so ive been thinking about this a lot lately after the last CW sprint where my rate was pretty decent on radio 1 but i kept fumbling around trying to get radio 2 doing anything useful. like the theory is solid, while one radio is sending your exchange the other is hunting for a new mult or just scanning for a run frequency, but in practice my station just wasnt keeping up with my brain.

part of it is probably the SO2R setup itself, im running a microHAM MK2R+ and two K3s which honestly should be plenty capable, but the interlock timing between the two rigs when theyre close in frequency is still driving me nuts. ive got bandpass filters on both but i think im still getting some bleedthrough on 40 because the antennas are not exactly ideal separation. anyway the actual question i guess is — at what point in terms of rate does SO2R actually start paying off vs just killing your focus and making you slower overall. ive read that some guys dont even bother with the second radio during a run until they drop below like 80-90/hr but that seems high to me. curious what others are actually doing

honestly the crossover point is really station dependent and also how practiced you are at it. when i first started SO2R seriously i was probably making myself 20% slower for the first few contests just because the mental overhead wasnt automatic yet. now its more like muscle memory but it took a while. the 80-90/hr threshold thing i think comes from the idea that if youre running that fast theres almost no dead time to work the second radio anyway without dropping a call on the run frequency and that hurts you more than the extra qso wouldve helped. where SO2R really pays off for most contesters at an intermediate level is the S&P phase or when your run dies and you need to rebuild — you can keep the rate from cratering as bad while you find a new frequency.

also the bleedthrough issue you mentioned — whats your antenna spacing like? even with good bandpass filters if the antennas are under like 50ft apart on the same band youre gonna have a bad time. stacked verticals for 40 with close spacing will just murder each other.

i ran SO2R for the first time last NAQP and kind of gave up on it halfway through lol. not because it doesnt work but i realized my logging software keyer integration wasnt set up right so every time i switched focus between radios N1MM was sending on the wrong one. spent like 20 minutes fixing it during the contest which was just dumb, should have tested more beforehand. the actual SO2R when it worked felt great though, found a couple mults on 15 while holding a run on 40 that i definitely wouldve missed otherwise