SOCWA

Rules in finnish language: Pohjoismaiden cw-awardi SOCWA

Scandinavian Open CW Award, SOCWA

Object
The object of The SOCWA is to inspire amateur radio operators in Scandinavia and elsewhere to increase CW activity on the HF ham radio bands. The intent of the award is to encourage and reward amateurs to carry on sustained CW conversations rather than short-duration CW signal reports.

Organizer
The Promoter and responsible entity for the award is the Öland Island Radio Amateur Society, SK7RN. This activity is sponsored under the auspices and in close cooperation with The Scandinavian CW Activity Group, SCAG.

Participants
SOCWA encourages CW communication by and between with licensed amateur radio stations in the Scandinavian countries of Denmark, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. The prefixes OY, JX, JW, OH0 and OJ0 also count as Scandinavian countries.
Amateur radio operators from non-Scandinavian countries who register on the award website are welcome to participate and qualify for the award. In this regard qualified QSOs must involve a station in the aforementioned Scandinavian countries.
Members of SCAG, Scandinavian CW activity Group (no matter of Country) participate in SOCWA with a special Lottery drawing.

The activity
This award will be available to successful participants, starting on January 1st each year. The SOCWA encourages unlimited CW activity between participating stations. The award will be available to those stations and/operators who register and report confirmed contacts as described below.
How to register
SOCWA participants register on line at www.socwa.se

Frequency Bands
According to the IARU’s HF band plan.
Recommended frequencies (khz): 1835-1840, 3535-3540, 7035-7040, 10125-10130, 14035-14040, 18085-18090, 21035-21040, 24905-24910, 28035-28040

Call
A response to the call CQ SAX will initiate contact with a station within the SOCWA sphere.

Logging
QSOs should be logged at the SOCWA home page. To qualify for the award, QSOs must be at a minimum of ten of minutes. Both stations have to log the QSO on the website. The time stamps (GMT) of each station’s logged on the website must match each other.

All-embracing rule
Repeated QSOs between two stations are permitted so long as there are no more than one (1) QSO every 24 hours but on different hf bands. Band variation is desired and encouraged. Always consider the CW speed of your opposite. If your counter party is sending at a lower speed, please reduce your speed to reduce errors and to eliminate the risk of confusion.

Non-Scandinavian Radio Amateurs:
After fifty-two (52) or more confirmed and approved QSOs, Non-Scandinavian Radio Amateurs can print, free of charge, the SOCWA Award directly from the home page. There are also Awards for 100, 250, 500, 1000, 1500, 2000 samt 2500 qso's.

Project Managing Group
The SOCWA activity is managed by Mats Gunnarsson SM7BUA, Rune Wande SM5COP, Rikard Wärff SM1CQA (SK) , Roland Johansson SM6EAT and Erik Nyberg SM7DZV. The chair is SM7BUA Mats Gunnarsson with SM7DZV Erik Nyberg as alternate.
The Project Managing Group shall make all relevant decisions and such decisions shall be final.

Two of the group's founders is SK, Rikard Wärf SM1CQA and Erik Nyberg SM7DZV.