One of the towers at the well appointed station of Ranko Boca 4O3A in Montenegro.

From Georgia in Zone 20, This is the view of the main tower at the station of Gia Gvaladze 4L4WW.

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Planning Your Fall W/VE Contest Season - Don't Forget About New SS Low Power Categories

By Jamie Dupree NS3T  radio-sport.net 
Posted September 25, 2011

As you start your planning for the 2011-2012 contest season, there continues to be an expansion of low power contest offerings for contesters, as extra categories will now be available in this year's ARRL November Sweepstakes.

"The M and U category High and Low power categories are new in 2011," wrote Sean Kutzko KX9X in a special publication about this year's SS contests, announcing that "Unlimited" and "Multi-Op" will have high and low power options.

The ARRL though made clear that the new low power categories won't change anything in terms of the exchange, as Kutzko says that "both power categories still send "M" or "U" in their exchange" in the oldest domestic contest in the United States.

Earlier this year, the ARRL offered up low-power categories in the Assisted and Multi-Operator categories for the ARRL DX Contests, and it won a positive response, as almost 30% of all submitted logs from the U.S. and Canada were in the Assisted categories, the highest ratio ever for that contest according to the ARRL.

Of course, the bottom line is whether extra low power categories will actually mean more logs being submitted. Here's what happened in this year's ARRL DX Contests:

In ARRL SSB, total log entries in 2010 for Single Op High Power, Low Power and Assisted were 2,147; in 2011 with the Assisted category split into a High and Low Power section, those same basic categories saw 2,349 entries, and increase of 202.

The numbers though did not go up for ARRL CW - 2,690 entries in 2010 versus 2,660 in 2011 when you combine those different Single Op categories.

Last year, CQ introduced both Low Power and QRP sub-categories for Assisted entries, and it was a hit in both the SSB and CW contests.

The November Sweepstakes contests begin with the CW test, which starts at 2100 UTC November 5 and runs until 0300z on November 7.

The SSB Sweepstakes test occurs two weeks after that, beginning at 2100z on Novmeber 19 and ends at 0300z on November 21.

UPCOMING RADIO SPORT CONTESTS

CQ WW DX SSB

0000z October 29 to 2400z October 30; more on the rules at the CQ WW web site.

ARRL November Sweepstakes CW

2100z November 5 to 0300z November 7; more on the rules at the ARRL web site.

ARRL November Sweepstakes SSB

2100z November 19 to 0300z November 21; more on the rules at the ARRL web site.

CQ WW DX CW

0000z November 26 to 2400z November 27; more on the rules at the CQ WW web site.