Shift expectations ...
The IARU UHF-/SHF- Contest report 2006 (by DL6AUI and DL2ALF) :
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A lot
of technical details had to be discussed via internet in the days before
the contest weekend. But everything was OK when we started loading our
vans on Friday beneath a sunny blue sky. The new 23cm 200W - PA was
ready for use just in time on Thursday evening. Well prepared we were collecting the X17 OMs including Manfred, DK5FA, on the way to the top of the Thuringian Forest. Just arrived (the weather was better than expected) we had our traditional donuts with a cool beer. The erection of the 23cm mast was easy after that, we finished the work just 2 minutes before the rest of the crew arrived. The weather remained good so we decided to build up the 4 x 432-13WL Mē array. While we were working on the array and the other masts the weather was changing into a "nice" rain storm with water hitting us horizontally.  Hard work again like in September but we managed everything until 1300UTC : 5 masts for 6 bands but everyone was soaked to the skin. After changing clothes completely there was enough time to check the weather radar : two more rain fronts to pass until evening. We started the contest 432MHz - 10GHz just on time, the mm-waves were not in use due to the bad weather. Later in the afternoon the rain stopped but the wind was blowing stormy until late in the evening.  On Sunday morning, it was quite foggy, the chiefs on duty had to repair a defective 70cm PA.  After that we started to put the microwave equipment on the tripods with a short delay.  Murphy was hitting us again : the 24GHz PA was dead, detected after the contest weekend. Suddenly the fog was dissolving and we had a beautiful sunny day with clearly visible atmospheric layering : best DX conditions! See the dark layer on the picture below! Feel the tropospheric duct, one of the best openings to G in our long contest history. This was a bit like the legendary October 1995.  Sorry for all the missed skeds. Even with 3 OMs in the microwave shack we simply could not manage all the incoming requests. So we lost some QSOs with our true fellows : we will do better next time. The equipment worked well except the above mentioned problems. The 4 x 432-13WL (each antenna is approx. 10m long) did a great job during the contest, working much better than a "2 over 2" array we had tested some years ago. The setup was a bit tricky because of the guy ropes but we succeeded at last.  See the new 23cm - 200W - PA made by DL6AUI and DL2ALF in its first contest mission. It worked very well without any problem. A short specification will follow later on this pages.  At the end we achieved record breaking results nearly on all bands setting fabulous new high scores. Like the October ' 95 results these records will again last for years. Some claimed scores in October contest 2007 (432MHz - 10GHz, new all-time highs are in red )
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