From: Grant Willis (VK5GR)
Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2023 21:29:38 GMT
Folks, For what it’s worth VK5WIA managed: Contest:

Total     254    3335   93   10  13.1Score: 3,3351 Mult = 2.5 Q’s

 I saw some big scores towards the end – 800-900s from some of the Canadians and ZF2CA. I also learned what the impact was of my lack of CW practice prior to the contest. I hope I didn’t break too many callsigns. It certainly hit my rate that I used to be able to achieve. I also found it really hard to get spotted on the cluster network. A lot of stations I think must run in the non-cluster section of the contest. To know when the band was open, I resorted to scanning the RBN for my own spots to know if I was at least making it through to the target areas. All up I managed to stay on air for 12:08 hours which included a fairly successful run across the morning greyline on 40m and a good run on 10m Sunday evening to G as well as Sunday morning into VE. I also had contact with quite a few of the Africans on 10 and 15m (9J, 5Z, 9G) but no ZS or VU? To the Caribbean I made 6Y and ZF. No 9M however for Asia but at least made 9V. There were almost no VK domestic ops other than the team stations, and sorry but I couldn’t find many of you during my on times. I only completed a 4-band sweep with about 4-5 of you. (no 80m here still, waiting on parts to rebuild and reconfigure the antenna). I had quite a few G and a couple VE stations that I also managed 4 band sweeps with. HQ stations seem a bit scarce as well. Other than VK and G where there were 4-5 each, there really didn’t seem to be any on. I think I found one in VE, none in ZL and that was it. Even the VKs weren’t common although I managed at least one QSO with each of them (except VK3 – sorry Lee missed you somehow). 
Finally, a general word. There were some really grotty signals on the air too. If amateurs want to make a case for high power with the authorities, operators need to put more effort to understanding how to run their transmitters such that they don’t have massive sidebands, clicks and other artefacts on them. In a couple of cases, I suspected RX overload, only to lower my RF gain etc and still see the artefacts present, so I am fairly certain it was the transmitter end. Food for thought. 

Regards,Grant VK5GR as VK5WIA for the 2023 BERU

 P.S. Logs have been submitted to RSGB and copies sent to VK3GK as requested