2008: Guinea Planning

The following article was published in the GMDX Club members’ magazine prior to the team’s 2008 visit to Guinea.

3X5A Revisited

Roger Western, G3SXW

The VooDoo Contest Group won the CQ World-Wide CW contest, Multi-Multi section, as 3X5A last November. This year we will do it for the second time. During the visit we will make some 18,000 QSOs. Civil unrest and hotel refurbishment are the risks: fingers are crossed.

We have done the CQ WW CW contest for the past n-n-n-nineteen years continuously and this will be our 15th straight year Multi-Multi from 9G5AA, TY5A, 5V7A, XT2DX, 5U5Z, TZ5A, 3X5A. We operate from a country for two years and then move on. The trick is to store our 1+ tonne of equipment locally. We then fly in each year with just rigs and computers.

3X5A 2008 – Outline

– Ned AA7A, Roger G3SXW, Don G3XTT, Fred G4BWP, John G4IRN, Rob GM3YTS, Vince K5VT, Mike KC7V

– 7 Elecraft K2/100s + 1KW Alpha amplifiers

– yagis for 40, 20, 15 and 10 metres plus verticals and dipoles for 80 and 160m, plus receiving antennas

– 8 laptops running Win-Test, wireless router, Win-Key, plus internet

Next Year

We will move to 9L Sierra Leone next year. After 3X5A three of us will drive 250 miles to Freetown, with hired bus and driver for a couple of days. We will choose the best hotel and find out about 9L licences. The journey itself will inform us about the state of the road, the middle 50 miles are unpaved, and the border crossing.

C U in November

We will QRV as 3X5A for the full 48 hours on all six bands. There are unanswered questions but we are confident that we will succeed. We have bought airline tickets so we are committed. Next visas; yellow fever certificates; malaria tablets; reserve hotel rooms; renew 3X licences; details about the logistics, station and antennas etc etc.

We all look forward to working you in the contest from 3X5A. Propagation from 3X to Scotland will be magnificent, like a pipe-line – promise! Good luck in the contest, old man. CW forever!