Last weeked we joined the ARI italian contest 40 & 80 meters. Even if I’ve never enjoyed so much the italian only competitions, I must admit that I’ve been enthusiast.I operated the IQ5FI, club station, during the day-light hours, so, mostly on fourty meters, and has been a surprise for me, since the frequency was very very busy. SSB contacts were very difficult due to the high QRM and due to the quick change of propagation with fast openings to north and then to south (we are located in the center).

So happened a couple of times, that while I was calling CQ and making contacts into an apparently free frequency, ather a repentine propagation change, stations were reclaming the same frequency because according to them, they were using that short piece of fourty since several minutes…. (and we too) HI !

During high QRM conditions, RTTY and CW contacts payed a lot.

We made 546 QSO’s in the 24 hours, scoring 118000 points, much better than the previous year were we made just 80000.

As for the CQWW SSB, I’ve taken a couple of minutes of recordings, that I’ve edited and published today on Youtube. Most of dialogs are in italian of course, but I’m sure you will be able to understand most of the QSOs…

Watch and comment video on YouTube
[tags]ham radio,contest,ari,amateur radio,contesting,video[/tags]