I’m lucky enough to live in a part of the world where–by and large–the weather is pretty darn nice.
In fact, I recently received a comment from a reader who jokingly said that I should work for the tourism board of western North Carolina because the weather always seems so pleasant in my POTA/SOTA videos.
It’s true: most of the time I hit the field to play radio, the weather is very pleasant.
That said, you see more of these “fair weather” activations because I tend not to make videos of ones in poor conditions mainly because I don’t like managing the camera in high winds, heavy rains, or even super cold conditions–especially when I want to get in and out of the field quickly. The camera tends slows everything down.
On Friday, December 1, 2023, though, I decided to do a park activation in the rain and make a video! Here’s my field report:
Pisgah National Forest (K-4510)
That Friday morning, I dropped my daughters off at classes, then made my way to the Mills River library to put the finishing touches on a field report and publish it. It was rainy and I wasn’t complaining; it had been a very dry fall in WNC up to that point.
After I published my field report and attempted to catch up on the email backlog a bit, I hopped in the car and headed to the Sycamore Flats picnic area in Pisgah National Forest (K-4510) and Pisgah Game Lands (K-6937).
That day, knowing it would be soggy, I packed my Discovery TX-500 which is pretty much rain-proof. By this, I mean that it’s designed to cope with rain, but it’s not designed to be completely submerged in water.
Truth be told, I had no intention of making an activation video. Once I arrived on site, though, I thought, “Why the heck not?” After all, other than being rainy and chilly, conditions were pretty pleasant. That and my OSMO action camera is completely waterproof.
I grabbed the camera and started filming the activation while closing up the car.
Setting Up
When playing POTA in the rain, I tend to select picnic tables or sites that are under the canopy of trees if at all possible. Trees not only provide antenna supports, but they also help divert a bit of the rain.
I found an ideal site under the canopy of a few hemlocks.
I deployed my PackTenna end-fed half-wave (EFHW) oriented (nearly) vertically and with the feed point close to the tree trunk so that it would be better protected from the rain. I wasn’t worried about the antenna getting wet, but I also didn’t want the toroid and windings to get completely soaked either. It’s never a bad idea to use what bit of natural protection the trees can offer.
As you can see in the photo above, I had my TX-500 completely exposed, but the battery, in-line fuse, and (to some extent) the speaker mic were all protected in the TX-500’s Telesin Case.
Many thanks to Alan (W2AEW) who shares the following guest post:
A self-imposed POTA Park-to-Park Challenge…
by Alan (W2AEW)
One of the things I love about the Parks on the Air program is that every activation is a bit of small challenge. What will the band be like? What antenna will I be able to deploy when I get there? Will I have a spot to setup? Will my CW ‘ear’ be properly tuned up? You get the picture…
There are a few parks that I activate much more than others – call them my “home” parks. These are the ones that are close to my home, easy to get to and setup. One in particular, Washington Rock State Park (K-1635), is certainly the closest. It has some interesting Revolutionary War History.
Not only is this park very close to my home, it also has pretty good elevation (about 500’) for this part of New Jersey. In fact, the local fire department hangs a very large illuminated star during the Christmas season at their building that is adjacent to this park.
This star can be seen for miles to the South and East of the ridge.
It’s no wonder that I’ve activated this park more than 20 times in the last year and half.
My XYL Nancy was *very* generous to me this year at Christmas – gifting me a new Begali Adventure CW paddle! She even had it engraved with my call:
I wanted to think of a unique way to celebrate my first POTA activation using this paddle. I would be going to K-1635, so the location would be very familiar. Therefore, I thought of an interesting self-imposed challenge… Attempt to complete an activation with ONLY Park to Park contacts!
As I thought about this, I figured my best chance of success would be to operate on the weekend (significantly more parks are active), and use my most efficient multi-band antenna (a 40m EFHW).
Being an engineer, I’m use to having goals. I’m also used to having additional constraints imposed – let’s call them stretch-goals. Possible stretch goals for this P2P Activation Challenge could be:
Operate QRP (all of my POTA activations are QRP, so not much of a stretch)
Operate only CW (nearly all of my activations are CW, and this helps with the QRP goal too)
Attempt this using a more compromised antenna
Attempt this during a weekday
It turns out I had a few free hours on Wednesday, December 27, 2023 to play radio… It was kind of a dismal day weather-wise. I figured it might be the day to attempt this challenge. The wet weather had me thinking that I’d setup my SuperAntenna MP1 vertical instead of using the 40m EFHW (and having it and the throw line get all wet and muddy). The stage was set for the challenge including the stretch goals.
I setup the MP1 on the bedrail of my truck, using an MFJ-1976 ten-foot whip on top.
The band conditions were in pretty good shape, so I figured I had a shot. I setup the rig inside the truck because of the rain, and got the iPad going with the POTA spotting page to see who I could hunt. I logged four P2P contacts in the first 20 minutes, so there was hope!
In the end, it took about 90 minutes to log 11 Park-to-Park contacts. Well, actually 12, since one of them turned out to be a two-fer. I logged a few “familiar” activators, including Teri KO4WFP – a frequent contributor of Field Reports here, and Jonathan KM4CFT – running a two-fer out of North Carolina. There were a few that I noted in my paper log because I had a good copy on them, but ultimately couldn’t bust thru the pile ups there were getting (like K7SHR at K-10946 in WY and K0YY at K-4416 in TX).
A personal thanks to all of the activators in my log that helped me reach my P2P Challenge:
KL7NL at K-6945 in NC
KM4CFT at K-8313 and K-3378 in NC
WD4AWD at K-2982 in TN
KU8T at K-4208 in IN
KO4WFP at K-0659 in FL
W0ABE at K-10532 in CO
N4XTT at K-2982 in TN
NM1L at K-7475 in FL
KC1BDJ at K-7879 in FL
KI5GBQ at K-7687 in OK
NS1C at K-2420 in MA
All contacts were on 20m with the exception of NS1C on 40m. All were CW.
This was a fun little challenge, one that I hope to repeat in the future. Hope to see you all on the air – POTA-ON!
Many thanks to my buddy, Don (W7SSB), who shares the following photos and product brochure of the yet-to-be-released Xiegu X6200.
The X6200 is not yet in the hands of reviewers, nor is it in production. This hasn’t stopped some people from “reviewing” this unit, so take anything you read up to this point with a grain of salt. A lot of folks have asked me what I think about the X6200, but I won’t comment until I’ve actually gotten a unit and tested it in the field.
I do have a few notes:
I hope Xiegu takes time to have the X6200 thoroughly field-tested prior to production. In the past, early adopters have really taken on the role of Beta testing; it all makes for a very confusing evaluation period. In the same vein, I hope that more of the advertised functionality works from day one.
Xiegu mentions that this unit has improved receiver sensitivity and a lower noise floor–both of these are most welcome. I hope this equates to more refined audio as well.
I hope the receiver front end is more robust and has built-in BCI filtering. Previous models have suffered from overloading.
Of course, I will plan to review the X6200 and give it a thorough shake-down.
These files are kept up-to-date on a daily basis. You’ll see that this currently lists memberships of 117 different clubs, including the vast majority of QRP clubs, a surprisingly high number.
Many thanks to Teri (KO4WFP) who shares the following guest post:
The Countdown Begins with Jack Hill State Park
by Teri (KO4WFP)
Having completed my kilo for Wormsloe State Historic Site (K-3725) and earned the Marathon Award for the Straight Key Century Club, I needed a new goal into which to sink my teeth. I’ve often set goals in my life as they motivate me to learn and step outside my comfort zone. So what better goal than to activate 60 parks new to me over the next year! I admit it is ambitious; however, goals should excite you as well as make you a little nervous because then you know you are stretching yourself.
How do I plan to accomplish activating 60 new parks? The weeks my son has a break from school offer the perfect opportunity to travel. I can also work in overnight trips to locations in Georgia or South Carolina throughout the year. To save money, I’ll drive on these trips and camp. Most state parks which offer camping are also a park on the POTA list, an easy win-win. For safety, my “POTA pooch” Daisy will accompany me if I am alone, offering an opportunity for the two of us to strengthen the bond we have and work on her training.
My first break-week trip is to Florida during the second week of winter break, December 24th through January 1st. I have nine to ten parks I plan to activate that week, depending on the weather. Daisy and my brother Joseph (no, he is not a ham) will accompany me. Joseph and I took a cross-country trip out west in my twenties and spent six weeks on the road. We mostly camped but also visited friends and relatives along the way.
However, before I leave on my Florida trip, I began my pursuit of 60 new parks with Jack Hill State Park, a park that is only an hour from my new QTH in Bloomingdale, Georgia.
Anyone who knows me knows that I am not a fan of winter. (Spot me this as I live in the Deep South.) However, I am determined to not miss out on POTA because of a little cold weather. Thinking the temperature would be warmer in the afternoon, my dog Daisy and I headed out later than usual on Wednesday, December 13th for our activation.
I enjoy driving in rural Georgia. You never know what you’ll see. Daisy and I went through the town of Bellville, a whistle stop in the middle of nowhere. The town was established in 1890 along the tracks of the Savannah & Western Railroad and was a regional transportation hub for agricultural and timber products. A mural in the town across from the old depot pays homage to the town’s railroad past.
Jack Hill State Park is located in the town of Reidsville, Georgia. It offers amenities that include boating and fishing on the park’s lake, accommodations in the form of camping as well as cottages to rent, a splash pad for kids, and even a free miniature golf course! The park was originally named Gordonia-Altamaha State Park as it is near the Altamaha River. However, it was renamed Jack Hill State Park in 2020 in honor of Senator Jack Hill who was instrumental in the local community. Continue reading KO4WFP: The Countdown Begins with Jack Hill State Park→
Many thanks to Todd (KK7ISX) who shares the following article about his portable field radio kit which will be featured on our Field Kit Gallery page. If you would like to share your field kit with the QRPer community, read this post.
KK7ISX’s Xiegu X6100 Field Kit
Hey Thomas, I love perusing the Field Radio Kit Gallery section of your website. It’s helped me dial in my SOTA kit while I’ve been injured this fall so I’d like to pay it forward.
Photos
This is my current set up for my Xiegu X6100:
Equipment list:
[Note: All Amazon and Radioddity links are affiliate links that support QRPer.com at no cost to you.]
Xiegu X6100 (note: using this link to purchase will include a $15 discount for you and a commission to QRPer.com)
Elecraft AX1 Antenna and counterpoise (Counterpoise modified with a 2 mm banana plug an inch from the U-Type wire connector in order to be compatible with the ground connector on a Packtenna 20/40 EFWH)
Elecraft AX1 40m Antenna Extender
Elecraft AX1 tripod adapter (with a female 2 mm banana plug soldered to it)
I have written some pieces of software to automate the sending of emails to callsigns in adif files. I wrote them to help myself and they work very well. One of them I’m making publicly available since it’s very simple and, although it’s pure command line, I believe most hams would be able to use it.
In this video I explain it and teach how to customize it to your needs:
This software will send one email per callsign in the adif file you choose. It can be used for many things but it fits very well the use case where you record a POTA activation and want to send the link of the video to everyone in the log. It’s specially ideal for POTA because you can download the log per activation from the POTA website =]
The motivation to create this software comes from the fact that I don’t use paper QSL cards anymore, instead I record the QSO and use YouTube as video storage. And since I have it on YouTube already, why not share with the other ham? They love it!
Also, recordings (audio or video) of your radio activities becomes so as they age! See an example. This is the first time tried QRP on the ham bands:
Just from this recording I learned so many things, such as the speaker I had sucked! You can hear much more in the recording than what I could hear in that session heheh
If you want feel free to share this software with other operators, I’d be happy if it helped more people publish real ham radio content on YouTube, like yours.
73
Thank you so much for sharing this, André. I’m sure there are others who record their activations on video and will benefit from your command line tool!
So busy, in fact, I completely overlooked an activation video I filmed two months ago (on Monday, October 23, 2023)!
That said, one of the things I love about making field reports and recording videos is re-living activations a second time. It’s fun to remember the site conditions, the weather, the radio/antenna choices, and all of the folks I might have logged.
I enjoyed stepping back in time a couple of months for this one!
Lake James State Park (K-2739)
That Monday was the first day I surfaced to fit in an activation after fighting a respiratory bug the previous week. I felt much better and tested negative for Covid, so I made my way to Hickory to help my parents with some tasks.
On the way that morning, I stopped by Lake James to play a little POTA with one of my favorite radios in the world: the Elecraft KX1.
On October 23–as I mention in the video–the QRP world had only just learned about the new Elecraft KH1 and I had yet to receive the almost-production unit I ordered as a field tester.
I knew that once I received the KH1, I’d be using it heavily for a few weeks, so I wanted to fit in a little KX1 time in advance!
POTA in Color!
The weather and fall colors at Lake James were absolutely stunning!
New KX1 Tufteln Cover!
Back when I filmed this video, it had only been one week since the W4 SOTA campout where my friend Joshua (N5FY) gave me a few prototype snap-on protective covers for my KX1s.
These covers are very clever because they protect all of the important front-panel components yet remain very low-profile so add little bulk to the radio.
Image: Tufteln.com
Joshua provides two new screws for the front panel (you simply replace out the stock KX1 screw); the cover magnetically snaps onto the higher-profile screws and seats itself securely.
Image: Tufteln.com
I demonstrate my cover in the activation video.
At the time, this was a product Joshua was considering adding to the Tufteln line-up–since then, he’s made it available to order–click here to check it out.
At present, Joshua offers the covers in two colors: black and light brown. Mine are the light brown color.
You’ll notice in the video that Joshua added my callsign to the covers he gave me. I don’t think the production covers are customized with your callsign because Joshua makes these in batches. You would need to check with him about customization–I assume there would be an extra charge and lead time for that because it would require modifying the file and printing a one-off cover.At any rate, I love the covers and have added them to all of my KX1s. Note that I used a Sharpie to write the name of each radio on the cover–this makes it very easy to tell the difference between my KX1 models (they’re named Ingrid, Greta, and Ruby)!
Gear:
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It was early enough in the morning that I decided to spend some time on the 40 meter band to work POTA “locals.” I deployed my Chelegance MC-750 with the 40 meter coil.
I tested the SWR and discovered it was high due to a loose connection on the end of the cable assembly–I fixed that and the SWR came down to 2.5:1. With the MC-750, I could have easily lengthened or shortened the whip to get a perfect match, but instead I took the lazy (& speedy) route and simply used the KX1 ATU to get a 1:1 match.
Even though I’d spent a long time talking about the KX1, KH1, the Tufteln cover, etc. in the video, I actually didn’t have a lot of on-the-air time. (Typical me to talk away my activation time!).
I started calling CQ POTA and the contacts started rolling in.
Within ten minutes, I’d already worked ten contacts.
I worked a couple more, then called QRT. Looking at the time, I had to end this activation earlier than I’d hoped. I needed to hit the road again.
I packed up in short order, but still took a few moments to enjoy the beauty of that lovely autumn morning.
QSO Map
Here’s what this five watt activation looked like when plotted out on a QSO Map:
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 monetization turned off on YouTube, although that doesn’t stop them from inserting ads before and after my videos.
I hope you enjoyed the field report and my activation video as much as I enjoyed creating them. I enjoyed reliving this Octeber activation.
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 certainly 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 make 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!
Here’s wishing all of the you best of the Holiday Season!
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Many thanks to Don (W7SSB) who writes:
