Tag Archives: SSB

CQ WW DX Contest SSB 2012

Last weekend I participated in SSB part of CQ WW DX contest. I didn’t try for some serious score, just wanted to have some fun and was QRV only on higher bands (10, 15 and 20 meters.)

Here are a few notes about my contest activity:

  • Total time on was 15.5 hours
  • During the time, I managed to make 640 QSOs, most of them – 205 QSOs – on 10 meters band
  • My claimed score is 175 648 points (998 QSO points, 56 CQ zone multipliers, 120 DXCC multipliers)
  • 73 different DXCC entities were contacted, one of them (TG – Guatemala) was new to me
  • Most QSOs were made to the United States (113), European Russia (50), Spain (38), Asiatic Russia (34) and Canada (22)
  • 25 different CQ zones were contacted; most QSOs were made to Zone 5 (94), Zone 14 (82), Zone 16 (76), Zone 4 (32) and Zone 15 (26)
  • The longest contact was to Australia, to Zone 29 (Western Zone of Australia)
  • My most favorite band was 28 MHz, where I managed to make a lot of QSOs to North America and Caribbean

I liked the contest a lot, hope to hear you in CW part.

73! Ondra, OK1CLD

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Results of CQ WW DX SSB 2011

Results of SSB part of last year’s CQ WW DX contest were just published on contest website (or maybe a few days ago, I wasn’t checking very often…).

For a few last weeks, I was quite looking forward to them, since my claimed score in CQ WW DX SSB 2011 was better than ever before. (If you’d like to, you can read more about my participation in the contest  in one of previous articles on this blog.)

As I learnt just a few minutes ago, my final score is 447,529 points (847 QSOs, 232 Country multipliers and 79 Zone multipliers), thanks to which I’m the 1st in SO AB LP category in the Czech Republic!!!

This year’s CQ WW DX SSB is held on 27th – 28th October, hope to hear you then!

73! Ondra, OK1CLD


Update 18.10.: Just received a certificate, the first one I’ve ever received for CQ WW DX!

My certificate for CQ WW DX SSB 2011

My certificate for CQ WW DX SSB 2011

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SSB Liga 05/2012

Today, for the first time after a few years, I participated in SSB Liga contest. It’s a two hours long Czech and Slovak contest, held each month on 80 meters band SSB. Connections may be made only between Czech and/or Slovak stations and contest exchange is OK/OM district abbreviations.

I really like the contests where exchange is some location information and not just serial number – because I’m much more interested in where I managed to call to, than in how many contacts the other station made… Another thing I like is that max power that can be used is 100 Watts, which means the contest is a good practice for me, since I use 100W all the time…

In this morning’s SSB Liga I managed to make 92 QSOs into 54 OK/OM districts. Most of them (70 QSOs) were made while calling CQ. My total score is 4968 points and according to contest website, at the moment of writing (5th May 21:34 CEST) I’m on the 21st place out of 49.

I had a really great time during the contest and regret not participating before. If I have time I’ll definitely participate in the next month’s part.

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CQ WPX Contest SSB 2012

Last weekend, just like on every last weekend of March, I participated in SSB part of CQ WPX contest. This time, unlike the year before, I decided for SO AB LP category (TB-WIRES category overlay).

Screen of my log (N1MM) at the end of the contest

Screen of my log (N1MM) at the end of the contest

My best result before this year’s competition was quite low, only 415 QSOs and 280 694 points, so this time I was determined to take the contest a little more seriously – and set my goal  to 700 QSOs.

I started at 00:00 UTC on 80 meters band. To my pleasant surprise, conditions seemed really good. I could hear a lot of stations and had no problem calling them. After first four hours, there were 135 QSOs in my log and more than hundred of them from 3.7 MHz. 40 meters band wasn’t so good, even though I liked a lot e.g. QSO to HK1T from Colombia!

Read More (score summary and rest of the story) »

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ARRL DX Contest SSB 2012

Just two weeks after CW part of ARRL DX Contest, it was the time for SSB part. I was determined to try for my best result in SO AB LP category, but it didn’t start well.

After the contest start, I could hear only a few U.S. stations, but not very well and they couldn’t hear me. After about 20 minutes I gave up and went to sleep, having my alarm clock set for 2 a.m. However, CONDX on the band were even worse then before! After short lookup on the Internet I learnt that reason was probably M Class Solar Flare and decided to go to bed.

ARRL DX SSB 2012 - QSO map

ARRL DX SSB 2012 - QSO map

Mistake was that I woke up quite late, after 7 UTC. My friend told me he managed to make a few QSOs between 4 and 6 o’clock… At about half past seven I managed to make only 2 QSOs, to Pennsylvania and Maryland – and just hoped higher bands would be better… Read More (score summary and rest of the story) »

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CQ WW DX Contest SSB 2011

Hello, today I’d like to write here something about my participation in last weekend’s SSB part of CQ WW DX contest. I enjoyed the contest a lot and even managed to make much more QSOs than in any contest before!

I decided to take part in SOAB LP category, since I had an equipment for all bands except for 160 meters. Here’s the list of what I used:

On Friday evening, I prepared a plan for the whole contest. For every hour I set a certain QSO count I’d like to make during that time. Planned total was 850 QSOs and as it later turned down, it was very realistic.

CQ WW DX SSB 2011 - QSO map

CQ WW DX SSB 2011 - QSO map

Read More (score summary and rest of the story) »

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King of Spain Contest 2011 – SSB part

This weekend I participated in the SSB part of His Majesty King of Spain Contest. I like this contest quite a lot, unfortunately in last few years I had no time for it…

Contest starts at 12:00 UTC, but I was on a short cycling trip and started three hours later. There weren’t a lot of stations on the band and so by the evening I made only about 50 QSOs. I still enjoyed it quite a lot, especially because 20 meters band was open for quite a long time – it was very surprising (for me) when at 18:50, UTC I managed to make a QSO with 9M2CNC from West Malaysia.

On Sunday I made 30 more QSOs and by the end of the contest there were 80 QSOs with 20 DXCC counties (counting also EA and EA8) and 18 Spanish provinces (see table below) in my log. My total claimed score was 5 976 points.

Spanish province QSO count Spanish province QSO count
Alicante 11 Leon 2
Valencia 5 Asturias 1
Almeria 3 Avila 1
Cantabria 3 Castellon 1
Madrid 3 Ciudad Real 1
A Coruña 2 Girona 1
Barcelona 2 Malaga 1
Cadiz 2 Navarra 1
Las Palmas 2 Vizcaya 1

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CQ WPX Contest 2011 – SSB part

Once again, I’m quite a bit late with posting to the blog, since the SSB part of CQ WPX Contest 2011 was held a month ago. Anyway, I still have to mention here at least a few things about my participation in the contest, since I enjoyed it a lot:

  • My category was SO 15M LP, total net operating time only 10,5 hours
  • During the time I managed to make 172 QSOs, resulting in claimed score of 68 252
  • 45 DXCC countries were contacted, 4 of them were new to me (4J,BV,HR,KL7)
  • CONDX were great during the whole context, the best part for me was Sunday evening, when I made a lot of QSOs to western U.S. states (including some W6 stations). Two states (well, three… counting Alaska) were new to me – Utah (confirmed via LOTW) and California (not confirmed yet)

I’d like to thank a lot to all stations for QSOs, especially to those who already confirmed me the QSO via LOTW… See you in the next contest, I hope I’ll have more time and will be QRV a little longer…

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ARRL DX Contest(s) 2011

This year I participated in both CW and SSB part of ARRL DX Contest. I didn’t try
to win in any category, I just wanted to enjoy these contests – in fact the only goal I set was to try to make contact with at least some of nine U.S. states I still need for WAS award (AK, CA, HI, ID, LA, ND, NV, UT and WY).


ARRL CW was three weeks ago and for me it was a big disappointment. As I said here before, I have a little problem with a Morse code and so I managed to make only 53 QSOs (almost all of them on 14 MHz band – only one on 21 MHz band) from 24 states/provinces. Futhermore, I didn’t contact any of the nine states that were mentioned before…


Last weekend I had a much better time in ARRL SSB. I started on 20 meters band and during Saturday afternoon I managed to make 37 QSOs with 18 states/provinces. I know, it’s not very much, but some of them were very interesting for me, e.g. U.S. states of Oregon and Washington and Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia.

In the evening I switched to 15 meters and very quickly made a few QSOs there. However, the band closed soon after that, so I had to stop and wait for the next day…

On Sunday I began at 12:00 UTC and spent the whole time on 15 meters band. It was going very well and I managed to make 83 more QSOs… Nevertheless, I wasn’t completely happy, since once again I didn’t contact any of nine states I listed before. I already made up with the fact that I’d fail this goal and started to close my station, when at 17:35 UTC I noticed some station from Louisiana spotted on the DX cluster… Even though my train to Prague (where I study) was leaving in less than hour and I wasn’t even packed, I decided I have to make QSO with it… After tuning my radio I could clearly hear W5RU working quite a big pileup… It took me some time to call him, but at the end he heard me and before quarter to six I had Louisiana in my log! (Many thanks to W5RU for both the QSO and confirming the contact via LOTW.)

During the whole contest I managed to make 132 QSOs into 32 states and 7 provinces. It’s been probably my best result so far and I’ve been very happy with it, especially since (as I said before) I contacted one new state (LA).

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Results of CQ WPX SSB 2010

I just noticed that the results of SSB part of last year’s WPX contest have been published on the contest website.

You may’ve read about me participating in the contest in one of my previous posts. I learnt today that my final score is 269,280 points (405 QSOs and 288 multipliers).

It is the 4th highest one out of all 19 Czech contestants in SO AB LP, which is my best placement so far in this category!

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