CONTESTING
Plus: Upcoming Contests: North American QSO Party (CW and Phone), DARC Worked All Europe FX Contest (CW and Phone), World Wide Digi DX Contest, JARL All Asia Phone Contest, ARRL September VHF Contest
I ordered a large stack of blank QSL cards when I began contesting. I filled out each card by hand, then sorted the hundreds of cards by country, found a box of appropriate size to pack them in, and lugged the box off the post office for shipment to the ARRL Outgoing QSL Bureau. It was labor-intensive, time-consuming, and relatively costly. Why some contesters have given up QSLs altogether is understandable.
But today there is a better method. Now I just create a log to answer QSL requests, check my master log for each QSO with one click, and then either copy the information into my QSL log or type it in. Periodically I upload the “QSL log” to a website, select the card that I designed for the correct location, make a couple of clicks — and done. Whether hundreds or thousands, my QSLs are printed in color on both sides, produced with the QSO information and addressee, and dispatched to bureaus, most of which are within easy reach of the QSL service itself in Europe.
This type of electronically-produced printed QSL was, I believe, pioneered by GlobalQSL operating in Israel. As noted below, that service appears to be continuing. Since most of my DX QSOs these days are during contests and predominantly with European stations, and I believe in supporting our national societies, I personally use QDURE in Spain. This saves months of time getting my QSLs into the European system and to the operators who requested a paper QSL or from whom I am requesting one.
Although the Spanish QDURE and similar German DARC QSL-Service were initiated in 2016, their availability is not widely known among American contesters. So below I make the argument for why even veteran contesters should answer QSLs and provide information on how to do so quickly and efficiently using an online QSL printing and delivery service. Tim Duffy, K3LR, has always led by example on QSLing, and below I tell a story about Tim and a young 12-year old contester.
The summer antenna season is coming to a close, and now the time is arriving to test out repairs and improvements. Below also are notes on the August and early September contests.
One final
