KO7AA is a contest-only amateur radio club in TUCSON, AZ. Station trustee, station owner and main operator is Bill, KO7SS

After 20 years of contesting as WB0O in Bottineau, North Dakota, I moved to warm, sunny Tucson in October, 2003. It was always fun being the always rare North Dakota multiplier, and I had many Top Ten SS and Sprint finishes. I was the closest station in the lower 48 states to the geomagnetic North Pole and I also had a lot of disappoinment when the aurora would hit in the middle of a contest and the bands would go dead - I turned off the radio many times in the middle of a contest.

KO7AA / KO7SS is located on 4 acres in NE Tucson. There are 9000' mountains to the North and East which block low take-off angles, but NE (EU/W/K) and NW (JA) both have low(er) horizons of 4 degrees. Not exactly a mountaintop QTH but pretty good for in-town Tucson. Radios are TenTec OMNI VI+ and OMNI VII, and amps are Alpha and Ameritron. SO2R is with Microham u2r and N1MM

The antennas are big: An Optibeam 5 el 20M / 3 el 40M on a 50' boom mounted on a US Tower 89' crankup. The rotor is an M2 OR2800. An M2 6 el 15M on a 44' boom is at the 72' level turned by a TIC Ring Rotor. The tower and beams are painted drab green/flat gray camouflage to keep peace in the neighborhood, and it seems effective as the photo shows. When the tower is down (99.9% of the time), the beams are only 3' above the mesquite trees.

On 10M there is an M2 4 el yagi at 40' on a Universal aluminum tilt up tower, and a Zero-Five 5/8th wavelength vertical mounted as a groundplane on a 6' pole with 24 downsloping radials.

The property came with a 200' X 180' riding arena (graded flat, 3" deep pea gravel surface, split rail fence) that is the perfect vertical site - there is now an 80M 1/4 wavelength vertical over 6000' of radials. It is on a tilt over base, and usually goes up (like the tower) only 6-8 times a year for the big contests. There are RF issues on 160M with the neighbors' electronic devices, so that band is not used.

See you in the next contest!