RadCom February 2016, Vol. 92, No. 2

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February marks the end of the
2015-6 Super League series
and the start of this year’s
WPX contests.
The 2016 series of 80m Club Championship
contests starts this month. Last year it was a
nail-biting finish between Norfolk ARC and
The Three A’s CG. As the adjudicator Steve,
G3UFY said in his write-up; “In the General
Club category, Three As Contest Group
secured the G5RV Trophy with a lead of just
1,112 points (out of a total of 174,000+),
over second-placed Norfolk ARC. It was nip-
and-tuck throughout the series, with the
Norfolk contingent of 39 members set against
the Three As team of 23 dedicated contesters.
Both teams worked so hard that it is a shame
one of them had to lose out ... however it
does show that it IS possible to challenge the
big contest groups.” Things were more cut-
and-dried in the Local Club category, as “Tall
Trees CG managed to turn out 12 members
to secure the Horace Freeman Trophy by
a comfortable margin from runners-up
Horsham ARC.” The first session is SSB on
the 1st, followed by datamodes on the 10th.
The datamodes are RTTY and PSK63, and
you can work the same stations on each of
them. The First 1.8MHz Contest takes place
on Saturday 13th. Please note that the start
and finish times have been brought forward
by two hours and that this contest is now CW
only. The last RSGB HF event of the month is
the CW leg of the 80m Club Championships
on Thursday 18th. All Club Championships
sessions are 100 watts maximum.
The first RSGB VHF contest of the month
is 2m UKAC on Tuesday 2nd. Then we have
432MHz AFS, on the morning of Sunday
7th. This will be the final event in the 2015-
2016 Super League series, which I think
has been responsible for a huge increase in
the number of entries. In 2005 there were
37 entries in 70cm AFS, but in 2015 it
was 114. After that we return to the UKACs
for the remainder of the month; 70cm on
Tuesday 9th, 23cm on Tuesday 16th, and
6m + SHF on Tuesday 23rd.
There are three 48-hour long contests
this month, but first an apology. I forgot to
include the new UKEICC DX CW Contest in
last month’s column. This edition of RadCom
should arrive before it takes place on the
weekend of 23-24 January, so hopefully this
will be a timely reminder. The rules are the
same as their DX SSB contest, which took
place in December. February kicks-off with
an SSB session of the UKEICC 80m contests,
on Wednesday 3rd. The first of this year’s CQ
Worldwide Worked All Prefix (WPX) Contests
is RTTY, which is held for the entire 48
hours of the weekend of 13-14th. There are
too many categories to list here, so please
check the website. Another contest on the
same weekend with numerous categories is
the PACC (Dutch). It’s a CW/SSB event that
runs for 24 hours. Despite the fact it attracts
hundreds of entries, there were few from
the UK last year. If you submit a log with
25 QSOs or more there’s a fair chance you
will be placed first in your category in your
DXCC entity, so I’m awarding this contest my
first Wallpaper Alert of 2016. The second
48-hour contest is the ARRL International
DX, on the weekend of 20th-21st. Work the
USA (contiguous 48 States) and Canada
only, giving them a signal report and your
transmit power. US/Canadian stations give a
signal report and their State/Province code.
This is the CW leg of the event. The SSB leg
takes place next month. The 1-hour UKEICC
80m CW contest is on Wednesday 24th.
The REF (French) SSB Contest runs for 36
hours, starting 0600 on Saturday 27th. The
final 48-hour contest is the CQWW 160m
DX, which runs for 48 hours from 2200 on
Friday 26th. This is the SSB leg of the event,
the CW leg having taken place in January.
Sport Radio
Steve White, G3ZVW
RSGB HF Events
Date Event Times (UTC) Mode(s) Band(s) Exchange
Feb 1 80m Club Championships 2000-2130 SSB 3.5 RS + SN
Feb 10 80m Club Championships 2000-2130 Data 3.5 RST + SN
Feb 13 1st 1.8MHz * 1900-2300 CW 1.8 RST + SN + District
Feb 18 80m Club Championships 2000-2130 CW 3.5 RST + SN
RSGB VHF Events
Date Event Times (UTC) Mode(s) Band(s) Exchange
Feb 2 144MHz UKAC 2000-2230 All 144 RS(T) + SN + Locator
Feb 7 432MHz AFS § 0900-1300 All 432 RS(T) + SN + Locator
Feb 9 432MHz UKAC 2000-2230 All 432 RS(T) + SN + Locator
Feb 16 1.3GHz UKAC 2000-2230 All 1.3 RS(T) + SN + Locator
Feb 23 50MHz UKAC 2000-2230 All 50 RS(T) + SN + Locator
Feb 23 SHF UKAC 2000-2230 ~ All 2.3-10G RS(T) + SN + Locator
Feb 28 70MHz Cumulative #1 1000-1200 All 70 RS(T) + SN + Locator
Best of the Rest Events
Date Event Times (UTC) Mode(s) Band(s) Exchange (info)
Jan 23-24 UKEICC DX 1200-1200 CW 3.5-28 RS + SN + District Code
Feb 3 UKEICC 80m 2000-2100 SSB 3.5 4-character Locator
Feb 13-14 CQ WW WPX RTTY 0000-2359 RTTY 3.5-28 RST + SN
Feb 13-14 PACC Contest 1200-1200 CW, SSB 1.8-28 RS(T) + SN (PAs send Province)
Feb 20-21 ARRL International DX 0000-2359 CW 1.8-28 RST + Tx power (Ws send State, VEs Province)
Feb 24 UKEICC 80m 2000-2100 CW 3.5 4-character Locator
Feb 27-28 REF Contest 0600-1800 SSB 3.5-28 RS + SN (Fs send Dept No. or overseas prefix)
Feb 26-28 CQ WW 160m DX 2200-2200 SSB 1.8 RS + CQ Zone (Ws send State, VEs Province)
Italics indicate that only provisional information was available. * HF Championship event § Super League event ~ Different bands at different times
For all the latest RSGB contest information and results, visit
February 2016 74
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