On Tuesday, May 6, 2025, I made a little time in my afternoon schedule to take my Venus SW-3B on a final POTA activation.

I might have mentioned in previous posts (and certainly on the Ham Radio Workbench) that starting in April, I’ve been trying to downsize the shack a bit. This is a process I go through at least annually. My shack/office is very small, so things pile up quickly—and I like to divest myself of gear as best I can.

During this process, one of my readers here on QRPer reached out and asked—on a whim—if I’d consider selling him my Venus SW-3B. I gave it some thought and decided to do so.

I love the SW-3B, but the truth is, I hadn’t used it in a long while. It’s been tucked away in my headrest kit for more than a year, and I just haven’t been reaching for it. That and, frankly, I’ve a couple of MTR-3B LCDs, an MTR-4B, and an MTR-3B Currahee model–I’m flush with super compact transceivers.

I agreed to sell him the SW-3B but told him I wanted to take it out on one final activation—and that’s exactly what I did!

Blue Ridge Parkway (US-3378)

I had to fit this activation into a one-hour window while my daughter was in a class. Fortunately, the class was no more than a mile from the Blue Ridge Parkway. Unfortunately, if I wanted a site with a picnic table for easy operation and setup, I wasn’t terribly close to one.

Luckily, I had my complete SOTA kit packed, including my Helinox chair and Tufteln knee board. With those two items—paired with the SW-3B—I could operate comfortably just about anywhere.

I picked a spot on the side of the road, very close to the parkway entrance from US-25. I knew the drive back to her class would take no more than three minutes.

I paired the SW-3B with my KM4CFT 30-meter end-fed half-wave, which includes a 40-meter linked extension. I figured with this antenna, I could operate on 40, 30, and 20 meters (by removing the link if necessary).

Lately, propagation has been flaky, so having a bit of frequency agility is key to a successful activation!

Gear:

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Radio:

• Venus SW-3B

Battery:

• Bioenno 3 Ah LiFePo Battery (Model BLF-1203AB)

Key & Cable:

• CW Morse “Pocket Paddle”
• Key cable: Cable Matters 2-Pack Gold-Plated Retractable Aux Cable – 2.5 Feet

Other Accessories:

• Tom Bihn Handy Little Thing (HLT) Size 2
• GoRuck GR1 USA
  • HEROCLIP Carabiner Clip (attached to my backpack)
• Helinox Chair Zero
• Tufteln N0RNM Folding Knee Board
• Rite In The Rain Top Spiral Notebook
• uni Core Keeps Sharp Mechanical Pencil

Camera & Audio Gear:

• DJI OSMO 4 action camera with Joby Telepod Sport Tripod
• Sony ICD-FX312 Digital Recorder

On The Air

I hopped on the air and started on 20 meters by calling CQ POTA.

Fortunately, 20 meters seemed to be in decent shape.

Within ten minutes, I logged a total of ten stations—all within a typical 20-meter footprint, including Mike (N7CCD) in Washington State.

I worked three more stations in two minutes, capping off the activation with a total of thirteen and logging N9EEE as a Park-to-Park. I would have liked to spend more time on the air, but my activation window had closed!

QSO Map

Here’s what this five-watt activation looked like when plotted out on a QSO Map. Click on the map image to enlarge.

Activation Video

Here’s my real-time, real-life video of the entire activation.  As with all of my videos, I don’t edit out any parts of the on-air activation time. In addition, I have YouTube monetization turned off, although that doesn’t stop them from inserting ads before and after my videos.

Note that Patreon supporters can watch and even download this video 100% ad-free through Vimeo on my Patreon page:

Click here to view on YouTube.

The SW-3B is a great value

Each time I use the SW-3B, I’m reminded what a great value it is and how well it balances price and performance. It’s a little quirky, but at the end of the day, it’s an effective and efficient little radio!

No doubt, its next owner will create many more POTA and SOTA memories with it!

Thank you

Thank you for joining me during this activation!

I hope you enjoyed the field report and my activation video as much as I enjoyed creating them!

Of course, I’d also like to send a special thanks to those of you who have been supporting the site and channel through Patreon, and the Coffee Fund. While not a requirement, as my content will always be free, I really appreciate the support.

As I mentioned before, the Patreon platform connected to Vimeo makes it possible for me to share videos that are not only 100% ad-free but also downloadable for offline viewing. The Vimeo account also serves as a third backup for my video files.

Thanks for spending part of your day with me!

Cheers & 72,
Thomas (K4SWL)

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