PACC 2025 contest review

Contest: Dutch PACC 2025

Section: SO AB QRP mixed

TRX: IC-7300 @5% (5W)

Antenna 10m: 4 element LFA @14mh

Antenna 80-15m: Doublet inverted-V @12mh

Antenna 160m: Inverted-L with CG3000 tuner

This was my first PACC in which I didn't use any computer decoder for CW. I just tried headcopy. And it went well I think. I hope the final result will tell if I made less errors compared to last years. My goal was to beat last years score. And it certainly did happen. With 106 QSOs more and 16 multipliers more. I think there is still room for improvement, CW should be my first priority in this contest. It costs time to make SSB contacts, CW is so much faster if you are QRP.

Red dots = CW, green dots = SSB

Note that the green dot near Nigeria is wrong because of a wrong locator for a German station. I cannot change that. I was surprised my operating time was less compared to last year. ODX was with a Chinese station but I doubt he was in the contest? For QRP operation it is most time an European contest and less DX as you can see in the picture. Although I worked some Canada on 10m both CW as SSB I didn't hear VE9KK this time unfortunately. However again K1ZZ worked me on 5 bands CW again, something that's almost unbelievable. I think he has the best ears of the world. 

I worked 37 DXCC in last years contest. This year I worked 42, a 5 DXCC improvement. And now....why improvement for next year is possible:

You see that a lot of QSOs were made in the last 3 hours. That was the point were I got more self confidence and more experience in making it in CW pile-ups. I'm shure if I'm able to improve my CW skills I will make even more contacts in this contest. 

It was certainly fun this year. And I felt less stressful about CW. Propagation was actually great on 40m both CW and SSB. I don't have good antennas for 20m and 15m but with CW it seems that it doesn't matter that much. I got a good antenna for 10m but propagation has been better lately.

Previous blogger PA0K Paul made a video when he heard me on 40m SSB. I was surprised by my own signal especially at the second part of the video. Thanks very much Paul.

It looks like Paul was using a webSDR. Don't know which one? But it is nice to hear my QRP signal came trough with punchy audio.

I also made myself a recording from my CW efforts. I do not yet publish it before I listened to it. I might use it for another post.

If you participated in the PACC, I hope you had some fun! If you contacted me, thanks very much. Hopefully till next year. 73 . .