Old Blog
CQWW WPX New USA SO/HP Claimed (W1/Eastport)
Well that was unexpected. My pre-contest optimistic goal was 3400 Q’s. This score is over the current USA record held by KC3R from 2015, but I do not expect it to hold after log check. Location, location, location! The RHR station in Eastport, ME continues to impress. I felt like Superman on all bands, all the time. Almost all of the 40m Q’s were done with the 2 element yagi, and boy does that thing play! The high 3 element would have been marginally louder, but with 20m so good all night it made sense to use the big stack on the 20m radio. A whole bunch of EU on 80m with big signals even through the May static crashes. A guy could get used to operating from Maine, that’s for sure! Big time thanks to Ray and the RHR guys for their support and enthusiasm. Without a remote setup, I wouldn’t be on the air much at all. The RHR system worked beautifully once again also. Looking forward to seeing what they have planned for the future! Remote operating is here to stay, and RHR is at the front of the pack. Missed the EI5 mult. It was nice to go out to dinner with my family immediately after the contest also. One nice thing about a May contest is that no heater is required in the garage. Those winter contests are pretty brutal in Montana even with a heater going! Lots and lots of cool DX worked at all hours. The polar path was outstanding! Man, I love that stuff. 2BSIQ is hard with serial numbers. I was very aware of timing issues with serial numbers and two runs going. I counted *ZERO* times someone tried to CQ on my frequency during a couple of seconds of dead air. I DID have a huge problem with guys plopping down and CQing while receiving to a very weak station send their report. Normal SO2R search and pounce sure seemed easy compared to dual running at least. Congratulations to the big scorers. It looks like several records were broken all over, even with where we are in the sunspot cycle. Very cool. Also congrats to Kevin, N5DX, for another big remote score. The competition really keeps it exciting! Thanks for all of the Q’s, and we’ll see you in July! -Chris KL9A
Storm Damage W2/Taconic Site
On May 12th the Taconic site in Putnam County encountered a Macro-burst and an EF2 Tornado in the area producing 100/mph winds for 10 minutes. The area was hit hard. Amazingly, the tower and antennas survived but the Rohn mast bent and the home lost some of the roof and siding.
The RHR team quickly went into action to do the repair. Here is before and after Pictures
W2/Summit Upgrades 6/6 20M stacks + 3EL 40M
The RHR team in mid May added three new antennas in Summit. We replaced the old with new GXP antennas. The new firepower produces significant gain over the old antennas. Here is a few pictures of the install.
W1/Lubec new 8/8/8/8 stack with WARC
The RHR team is happy to announce the new 8/8/8/8 Innov 6M stack @ 105/80/55/30 on R55 Rotating towers is up by June 1 deadline. The new array produces 23dbi of gain utulizing 39’ booms in stacked configuration. On top of the rotating tower we added a GXP 7L-7B which covers WARC + 10/15/20/40m for SO2R capability. Later in the season the team will be improving 80M at the site. We expect 6M season and contest season to be very busy from this penninsula QTH sitting on the Atlantic Ocean and Bay of Fundy.
Dedicated 160M Amp installed at W1/Eastport
The RHR team installed a custom built 8877 tube 160M amp by QROKing (W1QJ) for the 4/SQ sitting 300m from the Ocean. Side by side is the 6M and 160M amps capable of 1500w with low power drive. Lou built this 160 amp in memory of our great friend and now silent key George K2ZZ.
W1/Calais Repairs and Upgrades
The Northeast USA was whacked by three consecutive Nor’easter storms that destroyed the M2 Rotor at the Calais site. The RHR team upgraded the site with a GXP 7L-7B with new Yaesu 2800 and installed a high gain Ubiquity dish for reliable ISP.
Here is a few action photos:
2018 WPX SSB Contest (Eastport, Maine)
Ray W2RE apparently won the USA SOA High Power by posed raw scores data published. Not only did he with the SOA category, he outscored the top M/M, M/S and SO operations in the USA!
Watch some of Ray’s live stream operation: https://www.
W2/Blueberry Upgrades!
The RemoteHamRadio team is happy to announce that significant upgrades on WARC and 40M have been achieved at the site. The team installed two new antennas which will provide more gain on 12/17/30/40M than the previous antennas. The new antenna models are 11-5 @ 70′ and Duo 30/40 @ 80′ from GXP Poland. To view, the upgrades click the photo album link which is in chronicle order from start to finish: https://photos.app.
KM7W ARRLDX CW
2014 WRTC Champion Chris KL9A (KM7W) operated the W1/Eastport Maine station in the 2017 ARRL DX CW contest. He apparently won the USA from the preliminary 3830 posted results operating SO/HP SO2R from his garage in Montana. His comment about the station: http://www.
