This year we participated as PA9G in the PACC 2017 contest. We operated as The Three Musketeers (Rob PA3X, Gerald PA9G and me PA8E) as multi-op, single transmitter. I practically moved my entire shack over to Gerald’s cabin in the woods. The big antenna plans we had before turned out to be a little too ambitious. We didn’t had that much lot to cover and as a result we had to work with only one antenna we already put up: the Fritzel FD-3. Because of this choice we couldn’t work 80 and 160 meters. As a result we already knew that would effect our score.

Saturday

My Icom IC-7300 was used as main rig and a borrowed TL-922 amplifier from Kenwood. While not from the same manufacturer the combination works great! Saturday afternoon around 13:00 local time the PACC 2017 hits off. I did the first shift until 22:30. Then Gerald took over and worked until 02:30. Rob operated as second operator and did a great job being the second pair of ears, free frequency finder and spotting the clusters to see on which band the most activity was. Personally I never had the convenience of a second operator, but as a result of this experience I wouldn’t do a contest without anymore! At this time we didn’t find any new stations on 40 meters. We could spot on the cluster everyone was to 80 and 160 meters. We decided to sleep for 3 hours and start again in the morning.

Sunday

The next morning I started again at 06:00 and worked until around 10. Then Gerald took over again and finished till 13:00. It turned out a good idea to get some sleep because we had to work good pile-ups on Sunday. Then we had to break down the station and bring all the stuff home. That evening around 19:00 every one of us was laying at home at the couch resonating: “you are 59 in Golf Delta” and “Good luck in the contest!”.

With snow falling the whole weekend, the PACC 2017 was a really magical event. Also I want to thank Rob and Gerald for the great teamwork. While this was their first participation in a contest, they did a very good job! We claimed a 368 contacts with 37168 points. We missed at least 100 contacts as a result to our inability to work 80m (FD3 is only 10,20 and 40). We did tried but it didn’t work out.

Next year we hope to join the PACC again. Hopefully then with 80 and 160 meters!