Good repair advice from FB.
Welcome to week two hundred and thirty eight of NARC’s contest news
Submissions or comments for this news to thedoctorphil@gmail.com. I particularly need any contest related photographs, you may be prepared to share, to head the news each week.
Contesting can be great fun but I know there’s a reluctance to step into unknown waters. It’s a great way of improving many aspects of our hobby including one’s own performance and the quality of your station. If you have any interest whatsoever please call in to the contest net on Friday evening at 9pm on 145.250MHz FM or speak to any of the regular contesters on 450. Or indeed email me!
Results:-
On VHF
The results of the 144MHz UKAC of 7th April were released on 20th April. Our NARC team of 5 stations managed 6th place. Leading scorer was Stewart G4AFF (903 points) with Steve M5BFL next (774 points). Neil G4HUN/p (614 points) Mike G4KQY (428 points) and Mike G4DYC (on a vertical colinear (171 points). Link here to results
The results of the 50MHz UKAC of 9th April were released on 23rd April. Our team managed 3 entries. M5BFL, 888 points, EI8KN 373 points and G4DYC 60 points. We came 8th in this one but remain 4th overall in the 6m series. Link here to results
The current VHF championship placings are at this link here
In the overall UKAC we are currently 5th, but a long way behind Harwell in 4th. Link here
On HF
Not having been involved I missed some HF results so here they are:-
The 88th Commonwealth contest (formerly BERU) ran on 14th and 15th March. There were several NARC members active in it. The list is as follows:- G4TUK 61st 12h HP SO, G4PFZ 23rd 12h LP SO assisted, G4IVV 24th 12h LP SO assisted, 2E0OBO 28th 12h LP SO assisted, G8VPE 32nd 12h LP SO assisted, G3LDI 37th 12h LP SO assisted, M0RYB 7th 12h LP SO unassisted , G3YLA 27th 12h LP SO unassisted and G4DYC 41st 12h LP SO unassisted. Peter, M0RYB has been battling with Peter, G3LET in this contest each year but can’t quite seem to overcome him. G3LET finished 6th in the same section this year! Better luck next time! Link here to results
The latest DX marathon (2025) results are out. M0NKR and G8OO were both represented.
Richard, G4CDN has been doing a lot of work on 160m and Managed a 2nd place in England in the CQ WW 160m CW contest earlier this year.
The results of the UBA DX SSB contest 2026 are out and Tracey, 2E0CEY was awarded a certificate, 7th in England. Note the unfortunate gender change!
I didn’t spot any other club members in there. Link to results here
This year’s HF championship results to date are at this link here
If people are entering other contests of whose results I am obviously unaware please e-mail me to let me know the outcome and I’ll mention it here.
Contests:-
On VHF
As promised, here is a summary of NARC’s entry in the 70 MHz UKAC of 16th April. I was away and there was only one NARC entry from Mike G4KQY who managed 11 contacts claiming 42nd in the Restricted section with best DX G4FZN/P. It looks like conditions weren’t great. Link here to claimed scores
On Tuesday 21st April the 1.3GHz UKAC ran. I was back for this one. There were 4 entries for NARC G4LPP, EI8KN, G3YLA and G4DYC. Conditions into the UK were poor but there was Tropo to Scandinavia and I was pleased to work Chris, SM6VTZ on SSB with nice clear signals. Link here to claimed scores
On VHF
The 80m CC SSB ran on Wednesday 22nd April. Conditions were quite good but that made the band extremely noisy. Some of our contestants had issues with SO2R operators leaving their run frequencies for a long time then jumping back on them after several minutes when they were now in use by another station. Things can get quite heated, but if you go to a clear frequency, ask a couple of times if its in use and get no reply, that frequency is then yours, whatever others may think! NARC had a lower turnout than usual with 13 stations on, despite this our scores were reasonable and we should be ok. Top scorer for the whole contest looks to be Andy, M0NKR who managed a very respectable 199 QSOs. Link here to logs received
Please let me know if you were on in any other VHF or HF contests and I’ll put a summary in next week’s news.
Apologies if I have missed any emailed reports, some go to spam and some get lost in the huge quantity of junk mail! I try to be diligent!
Upcoming contests in the next 2 weeks (all times in UTC):-
On VHF / UHF / SHF
Before each of the 2m and 70cm UKACs there is an FM leg starting 1 hour before for 55 minutes. I hear almost no activity in this from here but others may have more luck! Rules etc on RSGBCC site.
% Tue 28th Apr. 1830-2130 SHF UKAC
% Sat 2nd May. 1400-2000 432MHz Trophy Contest (VHF championship) – link here to rules
% Sat 2nd to Sun 3rd May. 1400-1400 May 432MHz-245GHz contest – link here to rules
% Tue 5th May. 1900-2130 144MHz UKAC
% Wed 6th May. 1700-2100 144MHz FT8 AC (2h and 4h sections)
Also of interest for some on the vhf / uhf bands are the EU FT8 activity tests – see the following link more information. These are on the first (144 MHz), second (432MHz) and third (1.3GHz) Wednesdays of each month. 1700-2000 Hrs EU FT8 series website
On HF
% Sat 25th Apr. 1200 for 24h UKEI DX CW contest (RSGB HF Championship) – link here to rules
% Sat 25th Apr. 1200 for 24h SP DX RTTY Contest – link here to rules
% Sat 25th Apr. 1300 to Sun 26th Apr. 1259 Helvetia Contest CW SSB Digital – link here to rules
% Sun 26th Apr. 1700-2059 BARTG 75 baud Sprint – link here to rules
% Mon 27th Apr. 1300-1400 QCX Challenge CW – link here to rules
% Mon 27th Apr. 1900-2100 RSGB FT4 contest
% Thu 30th Apr. 1900-2030 80m CC DATA
% Sat 2nd May 1200 to Sun 3rd May 1159 ARI (Italy) International DX contest Phone, CW, RTTY – link here to rules
% Sat 2nd May 1200 for 24h F9AA Cup PSK – link here to rules
% Sun 3rd May WAB 7MHz Phone contest – link here to rules
See Link to WA7BNM for other contests not mentioned above. There are several to choose from!
Wednesdays throughout the year, CW OPS 1 hour mini tests 13:00, 19:00, Thurs 03:00 and 07:00, exchange Name and G if not a member or CW OPS number if you are a member.
See CWOPS website for more details.
Also on Fridays 2000 to 2100 and Mondays 0000 to 0100 each week CW OPS runs the K1USN slow speed CW contests. Any speed up to 20wpm is acceptable. For rules see :- CW OPs SST page these contests are open to anyone.
All RSGB contest rules and further details plus log submission at RSGB contest site
A link to John 2E0TWQ’s site’s Narc contest history page – 2E0TWQ’s NARC contest results page
73 until next week,
Phil G4LPP