SOAPBOX: July 2019 ARS Spartan Sprint

K3ESE
not much to be heard on 20 or 80. skinny rig was ATS4A, T1 tuner, 3Ah Bioenno battery, Whiterook cootie, light headphones...1.5 lbs. antennas were the 20m EDZ at 50' and the 80m dipole at 70'.

K3RLL
Lots of activity on 40m this evening but not that many were Spartan Sprinters. Something was going on and apparently I didn’t get the memo. (SMILE)  Signals not too strong but the two best ones were KB1M in NH and KØZK in ME.  My G5RVjr has been beaming NE this evening. Thanks for the nice hour of enjoyable contacts.  72/73 … Don

K4EES
My first Spartan Spring. Enjoyed it.  13 Colonies seemed to be monopolizing the bands to an extent.  Lots for QRN. Only made one contact and he wasn’t participating in the contest, so not sure if it really counts? (Non-contest contacts count as long as the non-contester provides you with the standard information exchanged in the Spartan Sprint. - KI6SN)
K9DRP
Rough night working around the K2x QRO+ stations.  Worked 4 on 20, 4 on 40, and 1 on 80. K3JZD sure put forth a great effort calling on 40. Hope to catch everyone on FOBB this month!

K6CSL
Station is a Yaesu-FT-450 running 5 watts to 3 wire antennas and 1 vertical antenna.

K4BAI
A little confusing with the Firefly QRP having an one hour overlap with the Spartan Sprint. I have suggested to that club that they avoid a direct conflict in scheduling future sprints. Activity was pretty high during that hour, but I was unable to get three of the Fireflies to give
me their power, so I didn't count them in my QSO total. Thanks for all QSOs. 73, John, K4BAI

KB1M
6 Qs for 6 states. Sprint did not get my full attention as was also looking for 13-colony stations. Thanks for the QSOs. 72, Walt

WB9HFK
Icom 7300 at 5W, OCF dipole for 40M, and 150 Ft. random wire for 80M. Weight - 25 lbs. 72, Mark

WB5BKL
K3/10 @ 5W to a 40M extended double Zepp. 8 states this time. Best signals:  20M - N9NK, 40M - K4BAI, 80M - W5ACM. 20M was OK, 40M was so-so and 80M had a constant S-8 noise level.  Nice to
work both Bert and Arn in the same Sprint - both coasts! Had fun.

W5ACM
It was a difficult event for me this month. I could hear many stations “weakly”, but few could hear me. Many thanks to WB9HFK, K4BAI and WB5BKL for their patience so that we could at least get a few contacts during the event. All contacts were on 40M or 80M. I also have a few mechanical issues with the ATS-3a enclosure that need to be cured, but the batteries are holding in there! 72 de Andy, W5ACM, Houston, Texas.

K3JZD
40 meters only. Used a bare QCX-40 with a mini 12v Li-Ion battery pack and earbuds. 2 watts into a 40m Dipole. Used the 'straight key' on the QCX Board. 73, Jody - K3JZD

W5QLF
The normal QRP bandwidth that we have to ourselves was loaded with signals from the 13 Colonies Special Event and the Fireflies QRP Sprint. It was a chore to pick out the "SP" signals. Kudos to John, K4BAI for sending an exchange that worked for both the Fireflies Sprint and The Spartan Sprint. - Joe