Murray State University Amateur Radio Club
Kentucky State Parks on the Air
KYPOTA Official Contest Rules
Purpose
To promote public awareness of ham radio and Kentucky’s beautiful state park and national park system; to contribute to the recognition that Kentucky has a very diverse and wonderful ecology; to promote camaraderie within the ranks of Kentucky’s Amateur Radio Operators; to encourage contact with other Amateur Radio Operators around the state, country, and world, and to provide additional operating experience for Amateur Radio Operators.
Objective
To have competing stations operating from as many of Kentucky’s fifty state parks and ten national sites (referred to here as Kentucky Parks) as possible. Making contacts from a Kentucky Park to other Kentucky Parks is the goal all stations should strive for. Note: Non-Kentucky stations may work only Kentucky stations located in a Kentucky Park; Kentucky stations not located in a Kentucky Park may only contact stations operating from inside a Kentucky Park.
Contest Date
5th Annual KYPOTA – August 10, 2024
Contest Period
August 10, 2024: – 1400 UTC to 2200 UTC (9 am – 5 pm CDT). Eight hours.
Should contest postponement be necessary the makeup date will be August 24, 2024.
Modes and Bands
-
- Modes of Operation: SSB, CW and Digital
(Only digital modes capable of including the park ID in the exchange can be allowed)
- Amateur Radio Bands: 80, 40, 20, 15 and 10 meters.
- Please honor all band plans.
- Stations may be worked once on each band, mode and park.
Suggested Frequencies
These are only suggested frequencies. Operators should use good amateur radio practices and be considerate of others – do not cause interference.
Band (Meters) Phone (MHz) CW (MHz)
80 3.825 3.530-3.550
40 7.200 7.030-7.050
20 14.250 14.070-14.090
15 21.300 21.040-21.060
10 28.450 28.000-28.100
Entry Categories
You may work this contest as either a Single Operator or Multi-operator, you can use any legal power limit. But only one log should be submitted by each user for each park worked from. Park to Park contacts will be found by matching the logs submitted from each park and having matching contacts with exchanges.
Reminder: Low Power = .1 to 100 watts High Power = Greater than 100 watts
Kentucky Park Identifiers
| Park Name | Park ID | Park Name | Park ID | |
| Barren River Lake | BRL | Kincaid Lake | KL | |
| Big Bone Lick | BBL | Kingdon Come | KC | |
| Blue Licks Battlefield | BLB | Lake Barkley | LB | |
| Breaks Interstate | BI | Lake Cumberand | LCR | |
| Buckhorn Lake | BLR | Lake Malone | LM | |
| Carr Creek | CC | Levi Jackson Wilderness | LJW | |
| Carter Caves | CCR | Lincoln Homestead | LH | |
| Columbus-Belmont | CB | Mineral Mounds | MM | |
| Cumberland Falls | CF | My Old Kentucky Home | MKH | |
| Dale Hollow | DH | Natural Bridge | NB | |
| Dawkins Line Rail trail | DLR | Nolin Lake | NL | |
| Dr. Thomas Walker | DTW | Old Fort Harrod | OFH | |
| “Tom” Sawyer | TS | Old Mulkey Meetinghouse | OMM | |
| Ft. Boonesborough | FB | Paintsville Lake | PL | |
| General Burnside Island | GBI | Pennyrile Forest | PF | |
| General Butler | GB | Perryville Battlefield | PB | |
| Grayson Lake | GL | Pine Mountain | PMR | |
| Green River Lake | GRL | Pine Mountain Scenic Trail | PMT | |
| Greenbo Lake | GLR | Rough River Dam | RRD | |
| Isaac Shelby Cemetery | ISC | Taylorsville Lake | TL | |
| Jefferson Davis | JD | Waveland Historic Site | WSH | |
| Jenny Wiley | JW | White Hall Historic Site | WH | |
| John James Audubon | JJA | Wickliffe Mounds | WM | |
| Kenlake | KLR | William Whitley House | WWH | |
| Kentucky Dam Village | KDV | Yatesville Lake | YL |
Kentucky National Sites
| Park Name | Park ID |
| Abraham Lincoln Birthplace | ALB |
| Big South Fork | BSF |
| Camp Nelson | CN |
| Cumberland Gap | CG |
| Fort Donelson | FD |
| Lewis and Clark | LAC |
| Mammoth Cave Mill Spring Battlefield |
MC MSB |
| Trail of Tears | TT |
| Land Between the Lakes | BL |
Exchange
– Stations operating from a Kentucky Park send their call sign and their Kentucky State Park Identifier. Example: “W4PJC, LBL”
– Kentucky stations NOT operating from a Kentucky Park send their call sign and “Kentucky”. Example: ” W4PJC, Kentucky”
– Non-Kentucky W/VE stations send their call sign and State or Province. Example: “KD4BF, Georgia” or “VE3BF, Ontario”
– DX stations outside of W/VE (including KH6/KL7) send call sign and “DX”. Example: “KL7BF, DX”
Location
All contest stations must be inside the actual boundary of the Kentucky Park they are reporting to be transmitting from. You cannot pull off the highway near a Kentucky Park and claim to be in the Kentucky Park. Our expectations are for everyone to operate on an honor system and follow all the rules in order for this contest to be fair to everyone that participates. This is a RADIO contest and you should put in your log what you heard during the contest – not what you found on the internet afterwards.
Operation from a boat is allowed but the park ID operated from must still be supplied as part of the entry. The operation must occur within the park boundary or from within a bay where the park is located. For example, operations from within a bay on the LBL side of either Kentucky Lake or Barkley Lake will be considered as located in LBL and must be surrounded on three sides by LBL territory. Another example, at Kentucky Dam Village State Park operation within the bay containing the Kentucky Dam Marina is considered inside of the park because the bay is under the control of the park. Likewise, the bay where Kenlake Marina is located is also considered to be inside the park.
Scoring
– QSO POINTS – Each complete non-duplicate contact is worth one point, per mode, per park.
– MULTIPLIERS – Multipliers are the 59 Kentucky Parks (1 per park = 59 maximum). 1 multiplier for each different Kentucky Park contacted
– FINAL SCORE – Multiply QSO points times the total number of multipliers.
– Contestants contacting the host club, K4MSU, W4GZ or host club authorized special event stations K4E and K4Y, can receive 3 QSO bonus points for each contact on each band.
– Murray State University Amateur Radio Club (MSUARC) members and logs submitted under the K4MSU, W4GZ or authorized special event callsigns K4E and K4Y will be considered check logs only.
– Send in a standard Cabrillo file only.
– It is recommended contestants use an N1MM KYPOTA contest template that offers an exchange sent and one received. A link to the template can be found on our web site. To use them all you need to do is copy the file to the UDC folder found in My Documents->N1MM Logger+->UserDefinedContest, and then restart N1MM. Your logs should show the exchange you send (your park ID, if you are operating from a Kypark, etc) and the exchange you received (park/state/province), as well as the time and signal report.
The contest will be split into two groups, those entering logs from a park, and those who are hunting from home, regardless of category.
Example:
W4PJC operating from Kenlake State Park – 10 contacts on 80 meters, 15 contacts on 40 meters, 12 contacts on 15 meters, Total Contacts = 37, plus 3 bonus points for contacting a K4MSU site. Number of different Kentucky State Parks contacted = 10, Total score = 10 x (37+3) = 400.
Miscellaneous
-Call signs and exchange information must be received, confirmed and logged by both stations for a complete contest QSO.
– No cross-mode contacts and no credit for contacts made through repeaters or satellites.
– Please honor all band plans.
– No station may claim simultaneous operation of the same call sign in more than one Kentucky Park, State, Province or Country at the same time. Except the host club call sign, K4MSU.
– No individual shall make a QSO utilizing more than one call sign.
– Stations inside a Kentucky Park must make a minimum of four contacts. Three of the four contacts being made to three other (different from where you are transmitting from) Kentucky Park stations. This gives others the opportunity to contact your Kentucky Park.
– Multi-Operator entries may only use one call sign during the contest.
– Contacts made with captive stations do not support the stated purpose of KYPOTA and will not be counted. This includes contacts made with other passengers in a mobile, as well as so-called “California Train operations”, wherein a group of mobiles travel together for purposes of making contacts within the group.
– Soliciting for contacts is encouraged to promote more contacts being made during the contest. You can ask a station to meet you on a different band in order to make an additional contact. You should not self-spot on a cluster or spotting network, but you can ask another ham operator that is not in your group to spot you.
– Use of spotting networks is allowed. Since the use of mobile smart phones and wi-fi in Kentucky Parks is now commonplace, looking up spots on clusters is easy to do. This will encourage additional contacts for everyone during the contest.
– Remote operations are not allowed. Remote operations are defined as an operator having a transmitter at one location (example: in a State Park) and is controlling it remotely from another location (example: outside the State Park). Or an operator has a receiver in a different location than the transmitter where the operator is located. For this contest the operator, transmitter and receiver must be in the same location.
– If you are multi-op, you can get assistance from other humans in your operation. We encourage the monitoring of packet or spotting systems during the contest so additional awareness of the contest can be made to encourage participation during the contest.
– Decisions of the Kentucky Parks On The Air Contest Committee are final.
Reporting
– e-mail entries to: KYPOTA@murray-ky.net .
– Logs must clearly indicate UTC time (not local time), Band, Mode, Call Sign Contacted, State/Province/DX, or Kentucky Park Identifier received for all QSOs as applicable.
– ADIF or Cabrillo files are requested to be used for log submissions.
– E-mailed logs must be sent to KYPOTA@murray-ky.net and must be sent in no later than August 24, 2024, or 14 days after the end of the contest. Logs arriving after the 14 day entry window will be considered check logs
Reasons Why Your Log May Be Considered a ‘Checklog’
– Log sheet(s) missing – UTC times not listed – exchanges missing.
– Log sheet arrives past the due date.
– Part or all of the operation occurred outside of the boundary of a Kentucky park or outside of Kentucky for a park that spans states.
If you have any questions, please contact the KYPOTA team by e-mail: KYPOTA@murray-ky.net
Awards
Electronic Certificates will be awarded to:
– 1st place – in each of the entry categories (Overall High Score entry will also be noted on the top winner’s certificate)
Logs must be emailed no later than August 24, 2024 or 14 days after the contest.
Cabrillo Logs may be E-mailed to: KYPOTA@murray-ky.net.
MSU Amateur Radio Club 