Hawaii QSO Party is the only state QSO party that fully integrates digital modes with CW and PHone modes.
You can send and receive four character grid squares (ex: BL10) instead of the usual QTH name (MAU, CA, DX, etc) but ONLY if the mode you use cannot send or receive the required two or three character name. FT8, FT4 for example cannot exchange QTH names or abbreviations, but it can exchange grid squares. So that is what you must log.
If the other station does not send you their grid square, you should still log the QSO. You can enter a fake grid, ZZ00. Please don’t leave the received QTH blank. That will result in zero points for that QSO. Any four character grid will be OK. We trust that FT modes include error correction and that sort of copy accuracy is not as important as WHERE the other station is located.
For multiplier credit, if you log the grid square, you must accept our determination of what multiplier that grid qualifies for. We will use the QTH designation of the FCC mailing address of the callsign you logged. For example you work KH6TU and copy grid BL10. We will look up the address of KH6TU and see the STATE is HI. If it’s HI, then we use the zip code to determine the multiplier name which will be MAU in this example.
Please be sure to have YOUR correct TX QTH as the usual two or three letter mult name (State / Prov / Moku) and NOT your grid square. If you have your grid square as your TX QTH, we will replace it with your QRZ based State / Prov / Moku name.
If your FCC data as shown on QRZ.com is wrong (State or Prov), please let us know as soon as possible. If in Hawaii and your zip code is wrong, please let us know. DX station multipliers are determined by the station callsign.
NOTE: Your logging program may, or may not make this easy for you. If not, please contact your logger vendor.
If your logger does not allow entering a grid square (some do and some do not), then you have a choice. You can use the HQP contest module in N1MM (or other logger) and keep a pencil list of grid squares that you copied on the air. Then edit your log Cabrillo file after the event to include the grids (or QTHs). Then you have one log with everything in it.
The other choice is to keep two different logs. One log is the usual HQP log where you log SSB and CW. The other is a WWDigi type of log that logs your FT QSOs. Keep them separate and then upload both to the log entry page:
https://hqp.contesting.com/hqpsubmitlog.php
You will notice there are TWO places to upload your logs. Use one for your CW and SSB QSOs (Cabrillo) and the other for uploading your FT QSOs (also Cabrillo) if you had to keep two separate logs. We will take care of combining them into a single entry. If your log has no FT QSOs, then use the first box and ignore the other one.
NOTE: Your log(s) must include this line in the header:
CONTEST: HI-QSO-PARTY
For Hawaii stations: ALL FT QSOs will count
For non-Hawaii stations: Only Hawaii QSOs will count but having other QSOs in your log won’t cause a penalty. They will be ignored. So, please don’t delete QSOs.
Here are examples of acceptable QSO lines:
QSO: 14033 CW 2020-08-22 0525 KH6TU 599 MAU W6OAT 599 WA
QSO: 14080 DG 2020-08-22 0528 KH6TU -04 MAU W6OAT -10 CN87
Note that the RST or S/N columns are not optional. Some numeric value MUST be in those two columns. We don’t check S/N values so a true S/N or just 599 works fine. Please send questions to info@hawaiiqsoparty.org
Mahalo nui loa