusters. This situation continued for a while and I was able to contacts without intermission and accumulate points.

Since I was only operating on the 10-meter band, I did not have many stations to QSO with, but I was able to contribute points and monitor the band conditions. I am looking forward to WW RTTY at the end of this month and WW/PH/CW and ARRL 10m from October.

2023 All asian DX contest Phone 10m band

Last weekend I participated in the All asian DX contest Phone organized by JARL on 10m band at 100w. On 10m band, I could hardly hear any North American stations, but I was hoping for some European stations to open up in the evening as they were becoming more frequent.

The contest started at 9:00 AM Japan time. This is exactly the time for the North and South American areas open. However, I had some things to do, so I started the contest at 3:00 PM. This is exactly the time when Europe opens. However, I could hardly hear anything. 

I found out later that there was a magnetic storm and the conditions were very bad, and this continued until the end of the contest. 

The highlight for me was that I was able to contact with many YB stations. Even if the conditions are a little bit bad, I can still make a QSO with them, which is one of the things I'm looking forward to these days. Besides, YB is counted in Oceania, so the scoring rate is high.

Results

IC-7610, 6ele Yagi, N1MM

False (S/P) True (Run)

QSO Zone by time