The ARRL June VHF QSO Party (June 9-11) is a great opportunity to try out your gear for the VHF and higher bands. See the complete information on the contest here.
Under the theory that activity breeds more activity on the VHF bands, I am proposing a coordinated effort to activate all Colorado grids during the ARRL June VHF contest. This effort would collectively raise the scores of everyone in the Rocky Mountain region as we all have more grids to work locally. More importantly, this would be a lot of fun!
How difficult is this to pull off? There are 16 VHF grids in Colorado. If you are not familiar with the grid system, take a look at the Colorado vhf grid map on my web site.
The usual front range VHF stations would have DN70, DM79 and DM78 covered. There are a couple of rover stations already planning to head out east and hit DN80, DM89, DM88, DM87. DM77 will also be activated by one of the rovers. On the Western slope, N0KE is usually on the air from DM69. With a little encouragement, we could probably get a Grand Junction station or two on in DM58. This would still leave DM57, DM67, DM68, DN50 and DN60 open. There may be a local or two we could get on the air or maybe we need another rover to cover those grids. This idea seems to be within capture range.
I think the minimum station should be active on 2M and 6M, with decent Yagi antennas and running 100W or more. This would help facilitate QSOs across the state. Also, a good 6M opening would be a nice addition (not sure who is in charge of propagation this year 🙂 More bands would be better, of course, especially from the rare grids.
We especially need stations to participate from the western grids in Colorado (DM57, DM58, DM59, DN50) near Cortez, Delta, Grand Junction and Rangely. These can be fixed stations, portable or rovers.
If you are interested in participating in this effort and can operate from one of the more rare grids, contact Bob K0NR (bob@k0nr.com). To keep up to date on the status of this effort, monitor The Great Colorado Grid Run summary page.
If you are new to VHF contests, check out “How to Work a VHF Contest” at http://www.k0nr.com/rwitte/vhf_contest.html
There is a special award available to radio amateurs that help activate these Colorado grids. See http://www.rmvhf.org/Great_Grid.html for more information.