Editor note – Please enjoy this guest post from Jeff Bourgeois VE7EFF.

Today, September 6, I hope to POTA activate Inonoaklin Provincial Park CA-3626 in Southern BC, Canada, located on the shores of the Lower Arrow Lakes. On this activation, I will be using my novel experimental homebrewed Coaxial-Sleeve Dipole. The results were surprising!

We have been wanting to come back to this park since a brief visit to the area last summer.  I especially wanted to come back because, at that time, it had never been activated by anyone. I had plans to activate another park in the area that day.  Unfortunately, I was beaten to the draw just a few weeks ago by another ham.

The other reason I didn’t get here sooner was because it is a 3-hour drive east from our home in Kelowna, BC. 3-hours is pushing the limits of how far I’m willing to drive on daytrips, especially in mountainous areas. We rarely, if ever, do overnight trips.

We left the house very early in the morning on Sept. 6, 2024.  While the countryside is very beautiful enroute to the Arrow Lakes, I kind of dread the drive as the roads are often narrow, twisty-windy and up and down steep mountain passes.  At times it felt like being on a roller coaster.

We arrived at the park shortly after 9 AM.  Inonoaklin Park is a small day-use only park and we are the only people here today, so far.  What a beautiful location.  We can see a couple of small house boats moored in the lake.

There are no paved parking lots here, just sand and gravel.  I found a suitable spot to park my Subaru Forester.  While there are a couple of picnic tables a couple hundred feet away, I decided I wanted to operate closer to the water.

The first order of business is to deploy my antenna system. Until recently, I used my Gigaparts antenna mast tripod to support the Gigaparts Premium 34 ft. Carbon Fiber Telescoping Antenna Mast. But there are times when setting up a tripod isn’t the best option. For example, if I want to activate in a park parking lot area, the ranger may not approve of that setup. Recently I decided to buy the Chameleon CHA Porta Mount, Wheel Mount.  I thought I would use it today, just out of convenience. I have used it in two other parking lot situations before and I’m quite happy with it.

Last year, all my activations were done using my N9SAB dipoles with good results. But dipoles can be more work to set up than end-feds or verticals. Telescopic verticals are on my bucket list to try but I just haven’t got there yet.

I know that End-Fed antennas are very popular and successful, and one day I will give it a try, but I’m kind of hung-up on the idea of having to use a counterpoise wire to make it tune or work effectively. The counterpoise wire seems in essence to really just be the other half of a dipole, laying on or just off of the ground.  And I understand that in many cases, the coaxial transmission line kind of takes the place of the counterpoise.

For this activation I will be using my recently designed and built vertical or sloping ½ wave coaxial sleeve dipole antenna. It’s the one coiled-up in the top-center of the photograph below.  Keep in mind that this is an experimental antenna for me, and I haven’t documented precisely the construction details. I have written a rough description later on in this report. It will be operated as a slightly sloping vertical coaxial sleeve dipole.

Whether I’m using a dipole or sloping vertical, I try to situate the antenna such that it will provide optimal propagation to the SE direction.  Because I’m in the Pacific Northwest, I seem to get good propagation results when setting up the antennas to maximize radiation to the USA South-east. That’s my theory anyway.

I now have the top-end of the coaxial sleeve dipole tethered to the tip of my mast and sloping down at about a 20 degree angle.  The other end is supported by the Gigaparts mast tripod. It has nothing else to do today, so why not put it to work.

There are a couple of good reasons why I have the dipole sloping away from the mast, other than the mast being tilted due to being parked on a bit of an incline and the wheel mount shims being a bit sloppy today.

1. 1. I almost always have mountains obstructing part of the horizon view.  So, raising the angle of apparent maximum radiation helps maximize the signal just above the mountains for best skywave propagation. (That’s the theory, anyway)
   2. My carbon fiber dipole is much more conductive than I would expect; it substantially detunes the vertical dipole when draped vertically parallel directly next to the mast.  So I slope it away to reduce the mast detuning and signal absorption. That seems to do the trick.

      

This shows the 20m antenna construction in limited detail. This particular version is built using RG-8X coax from DXEngineering.

It is interesting to note that the dipole bottom-half is acting as both a 50-ohm transmission line and the bottom ¼ wave radiator for the dipole. This is due to the magic of RF skin effect on the outer conductor of the coaxial line. You can learn more about this antenna concept by searching on “coaxial-sleeved dipoles” on the Internet.

The coaxial-sleeved dipole is typically used for vertical VHF/UHF antenna design.  And I built one for my home 2m transceiver. I actually built 3 versions using different sizes of copper pipe. They seem to work really well. So then I thought, why not try this on the HF bands? This 20m coaxial-sleeve vertical dipole was my 1st attempt at this using RG-8X coax. I also built another 20m  version using RG-174 coax for backpacking POTA activations.

Ok, enough antenna talk. So, how did it work?   Let’s find out….

One funny side note here.
About halfway through the activation, a brief visitor called over to us and asked:  “Are you catching any fish?” Well, I guess from the picture below, it does kind of look like a deep-sea fishing pole.  As we are nowhere near the ocean, I don’t think there are any blue marlin or tuna in this lake. 😊 But, then again, perhaps I am fishing…. Yes, I will be fishing for POTA Chasers!  All I have to do is bait the fishing antenna with a few good CQ’s and wait for the bites!  😉

Today I’ll be operating CW with my KX3 at 10W, powered by a Bioenno 4.5 Ah battery.  I’m keying with the KXPD2 paddle. It works just fine, but I’m finding that I need to burnish the contacts after every few hours of ops. The handy little table is another fine product from Helinox.

Most of the next 6-hours are spent trying to make POTA contacts.
I did take a lunch break, and later another break to go for a walk to stretch my legs.  Such a beautiful day with beautiful scenery.  There is also a waterfall just a few hundred meters from here.

The results are in. The first two 20m contacts are P2P with KI7QCF and W4LOO; both in Utah, at 17:57 UTC (10:57 PDT).  The next 25 minutes are filled with 15 more 20m contacts in the states of CA, CO NC, MA, WI, ID, ON, TX, CA, KS, NM, NY, and OR.  Yes, I know Ontario isn’t a state 🙂

The real action today was on 17m and 15m bands.  So, let me jump around the bands and timelines before I report the best results. On the 12m band, I bag 4 contacts in TX, ON, IL, and GA, beginning at 20:11 UTC (13:11 PDT).

Near the end of the day on the 30m band beginning at 23:24 UTC I logged just 3 contacts in MI, MT, and BC.  I never get much action on 30m during daytime. And at the end of the day on the 40m band beginning at 23:53 UTC, I scooped-up my last two contacts in OR and BC.  I never get much action on the 40m band during the day either. So, now for the real action, 17m and 15m were hot and cold.  It was just a matter of patience and persistence.

17m Band, Round-1:
I actually had two goes at the 17m band first starting at 18:41 UTC (11:41 PDT). In the first go-around I logged 13 contacts including the states of CA, TX, NY, TN, CO, PA, and NM.  But there was one bonus DX contact with  SM3NRY in Sweden; sweet!

17m Band, Round-2:
After spending time on 12m and 15m, I came back to 17m to see what more was happening there.  It was even better this time around.  Beginning at 21:52 UTC (14:52 PDT) I logged 15 more contacts starting with FL, and followed by CA, NY, NJ, ME, VA, MO, and KS.  This time I’m awarded with 3 more DX contacts including EC1R in Spain, F4ILH in France, and EA2BD also in Spain.

Going back in time to 15m, I also had two go-arounds.

15m Band, Round-1:
This first 15m band round begins at 19:16 UTC (12:16 PDT).  This first round only harvested 5 contacts in the states of CA, MO, MI, TX, and IL.

15m Band, Round-2:
The second round of 15m brings in 9 more contacts including the states of IL, MI, MO, FL, and OH.  And 3 more bonus DX contacts in Belgium, Italy, and France with ON4VT, EC1R, and F5MDY.

It’s been a long day of CW ringing in my ears.  My last contact was at 23:56 UTC (16:56 PDT).  Time to pull the plug.

Tip:  Click on the photo to enlarge the resolution for a closer look.

In summary, this was my most successful POTA day ever in terms of numbers of contacts and DX. Perseverance, hopping bands and calling CQ for over 5 hours helped get the numbers up.  15m and 17m were the superstars of the day.  It also helps that we are at or near the solar maximum, too. I don’t win any awards for the most contacts/hour.  Generally, I typically only average about 10-12 contacts/hour on all my activations.  What I lack in speed, I make up for it in perseverance and hours on the air.

So, how much credit should I give to my experimental coaxial sleeve slanted vertical dipole?
Who knows;  chalk it up to luck, solar cycle, band conditions, the antenna, operating QRO at 10 watts, or all the above?  So many variables, who can say….

Alexis had an enjoyable day reading, sketching, and going for walks along the lakefront.  I had a productive and successful day achieving a total of 68 contacts; 8 of which were DX to Europe.

Time to pack-up and make the 3-hour rollercoaster drive back to Kelowna.

Thank you for reading,
Jeff – VE7EFF and Alexis – VE7LXE

 

Equipment List:

Elecraft KX3 with internal antenna tuner  

Elecraft KXPD2 paddle

Bioenno 4.5 Ah LiFePo4 battery

Chameleon CHA Porta Mount – Wheel Mount

Gigaparts Telescopic Mast, 34ft, Carbon Fiber

20m Coaxial Sleeve Slanted Vertical Dipole, home brew, experimental,

Helinox Table One Hard Top

Helinox Chair One