I had a similar experience to Scott. I used the contest to log a few countries. It was nice to hear all the activity on the bands. I spent some time just listening to some operators that really know how to work a pileup efficiently. Although i was not competing, i submitted my log to CQ and LotW so the contesters can get the QSO points. A fun weekend and no reason for the OP to get his panties in a bunch.

Thank you. I wasn't sure but thought that might be the case. My first step is going to be adding the optional SSB filter to the radio. I am also building a moxon to see if this will quiet the interference a bit vs the G5RV. Experimenting and figuring it out is part of the fun.
73,
Al

I know a low pass filter leaving the shack on the feedline helps reduce interference noise made by my HF radio to other electronics in my home and/or the neighbors. As far as i understand, it won't make a difference to the audible noise during reception of an ssb or cw signal. Is this correct? If i have a lot of ambient noise on a frequency, would a low pass filter help in any way?

I know there are other ways to achieve this, which i have done or am considering (changes to antenna config, installing cw/ssb filters in the radio, external dsp units, etc). I was just wondering if the LP filter had any benefits on "incoming" interference. Thanks.
73,
Al