The 10m challenge has the potential to be a world of fun. Similar to the SOTA theme/mantra, it’s a personal affair and what you want (or don’t want) to make of it.
As most of us know 10m is best enjoyed at the peak of the cycle which is pretty much where we are now. With that in mind, I dragged my self out of my warm bed and onto my favorite local peak.
Despite a bumpy start and unexpectedly sharing my “quiet space” with a troop of others it was a fun outing and worth the effort.
I’m glad you are motivated by the challenge Paul. It was after the USA<>EU S2S weekend that was such a success and your suggestion we should all try to be active for the ARRL 10m contest a few weeks later that made me suggest to my MT colleagues that it was time for a 10m challenge.
I’ve read your report and others and regret not going out as the WX was good here. But I really wasn’t sure if was legally sober enough to drive when I got up and decided if I wasn’t sure then I should not be behind the wheel. It looks like lots of people had plenty of fun though the flare spoilt things for the VK and ZLs .
I’m sure it is - I was looking for you in the table.
My 10W with the KX2 yielded five QSOs with three different callsigns including two summit-to-summits. Happy with that given the propagation - and I’m on the board.
73, Gerard - VK2IO
Hi Gerard,
Well in spite of all the armchair experts saying we would have lots of Es that didn’t happen in VK3. I wasn’t surprised.
So of the pages of alerts I had printed out I managed two S2S. Sadly not yourself.
But it was 10 m or bust and it looked like bust for a while.
I would keep my own offline score but don’t understand the Challenge scoring. 1 point per chaser. OK. A bonus multiplier for each S2S. Is that X1 for one S2S? Not a bonus if it is.
That’s a fine 10 meter challenge start, Paul!
I had fun on the 31st from Flint Peak (W6/CT-225). Various things conspired to keep me off the summit earlier, and I burned an hour monkeying with antennas, finally QRV around 22Z. An S2S with JP3PPL/3 plus QSOs with WN4AT and KD8DEU were my last 10 meter contacts of 2023.
The rollover provided five more on 10 including S2S with JP3PPL/3, 7M4QZE/1 and JE1LHW/3. I listened for several other JA and VK activators spotted on 10/12/15/17 meters only hearing traces. VK3PF was Q5 copy on 28044 around 0110Z, but could not hear my many calls. Another day, Peter!
New Year’s day I had various morning social engagements including riding the Rose Parade route by bicycle before the start. Once the B2 flew over we went for breakfast. By 22Z I arrived home, grabbed my SOTA stuff, then headed to Cerro Negro Benchmark (W6/CT-226). On the walk up I got to see the B2 bomber flyby that started the Rose Bowl game. On the summit I discovered the worst, no battery! Ran down to the car, threaded my way through Rose Bowl traffic to my apartment, grabbed the battery, drove back to the trailhead. If the game hadn’t already started I would never have been able to make the battery rescue trip. Whew!
Once QRV, seven 10 meter QSOs including an S2S with JE1LHW/3 were logged. At 00Z six more QSOs including regular chasers JG0AWE, JH1MXv and JH7IOT were made. I packed up in time to avoid post-game traffic and hear the exciting finale of the game!
The station: 5 watts (KX3) to a 44’ doublet fashioned from one length of CAT5e single twisted pair supported by a 6 m collapsible pole.
I’m looking forward to more antenna experimentation and more 10 meter activity. See you there!
72 David N6AN
David, HNY and many thanks for the 2 S2S. The first one was very hard to copy you but by the second S2S signals improved a lot.
For many more S2S!
73 de JP3PPL
Maybe I should write the scoring in Swahili as English seems to be confusing people.
Scoring for chasers:
For every unique activator you chase on 10m you get 1 chaser challenge point.
For every unique summit you chase on 10m you get a multiplier.
Your final score is chaser challenge points * multipliers.
So count how many different activators you chase on 10m during 2024. Count how many different summits you chase on 10m during 2024. Multiply them together. Ta da! That is your score.
Presumably activator A gets the “chaser” credit for completing a 10m Q with activator B (i.e. S2S) independent of the activator challenge credit activator A gets. Correct?
You are correct. The word bonus isn’t in the Rules but there is a multiplier (bonus by another name) system built in. After decoding the programmer talk I have the following.
For an ACTIVATOR
Score = total valid contacts multiplied by the number of SOTA summits ACTIVATED.
If that is wrong I need the original Swahili version please.
73
HNY
Ron
VK3AFW
Edit.
I have just found the Rules explained in understandable form in posts back in November. Sorry to be digging up old ground. WWHT.
But remember that valid contacts are only valid one time. For example, if I chase you 100 times, the only contact that will give you a point is the first one we had.
Yes it does say “unique chaser”. Something else I hadn’t initially taken in although the Swahili is clear.
That makes it tougher for countries with a small cohort of active chasers to build up a decent number of valid contacts. For them it necessitates working DX so I will be looking for you and other JAs.
Adrian, yes, you win the stuffed toy. (I had to do some Googling to get your point.)
Seems to me, unless the sporadic E gets good or the Sun really boosts the F layer, you’re going need a good bunch of active chasers at least a thousand miles (maybe much more) from your summits, 'cos the ground wave coverage is going to be limited…
That’s how I understood the scoring, but is something wrong with the calculation? as I chased MW0PJE/P on GW/NW-043 and GW/NW-042 on NYD and have a challenge score of 4. I was expecting a score of 2. The challenge log shows me as having 2 unique contacts, but they were both with Pete.