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NS Rules

Note

These are the "nominal" NS rules; they may be modified on a weekly basis.  Refer to the Next NS web page and nccc-blue or CQ-Contest reflector messages for details.

Time

• 0230-0300 UTC Fridays (Thursday evening NA time, DST ignored).
  Note:  NS begins at exactly  02:30:00.  A participant may not respond to a CQ or it's equivalent more than 30.00 minutes later -- 03:00:00.  In other words, if the soliciting station receives and sends the call sign of the responding station before 30.00 minutes after the start, then the QSO can be completed and counted.  Otherwise, not.

Frequencies (kHz)

• 1810-1820
• 3540-3545
• 7040-7045 (avoid W1AW at 7047.5 and PSK at 7038)
• 14040-14045 (avoid W1AW at 14047.5)
• 21040-21045

Exchange

• Serial number
• Name
• QTH (US State, incl. HI, Canadian Province, NA Prefix or "DX")

Rules

NCJ NA CW Sprint rules with the following modifications:

• Rules modified to NAQP rules:
  • NAQP Multipliers plus DC
  • Additional Countries considered by NS/NSL to be valid mults:
    1. Trinidad & Tobago (9Y, 9Z)
    2. Aruba (P4)
    3. Netherlands Antilles (PJ0-4 and PJ9)
  • Multipliers count once per band
  • 160 meter QSOs permitted
  • 100 watts or less power
  • Scoring is total QSOs times sum of multipliers on each band
• 1kHz QSY rule for both calling and answering CQs
• 30-minute contest period (see Time above)
• Use of Skimmer or Packet not permitted

Reporting

• Post to the 3830 reflector via the 3830 submittal web page for the NS Ladder Competition within 48 hours after the NS.  Direct posting to N6ZFO is also acceptable.

Guidelines

• Reduce CW speed for slower stations

Software

• Use either the  NA CW Sprint or Internet Sprint module of your favorite logging program.
• If your logging software cannot add band-multipliers to the score computation, then some manual post-contest work will be necessary to get the total score or use the NS Score Calculator which operates off a Cabrillo file.
• N1MM Logger, TR-Log, Win-Test and WriteLog handle NS completely, including proper score computation.  Details are available on the NS Software web page, along with specific information on other popular contest loggers.  If you can enhance this information, please contact N3ZZ.