Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Is it time for a new contest catagory????

For those of you who are into contesting or occasionally dip your toes into the waters of radio spot it can be a great way to sharpen your skills, make lots of contacts or work on an award. This evening I just finished reading PA1B's blog  posting about his IARU contest adventure this past weekend. Using his FT-817 and an inverted V antenna Bert was on his way to making contacts and that he did a 125 in total. So what is so special about that you ask??....Well the max power Bert used was 2.7 watts. BUT out of Berts 125 contacts 64 were made with with 800mW or less!!!! These QSO's were not just around the corner either 71 QSO's netted him the 1000 mile per watt status. So this got me to thinking.....why not have a QRPp (less than 1 watt) category in contesting?? Im just thinking out loud with this one!
But drop by Bert's blog and read how much so little can do!!


3 comments:

PE4BAS, Bas said...

That would be a nice contest Mike. And then a sub category solar powered into it. Couldn't we make our own contest? I think it could be populair. I have the idea QRPp hamradio is growing...73, Bas

Casey Bahr said...

Excellent idea Mike. I'm really surprised there is not a QRPp contest/category already. As a category it would be easy to implement. As a contest it would be even more challenging since everyone would also have to have those Excellent Ears that Bert talks about.

VE9KK said...

Good evening Bas, I too think that QRPp is on the rise. Having this category would be great for not only contacts but to get some awards on the wall using QRPp power. With all the green that is out there yes a solar sub category would be great. The only contest really that gets close to this sub category would be some stations on field day.

Hi Casey, it's true the skill factor would increase on all of us and we would get to know our rigs very well. With all the advances out there in radios plus the good ears there would be lots of fun to be had.