NAQCC November 2005 Challenge

Call     Number    Number
         of words  of QSO's
         made
K3WWP    8         59
KI4DEF   8         37
N2WN     8         59
VA3RKM   8         58
W2LJ     8         59
EA8BVP   8         59
K2EKM    8         ??
NU7T     8         17

Soapbox: K3WWP - (revised) I find it interesting to see how the results of this challenge are going. It seems it was indeed too easy as I surmised, and a lot of you are doing what I did and getting only 1 letter or number from a QSO, thus requring 59 QSO's to complete the challenge. This is going to help determine for future challenges just how easy or hard you like the challenges to be. There are at least three degrees of difficulty with this challenge. You can make it with a minimum of 5 QSO's if you find the right stations to work (hard), or any number of QSO's that give you the letters and numbers you need (easy), or make 1 letter or number per QSO for 59 QSO's (medium difficulty, but you must be more active). I count 21 letters and 4 numbers after double checking my original quick guess and Kevin's count below which means you have to add one more station to his 4 as the minimum number of stations required. Or I guess one station could be a /M or /P since we allow that to count and you could make it with 4 then. Or again in that case, let's see... you could work stations with a call format like HI2/YS6ARO/P and make it in 3 QSO's. Enough of that. HI

(original) Since it was so easy, I decided to make it in a harder way. There are a total of 59 letters and/or numbers in the words of our challenge. Going through my SS results and using a different station for each of the 59, I completed the challenge on the 84th SS QSO. Perhaps by juggling things a bit, I could have completed it earlier than my 84th QSO, but I don't feel like doing that at 12:30 AM which is the time right now as I am writing this.

KI4DEF - I have to agree with John K3WWP's soapbox comment, this one was a little too easy. It took me 37 QSOs to get these calls, and the month's only half over--hi! As John notes, you need 15 (I count 20) letters and 4 numerals, since we could use calls and letters more than once. Maybe the challenge should have been to see who could make all the words using the fewest calls (that could be the tie-breaker). Let's see, with 2x3 calls, that would be a minimum of only four calls! It took me a lot more than that (12). Fun!

VA3RKM - A fun exercise! I had to use one call twice (for an 'i'), although not the same letter in the call twice. I included all 11 of the sprint calls I gained last night.

W2LJ - I tried to make this more interesting by not using more than one station once for any reason; and I tried to use as many NAQCC members as possible. You would think that with the laws of averages, all the letters of the alphabet would appear equally in callsign suffix distribution; but for whatever reason, I found that there were few instances where I worked stations that had an "H" in their callsign. We only needed two "Hs" in these words; and in all the stations I've worked so far in November (126) only two stations had an "H" in their callsign. I suppose if this were Hungary, I wouldn't have that problem, HI!

EA8BVP - It's a interesting game, Congratulations!. I have done nothing special to get all the words. Those QSOs are from my diary QSO. Almost all the QSOs were made in 20m. I look forward to the December Challenge.

K2EKM - Been too busy to do much operating the past 2 months. Glad to be able to spend a little time behind the key. Words filled from the few times I was on (a little during Spartan Sprint, NAQCC Sprint & 80M FoxHunt, and a low-profile attempt during the CQ WW DX test).

RULES:
This is another of our popular alphabet challenges. Since November is Thanksgiving month, our words will be related to Thanksgiving. We asked you to select the words before November 1st, and only our three officers responded so here are the "words" for the challenge and the officer who submitted them.

Turkeys - KB3LFC
Plymouth Rock - KB3LFC
Pilgrim - KB3LFC
1620 - W2LJ
Mayflower - W2LJ
Standish - K3WWP
Maize - K3WWP
Indians - K3WWP

Just make as many words from the list above as you can with the letters and numbers from the station's call signs that you work between November 1 at 0000Z and November 30 at 2400Z. Any number of letters can be used from the same call sign. All parts of a call sign may be used - prefix, number, suffix, anything after or before a '/' used for portable operation. The same QSO may be used in different words. Note that both words must be made for 'Plymouth Rock'

For our newer members who may not be familiar with our alphabet challenges, here is an example of making the word 'Maize' with call letters:

M - K3MRT
A - VA3RJ
I - KI0ET
Z - K5DUZ
E - KI0ET

Submit a list of the words and the stations worked to make the words to us before the deadline. The one making the most words from the above list will receive a certificate. If we receive more than 10 entries, the one making the second most words will also receive a certificate.

Send to KB3LFC at:

E-mail:

You must type that address into your email program. No attachments - keep the log in the body of the message.

Postal mail: Tom Mitchell, KB3LFC, RD6 Box 122A, Kittanning, PA 16201
All entries must be postmarked or email dated before Dec 10, 2005.