High Temp Activation

Today I went to my favorite park and set up my IC705 radio to work an activation on Park K – 2169. The only difference today that was unusual was the fact that it was in the mid-90s here in Georgia, this usually is not a big deal but when I finally got my radio set up I was in the direct sun. This causes the radio to heat up very quickly and I found myself with a radio that was so hot that I could almost not touch the case in less than 30 minutes. So I moved the radio to inside my backpack to where I could shield it from the Sun as the shade moved closer and closer to my operating position. Eventually the shade got to the end of the table and I was able to get the radio out of the Sun. For the period of time that I was working 17 m I learned that the reverse beacon network was not picking up my CQs and the POTA site was not posting my spots either. These two items combined caused a very long and “quiet” period of 17m operation… HaHa. I finally got 11 contacts on 17 m after considerable time of what seemed like endless calling of CQ. I had my antenna strung high in the tree, probably 25 or 30 feet up, ran up over a large limb on the first tree and horizontally at a slight upward slope to another tree as shown in the graphic I made from the photo I captured. I am still using the N6ARA tiny paddle for my travel key and it works wonderfully to this day. I have done well over 15 activations with this key now and it keeps on working perfectly. Once I moved to the 20 m band the game kind of picked up for me as I was able to make another 24 or so contacts in short order. This being mostly due to the RBN starting to see me and I was able to get the POTA spot to take when I moved to 20. The band would fade in and out some as I was working but for the most part I was able to work contacts about one per minute. It seems like that is the maximum speed that I am able to work a Morse code contacts with the speed I am able to operate (about 20WPM) and with the exchange information I choose to send. All in all, it was a wonderful day to get out and play with my radio and to get an activation in at the same time. My next activation will either be with a Ten Tec Argonaut 5 or my PENNTEK TR–35 radio as I want to try one of those out for an activation soon. I have had the TR-35 for a while now and have only used it a couple of times in the shack at home so far. This is a travesty as it is a wonderful little radio. I hope to take it on trips in the future as it is SO small!!!

If you have not checked out the parks on the air, set up an account with them and look at what they are doing. It is a wonderful program and has lots of activity for the amateur operator. There is usually a mode that is something that you would enjoy doing, that will have people on the air almost all the time. Whether you are into digital, CW, voice, or any other mode that people use on the air there is usually something going on with POTA. I even had two traditional QSO contacts today during my activation, complete with name exchanges, QTH exchanges, and even our rig exchanges. So there is no hard and fast rule as to what information is traded in an exchange but they do normally have a minimum of signal report and usually the hunter will send the state they are residing in (but it isnt required from what I can tell), that is about it, anything else is fair game. If you want to know more about it you can go to the Parks on the Air website to learn lots more about it.

Thank you and 73

Parks On The Air Website

WK4DS-David

I started with keeping the battery in the pack but eventually had to also put the radio in it to keep them both out of the direct sun.

The Antenna tuner is usually across the table to get the RF away from me somewhat.

ICOM AH-705 Antenna Tuner with my homebrew cable I made for it that has power, coax and control cable all in one bundle.

Antenna ran into the trees with the counterpoises run along the ground underneath them.

The IC-705 is a wonderful little radio that works really well for portable operations.

Not a bad day running 10 watts into an EFHW wire antenna!

Long lost friends in amateur radio

I have been doing POTA (Parks on the Air) for a couple of months now and have started to notice a few call signs that show up in my log more often than not. One of thsee calls is K9IS. Steven has “hunted” me at almost all of my activations, to the point that I now know his name when he calls me. His call sign just kind of “jumps” off the page at me for some reason. I dont know why this happens but it does occasionally. Maybe this time there was another reason???

Here is the dejavu part of the story. I was talking to my buddy across town (KG4WBI) on the repeater one night and we got to talking about the contact I made to Alaska from my jeep on a RCI Ranger 2950 10 meter radio using CW and I wanted to know the output power I was using that day, (Trust me this all ties together at the end) So I remember that I had used that particular QSL card in my WAS card set for my Alaska card, so I dig out the box and start going through the stack to find the Alaska card and what do I stumble across? A QSL CARD FROM K9IS FROM WHEN I HAD MY OLD CALLSIGN OF KG4WBH!!! Seems that day I was playing with my Rockmite 40 I had built and he was using a Ten Tec Argonaut 5. I just recently bought an Argonaut 5 and plan on doing some activations with it using a straight key soon. (Like next week if I can get the cable built). Anyway, this blew my mind that we had made contact so long ago and now we are meeting on the air reguarly to make POTA contacts and we didnt even know it.

I was using a Rockmite 40 that day and it only uses about 500milliwatts of output power, hence the QRPp note.

I reached out to Steven and shared my little discovery with him and we both had a good laugh out of it. Neither one of us had remembered the QSO back in 2003 on April Fool’s day…till I found that card. This is one of the many reasons I like using paper QSL cards. It is fun to me to wax nostalgic and read back through these cards at times. Especially the ones with additional inserts sent with them that had background info about the operator or some cool little tidbit about the local area where they lived. It is a treasure trove of information. You should look into using paper QSL cards if you have not done it before. It isnt for everyone, but at least take a look. If you want to send just select cards on occasion, you can even make simple cards in photoshop for a specific event and just print photos of them, that has worked for me in the past more than once. I even used the discount version of Photoshop… GIMP. Anyway, let’s climb out of that rabbit hole and get back to the original story. HAHA

This is why I like paper QSL cards.

PS: By the way, the output power to Alaska that day from a modified 102” stainless steel whip mounted on the back corner of my jeep was just 8 watts. The bands were good to me that day.

PSS: If you noticed, my old callsign and my buddies call sign are sequential. We did this on purpose as we wanted to try to have sequential calls when we decided to get our licenses. I have since acquired a vanity call after getting my Amateur Extra ticket, but Roger still has his original call even though he now has his General.

What have I learned from documenting my antenna position?

The short answer … nothing world changing really.

But honestly I have learned a lot about what it takes to make contact with a QRP radio. The most important part is you setting up the radio and trying to make contact with it. I know this sounds obvious but it is often overlooked as people will look at the band prediction information like the space weather forecast and such and get paralysis through analysis from, this. They will not even bother to turn on their radio. This is a sad result that generates no activity and creates a group of operators that do not operate…

The next best thing I have learned from doing this small experiment is that I was not collecting near enough data to have a informed answer in any way, shape, or form. I was literally only recording my transmitter power, the signal reports (and this is totally subjective and not accurate really), and the antenna direction then generating a QSO map of my contacts from that time. This is not enough information to have any sort of relevant value to even bother with documenting the antenna position or elevation or any of that stuff. What I did learn though is that the antenna elevation and the counterpoise make a large difference and how well the antenna performs if you’re using wire antennas. I would attempt to get the wire as high in the trees as possible and it always seemed that the radio would here and talk much better when I did.

Antenna direction

I posted once on Facebook about this phenomenon of antenna direction and the location of the contacts and a reply was made that I had a omnidirectional contact chart mainly because I was where the radio operators were also at. This was said as a joke but it actually had merit. This actually made a lot of sense. What the charting of my contacts does show is that there is almost 0 NVI (near vertical incident) with wire antennas strung in the trees. Almost all of my QSO contacts are several hundred miles away usually showing that the near vertical incident is almost nonexistent with my wire antennas.

What this has basically taught me is that even if the prediction is for poor band conditions get out and try anyway this will normally result in you at least making a few contacts if not getting an activation in a park or just having a good time in general you don’t have to sweat it too much just get the wire up in a tree put out a counterpoise of some form and the antenna will do its job once you tune it with a tuner. It’s all the better if it is a resident antenna anyway as you do not have to tune this antenna to be able to use it.

Antenna Direction

Parks on the air is a wonderful activity and I really would recommend you try it out if you have not done it already it is a lot of fun and I get to operate QRP radio in the park and I’ve become the DX! This is something that I have never experienced under normal operating conditions as a US amateur operator. It is literally not something that happens to me normally. So if you want to try out being the “DX” this is an easy way to do it without breaking the bank from having to travel lol