The rules for the Pennsylvania and Michigan QSO parties are largely similar. QSOs count separately on CW and phone, and both events have an M/M category that does not preclude having simultaneous stations on phone and CW on the same band. If you think keeping transmitters on separate bands from interfering with each other is a challenge, preventing interference from two transmitters on the same band raises difficulty to an entirely new level.

Planning any portable operation begins with finding a place to operate. Michigan is largely rural, with only a few major metropolitan areas. Since counties are multipliers in MiQP, we wanted to find a QTH in a somewhat rare county. For the past three years a diverse group of members from the Mad River Radio Club (MRRC) has traveled north to Cheboygan County to operate the Michigan QSO Party as K8MQP from a QTH owned by club member, John, KN8S. In 2005, the QTH was a residence on a suburban-style lot on a canal off of Burt Lake near Indian River. In 2006, however, the group operated from a 10-acre site on the shores of Silver Lake, near Afton, Michigan. For 2007, the group returned to the Silver Lake location, but with more operators and hardware, in a quest to be the top MiQP multi-multi entry.

Station planning for a MiQP M/M, and especially for a portable operation, is a tradeoff between simultaneous coverage of any band-mode where contest activity exists and the amount of equipment required. MiQP bands are 80 thru 10 meters on CW and phone, with no VHF or 160 meter operation. Experience taught us that 40 is the main MiQP band, with good levels of activity for the entire contest period on both modes. So, we planned separate stations on CW and SSB for that band.

In the previous two MiQP's 20 meters was a pleasant surprise, providing QSOs virtually throughout the contest period. Since the majority of this activity occurred on SSB, we felt we could cover both modes with a single 20 meter station. The next most-important band for the MiQP is 80. At this point in the sunspot cycle 15 and 10 have negligible activity, so we felt we could cover all three bands on both modes with a single station. This added up to four sets of contest-grade radios, legal-limit amplifiers, networked logging computers, operating tables and chairs plus all the necessary accessories.

In 2006 we had just five operators for the four stations, our goal this time was to have at least six. Four 2005 participants - Dave, K8CC, Ken, W8MJ, John, KN8S and fellow outdoorsman Tim, KE8OC - were back, and Mike, WD8S, joined the team for the first time. In addition, Uli, KK8I, was able to participate after a conflicting business trip fell through at the last minute. This gave us our six operators, but John also invited his brother-in-law, Jerry, KD8EGH, and Jerry's son Scott, KD8EGJ, to join the fray. Although Jerry and Scott are relative newcomers to ham radio, they were valuable assets.

The MiQP starts at noon local time on Saturday, so on Friday morning, W8MJ, WD8S and K8CC (in K8CC's Grand Cherokee) and KE8OC along with wife Nancy (in the KE8OC Ford F-150) headed north from Detroit for Cheboygan County. The K8CC Jeep towed a trailer carrying a 48-foot aluminum tilt-up tower, while the KE8OC pickup pulled another trailer carrying a 56-foot aluminum tilt-up tower belonging to Don, K8BB. Both vehicles were heavily loaded with radios, amplifiers, computers, operating tables and myriad necessary radio accessories.

Late Friday afternoon, KK8I started north after work with his VW Passat wagon also full of radio gear and traveling in a caravan with the K8BB/N8NM team, which was planning to operate MiQP as a mobile, kicking off the contest near our location.

For the complete version of this article, with corrections of the version published in the NCJ, view the pdf version.