[MiQP-Mail] Suggestion for Mobiles/Rovers

David Pruett k8cc at comcast.net
Wed Apr 19 22:45:44 CDT 2006


This thread has taken so many twists and turns, that I having a hard time 
trying to decide who to respond to.

To Hank's point, our #1 goal is to organize to have every county 
covered.  I agree with him that I'd much rather have a well-equipped fixed 
station spending the entire contest period to provide maximum exposure of 
the county to as many participants as possible.  That's why we go to CHEB 
as K8MQP with four stations to cover every open band/mode at all times.

The MiQP committee also spends a lot of effort cultivating contacts within 
Michigan clubs.  These contacts generally result in fixed station activity, 
for varying percentages of the contest period.

Still, it's the mobiles that are invluable for filling in the empty 
counties.  A lot of people don't realize that a lot of Michigan has pretty 
low population density.  As a team that has operated MiQP mobile FROM EVERY 
ONE OF THE 83 COUNTIES, W8MJ have seen this first hand.

I think K8MR's philosophy of knowing whether they were the only planned 
mobile for the county is terrific.  Working down the pile benefits the 
contest by providing more exposure, and the K8MR benefits in a way I'll 
explain in a minute.

Having been part of ahe team that did MiQP mobile every year from 1999 to 
2003, and having won the category three of those five years, I believe I 
have a well-informed opinion on what makes the MiQP mobile station 
successful.  And to politely diesagree with Ethan, it's *NOT* running a 
bunch of counties as fast as you can to keep the rate up.  Every year I see 
mobile teams trying to maximize the number of counties they run, and they 
don't often win.

The easiest thing for a QSO party mobile to do is to sit on 40 CW and run 
stations.  If you change counties often enough the rate stays 
high.  However, in reality you're just working the same 20-30 stations over 
and over again, so while you might have a big QSO total, you will suck on 
multipliers.

I've seen more QSO party mobile competitions lost on multipliers than 
QSOs.  If two stations are close on QSOs, the one with the multiplier edge 
will prevail.  I've been on the winning end of this, and the losing end as 
well.

SO if multipliers are the key to winning, how do you get the 
multipliers?  In my experience, there are two strategies, and both go 
against the "run 40 CW from maximum counties" strategy:

- Spend significant time on other bands, particularly 20M.  A lot of the 
time, 20M is good for an MiQP mobile down to the southeast, so getting FL, 
GA, TN, the Carolinas and such is not hard.  What is really needed is 
exposure to the western mults, and that often means low rate CQing on 20 CW 
when you're itching to go back to 7045.  While this does not provide much 
exposure for working stations like N8M, it *is* important to provide 
stations for the western MiQP regulars to work.

- The second strategy involves SSB operation.  With MiQP rules granting 
mults per mode, the mobile station *HAS* to get SSB mults to be 
competitive.  If it means S&Ping fixed stations, so be it.  Unlike WT9U, 
I've had reasonable success getting fixed stations on SSB to answer my 
calls.  While I won't deny that making one's self heard on SSB while mobile 
is a challenge, there have been times where I've had some outrageous rates 
for short bursts like say, 15 minutes.  The trick is to be able to 
recognize when these high-rate SSB opportunities exist, and capitalize on 
them.  I have some strategies in this regard, but I'm not spilling THOSE 
beans :-)

If you put these strategies together (exposure to western mults, SSB) you 
find youself on 20M SSB.  If you can roust up stations, its a great way to 
fill in mult holes.  Trust me, you gotta do it!

I suspect much of this discussion is clouded by the horrible 40M conditions 
we had last weekend.  The K8MR/m score looks remarkably like the K8CC/m 
score from 1999 (first year we tried this) and that was a high-disturbance 
year too.

73,

Dave/K8CC



At 09:04 PM 4/17/2006, James Walter wrote:
>Hank and others,
>
>There was quite a bit of coordination off the list between the mobiles.
>This was my 5th year in the MIQP as a mobile/rover (thanks to K8MR's article
>in NCJ that got me inspired).
>
>I know from my experiences that there will be a core of fixed stations that
>I work over and over again, county to county.  That's why I try to do as
>many counties as possible (within reason) to maximize the rate.
>
>Last year in Ohio Ted, W8UE and I did 28 counties in 12 hours.  That allows
>about 25 minutes per county.  Of course some counties take a bit longer than
>others to traverse so some adjustments have to be made.
>
>Since the multipliers count only once per mode for the duration of the
>contest there's little incentive for me to stay in any one county too long.
>There's not a lot of incentive for me to S&P and call fixed stations either
>because they normally CQ in my face.  I don't know how the other mobiles
>fare but I  normally have a couple of S units more noise on the receive side
>as well which makes it more difficult, especially when the QRP stations
>call.
>
>Of course, if the contest sponsors were to add bonus points for say 50 Q's
>per county that would change my strategy.  If I were to go out as a solo
>operation I would approach the contest considerably different as well
>hanging near 4 corner counties and minimizing drive time.
>
>Please look for WT9U/m in the upcoming Indiana QSO Party the 6th of May.
>
>73...Jim, WT9U
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Hank Greeb" <n8xx at arrl.org>
>To: <miqp-mail at miqp.org>
>Sent: Monday, April 17, 2006 2:10 PM
>Subject: [MiQP-Mail] Suggestion for Mobiles/Rovers
>
>
> >
> > A suggestions, NOT a criticism for MIQP mobile/rover operation.
> >
> > Why not get together as a group (I thimk most of the mobiles are members
> > of MRRC) and decide on who will cover what counties, and divide the
> > number of counties amongst the mobiles.  Maybe this was done, but I've
> > seen 20+ counties per mobile, giving less than an hour per county.
> >
> > If conditions are great, it really doesn't matter how long a particular
> > county is on the air, because people from everywhere can contact people
> > from anywhere.  But, when conditions are not optimal, then only distant
> > stations can contact mobiles from many of the counties, and the local
> > (Michigan) stations do not have an opportunity to gain "rare" multipliers.
> >
> > The fellow who ran four counties, and switched from 40/20 during the day
> > from each of the counties for the "far out" states, and back to the same
> > 4 counties for a tour of 80/75 meters had a good idea.  He was on over
> > an hour in each county on each band, which should have allowed folks who
> > were really looking for the county to find the station.
> >
> > The optimum contest would have a well equipped fixed station in every
> > county for the duration of the contest, and the mobiles would be "icing
> > on the cake."   That doesn't even happen in Sweepsteaks  (for ARRL
> > Sections) so this is certainly a "pipe dream."
> >
> > 73 de n8xx/N8M Hg
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > MiQP-Mail mailing list
> > MiQP-Mail at miqp.org
> > http://mail.miqp.org/mailman/listinfo/miqp-mail_miqp.org
>
>
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