Field Reports, Guest Posts, Morse Code, News, POTA

Vince’s chilly #POTAThon1111 run on Remembrance/Veterans Day 2022

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Many thanks to Vince (VE6LK) who shares the following guest post and field report from Alberta, Canada:

#POTAThon1111 – report from the field

by Vince (VE6LK)

My goal is to activate all of the parks I can that have never been activated.

I’m blessed to live in such a beautiful part of the world and see these parks up close. One wall in my shack has a map of all the un-activated parks and routes within a day’s drive of me, and most are already planned with routes. There will be more #POTAThons!

[Click all images to enlarge.]

#POTAThon is what I call it when I plan on getting to more than one park in a day. Usually these things aren’t thought of for weeks in advance, they are more like a “tomorrow morning” kind of thing. Opportunistic, if you will.

But first, a note about the day I chose…

November 11 is called different things in different countries, but what we share in common is we honour our Veterans and we give thanks for the freedoms they fought for. So today I paused to give thanks and think of the lives they gave so that I have the freedoms I do today. I would bundle up that giving of thanks into an urgently needed day away from the office.

And with that, #POTAThon1111 was born.

#POTAThon is what I tag these activities on my Twitter feed and the month and day denote when it happened. By definition a #POTAThon is more than one activation in a day; I’m simple like that. #POTAThon1111 is the third such event.

The first was #POTAThon0930, an ambitious day attempting 8 sites with two operators and most of them in backcountry outside of cellular range. You can see the video from that day when you click on this link. We didn’t get to all 8 but we had a hoot trying.

Just before I departed for #POTAThon0930, Thomas Witherspoon K4SWL (you know him, right?) said words to me I’ll never forget: “Vince, just work CW at a speed where you are comfortable, people will adjust. If you work the sacred language, I will find you.”

With those words of encouragement, I gave it a go. On that day I worked CW and a bit of SSB, but since then it’s been all CW for POTA. While the propagation wasn’t with Thomas and I on 0930, we did connect some weeks later – KX3 to KX3 no less.

You need to understand that I think I’m terrible at CW, but I also need to let you in on a secret: there’s no such thing as a Bad CW Contact. I explain that concept in more detail on YouTube, and the essence is: just do it and roll with it, warts and all. People adjust their ways and usually their speed. Go out and have fun trying. Continue reading Vince’s chilly #POTAThon1111 run on Remembrance/Veterans Day 2022 →

Morse Code, New Products, News

New N0SA SP4 POTA/SOTA Mini Morse Code Magnetic Paddle from CW Morse

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Update: This post was originally posted a few days ago which turned out to be prior to this paddle being in-stock in any quantity. CW Morse has some of these online and available for order at time of posting this morning (14 Nov 2022) and will have many more later this week. We’ll post an update on QRPer when their main production run is available. 

Many thanks to Timothy who notes that CW Morse has added a new key to their product line: the SP4 POTA/SOTA Mini Morse Code Magnetic Paddle.

This key looks a lot like the N0SA paddle you see in many of my videos because it is designed by N0SA and made by CW Morse!

Here’s the description from CW Morse’s website:

The SP4 POTA/SOTA CW Morse Magnetic Iambic Double Paddle – Designed By N0SA.

Super Lightweight, Portable Compact Paddle With An Attached 3.5mm Cable.

Uses Magnetic Tension And Easily Adjustable With Stainless Steel Contacts.

Great for portable operations, and supplied with 3M Dual Lock Velcro for easy mounting and removal of the paddle from base or anything of your choosing.

FEATURES: Small and light weight – only 1.7ozs.
WITH BASE: Small and removable from base – 1.25 lbs.

Measures 2.5″ x 1.1″ x 1″

Frame and finger pieces are 3D printed with carbon fiber reinforced PETG.

Levers are solid CNC Machined 6061 aluminum.

3 foot flexible cloth covered cord with molded 1/8” plug stays flexible down to 0 Deg F.

All fasteners used are Stainless Steel.

Allen wrench that is needed for spacing adjustment is also included with the key.

Adjustments stay put when set, so adjust once and forget about it! 🙂

This paddle is available with or without a steel base.

I have not tried this new paddle yet, but I did know it was in the works. I’m so glad it’s now being offered because I’m a huge fan of both N0SA and CW Morse (disclaimer: CW Morse is a proud sponsor and affiliate of QRPer.com).

The price for the new key is $82.95 without a base or $109.95 with base.

Click here to check out the new N0SA paddle at CW Morse.

Field Reports, How To, Morse Code, News, Portable, POTA, QRP, Skills, Videos

Field Report: How I evaluate a new POTA site plus serious QRP fun with my new-to-me Elecraft KX1

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On Friday, October 7, 2022, I had a couple of errands to run in/around Morganton, NC. Of course, I always have POTA in mind so squeezed in an activation at nearby Tuttle Educational State Forest that morning.  That activation took longer than expected due to swapping out antennas and radios, but it was a success and quite fun.

After Tuttle, I knew I could fit in one more activation if I made it quick, so I set my sights on Table Rock Fish Hatchery (K-8012), but first I had a couple of errands to run in Morganton!

I visited my friend Hamilton at his ceramics studio, popped by another store to pick up a couple of items, then (on Hamilton’s advice) grabbed lunch at the The Grind Café.

I must say that Hamilton was spot-on. My wrap was delicious!

Just what I needed to fuel another POTA activation, right? Right!

After lunch, I drove to Table Rock Fish Hatchery. The weather was ideal and the leaves were beginning to show color.

At our home in the mountains, we were almost at peak leaf color, but the fish hatchery site is much lower in elevation. The weather was simply ideal.

On days like this, driving to a site is half the fun. Continue reading Field Report: How I evaluate a new POTA site plus serious QRP fun with my new-to-me Elecraft KX1 →

FT8, News, POTA, QRP

Guest Post: QRP POTA Activation During the CQ World Wide Contest

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QRP POTA Activation During the CQ World Wide Contest

by Joshua (KO4AWH)

I had an opportunity to activate Fort Yargo State Park (K-2177) during the CQ WW DX contest.

Fort Yargo is my local park, about 30 minutes away. The park features a great playground for the kids to play on and many tall trees which are perfect for deploying a wire antenna. There really is not much more I could ask for in a POTA location. Even the noise floor is very low, about S0, so I typically turn on the pre-amp which brings it up to S2-S3 on my Discovery TX-500.

This was very much a last minute plan. I knew the contest was going on which may present some difficulty activating QRP. I knew I would not be calling CQ on 20m where I normally activate and hunting stations could be difficult but likely doable.

There was a bit of rain at the house in the morning, then a promise of drizzle the rest of the day. Not too sure what I would find at the park, but hopefully the rain would hold off and I could get the activation in using the TX-500 without too much worry about it getting wet. I threw in a picnic blanket with a water barrier that promised a bit of protection from the rain if needed it.

I have a go-box setup with my TX-500 and IC-705, as well as several antennas, an ATU, and all cabling and power needed to run FT8 either on my Raspberry PI4 with the TX-500, or on my iPad through the IC-705.

I was taking my wife’s vehicle as she had the car seats needed for the 3 kiddos that were coming along. So, I had to be sure I had everything I needed. There are quite a few additional radio items I keep in the back of my car that I would not have available. But everything should be in the go-box, right?

Go-Box with two full stations, TX-500 and IC-705

After a bit of mist and some rain on the drive over, I planned to setup the TX-500 knowing it would get a bit wet. I tossed the throw line in the tree and pulled up my Tufteln EFHW QRP cut for 20m. In retrospect I probably should have pulled up the EFRW for a bit more band agility.

I tuned around for a few minutes.

Yup, there was not a single free place across 20 meters where I could start calling CQ in the clear. In fact, the stations I listened to for more than a few seconds had someone else start calling right on top of them. 20 meters was indeed crazy.

I could try to hunt some DX with my QRP signal, it would be a fight no doubt, and a nice challenge. After another DX station I tuned to had someone in the States start calling right over top of them, decided not to hunt. Continue reading Guest Post: QRP POTA Activation During the CQ World Wide Contest →

Field Reports, Morse Code, News, Portable, POTA, QRP, QRP Radios

QRP DX: A quick POTA break with the Penntek TR-45L on the Blue Ridge Parkway

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As I’ve mentioned in the past, I feel pretty lucky to live in an area that is  flush with POTA sites.  It’s not that we have numerous individual parks, but the parks we do have encompass massive portions of the area.

One park, in particular, that literally runs around and through Asheville, NC, is the Blue Ridge Parkway. When I’m in town and have a few free minutes, it’s quite easy to hit the BRP; it’s never far away.  I can set up along the parkway pretty much anywhere, or go to the Visitor’s Center or Folk Art Center if I want to operate from a picnic table. In addition, the Mountains To Sea Trail runs along large portions of the parkway, so it’s very easy to hit it as well.

On Wednesday, September 28, 2022, I took my daughters to a class and had the better part of an hour to play radio. The BRP’s Folk Art Center was only a 10 minute drive from their class, so I made a beeline for the site as soon as I dropped them off.

I had the amazing Penntek TR-45L packed in my car, and decided to pair it with my Tufteln End-Fed Random Wire antenna.

Continue reading QRP DX: A quick POTA break with the Penntek TR-45L on the Blue Ridge Parkway →

Antennas, Guest Posts, Morse Code, News, Portable, QRP

Rich re-activates Santa Fe Prairie State Park with QRM-busting in mind

4 Comments

Many thanks to Rich (KQ9L) for sharing the following field report:


Field Report: Testing a horizontally-polarized antenna at a high QRM POTA site

by Rich (KQ9L)

I wanted to give a quick follow up report from Santa Fe Prairie State Park (K-7839).

As you may recall I wrote up my POTA activation from this park on Oct 23, 2022. I made 15 Q’s that day but deep down felt I could do better. The setting of the park is quite industrial and consequently the man made noise is bad. Reflecting back on this activation, I feel that the limited the number of QSO’s I made that day was due to this QRM.

I resolved to try again but this time my objective was to figure out a solution to mitigate the effects of the QRM on my QSO count. Thinking about the problem, I recalled than manmade noise typically is vertically polarized and therefore for my second attempt, I decided to test this and use a horizontal antenna.

As luck may have it, here in Chicago we continue to experiencing unseasonably warm weather and my work schedule wasn’t too busy on Thursday, November 3, 2022, so it seemed like a great chance to put my theory to the test.

For the antenna, I decided to use one which I have owned for awhile, but have never used. I had purchased a RadioWaves Double bazooka from an online retailer some time back when they were on sale and planned to set up it a flattop dipole.

If you recall from my description of the Santa Fe Prairie State Park, there is a scenic overlook which has a tree mounted pulley system perfectly spaced to mount a 20m dipole. Although this would be the first time I used the system, it turned out to be a well designed and intuitive hoisting solution to use.

The “pulley” is actually an eyelet with paracord running through the eyelet. The paracord is in a continuous loop just like rope on a flag pole. By employing a simple overhand knot I secured the end of the antenna to the paracord and hoisted the antenna up into the tree about 20ft. It literally took a few minutes and I was ready to go.

Antenna was fed with my RG-316 feedline with built in common mode choke. Since a dipole is a balanced antenna system, it really doesn’t need the choke, but it was the coax that I had packed with me and I figured it wouldn’t cause any harm or negatively affect my test. I was QRV by 3:20pm, and anxious to get on the air. Continue reading Rich re-activates Santa Fe Prairie State Park with QRM-busting in mind →

Accessories, News, Portable, QRP Radios

Sam sources a larger tuning knob option for the Penntek TR-35

3 Comments

Many thanks to Sam Duwe (WN5C) who writes:

John (AE5X) had suggested a while back finding a larger tuning knob for the Penntek TR-35.

I was striking out in finding one that fit but had to put in a Mouser order and thought I’d give this knob a shot (Mouser # 706-11K5013-KFNB) and I really like it!

I accidentally bought the gray version and had to paint it black. It’s shiny because of the clear coat and rough because of sanding and because I’m apparently awful at painting, but I find that it fits with the plastic bezel of the radio.

With the optical encoder it really glides, and totally changes the feel of the radio. Pretty good deal for $2.36.

Thank you for the tip, Sam!

Field Reports, Guest Posts, Hams, Morse Code, News, Portable, POTA, QRP

Jay discovered that his first CW POTA activation wasn’t scary at all!

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Many thanks to Jay (W1ASP) who, last week, sent me a note about his first POTA CW activation. I asked if he’d consider writing up a short field report about his experience to share with others and he was happy to do so. Thank you, Jay.

Halloween POTA

by Jay (W1ASP)

Halloween doesn’t have to be scary.

I set out to Bear Brook State Park (K-2643) for my first CW POTA activation.

Bear Brook is relatively close by, its the largest state park in New Hampshire with over 10,000 acres. There’s camping, hiking and biking trails along with an archery course and plenty of swimming and fishing areas.

I didn’t give it much thought about what day it was, just that I had the time to do an activation and it was nice out, what a perfect opportunity to break in the newly assembled kit.

I decided on a spot next to the water and as luck would have it there was a picnic table right there. I took out my gear, set up and proceeded to tune around and listen. The band seemed pretty quiet. I wasn’t sure if I’d get enough QSO’s in to make it an official activation. I decided on 14.038 MHz, I sent QRL? I then held down the memory button, took a deep breath and hit it again to transmit: CQ POTA DE W1ASP

I waited a second or two and used the memory keyer once more, again nothing. I went to the POTA website on my phone and added my activation.

The memory keyer was used for a third time, I noticed a message pop up on my logging app, the Reverse Beacon Network spotted me. It wasn’t too long after, the first call came back to me!

I was nervous and fumbled a bit here and there but once I took my time I was fine, sending their call back and TU UR 599 599 NH BK. I cheated a little and left the CW decoder enabled. I wanted to be sure I had the call correct as I logged my 13 QSO’s. (I swear the 13 wasn’t intentional.) for my first CW park activation! I only realized that it was Halloween while walking back to my truck.

I thought to myself, “that wasn’t scary at all.”

Once I decided that, as an activator I’m in charge of the QSO, I relaxed and it was a lot of fun. I may have made a few mistakes but everyone was patient with me. I later received an email from another Ham in Delaware. He was using the same radio, and referred to them as the perfect “picnic portable radio” we emailed back and forth a few times and I look forward to hearing him on the air again soon.

 

The week before, I finished building my second QCX Mini. The first kit I built was for the 30 meter band around this time last year, this second one is a 20 meter version. I love these little radios, there’s something about these little transceivers that I just can’t seem to put them down.

I took my time making sure it was working properly, I hooked it up in my shack and I had my first QSO with another POTO activator in Maryland just over 400 miles away.  To say I was excited is an understatement!

I planned on putting together a kit about a month ago for POTA and eventually SOTA with the QCX Mini as the radio. I decided on using a small pack, I wanted it to be a self contained kit that had everything I needed to do an activation and nothing extra.

I keep the wire and radios together,  and depending what band I choose to operate on is the one I pack. I’m considering a third kit; maybe a 10m version? I threw the EFHW matching transformer in the bag along with a notebook, mechanical pencil and a battery pack I put together using four 3.2v LifePo batteries. The paddle I’m currently using is a stainless paddle I found on online with a mini CW paddle for backup and set of folding headphones.

I’m looking forward to my next park, this was a great experience. I wanted to learn CW since I became a Ham in 2016, that’s another story of what got me into Ham Radio in the first place.

Field Reports, Morse Code, News, Portable, POTA, QRP

POTA Plan C: Swapping antennas and rigs at Tuttle Educational State Forest

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After the success of my previous day’s activation at Fort Dobbs State Historic Site, I decided to take the Icom IC-703 Plus out for yet another activation.

As I mentioned in the previous post, the IC-703 has not gotten a lot of outdoor time this year because I’ve had issues with the electronic keyer locking up when using the radio with end-fed antennas.

Of course, there are a number of ways to mitigate or radiate the RF that could be coming back to the radio, so at Fort Dobbs, the previous day, I used a simple common mode choke. It seemed to do the trick.

I was curious if using a common mode choke might be the only solution needed to solve this problem, or if I’d need to perform a mod to my IC-703.

I was ready to test the IC-703 again.

I had a fair amount of antenna options in the trunk of my car, so on the way to Tuttle Educational State Forest (on Friday, October 7, 2022), I considered a few options to shake things up a bit.

Since I was feeling comfortable that the common mode choke was taking care of things, I decided to push the limit a bit and deploy an end-fed random wire antenna. I didn’t have any of my mini portable 9:1 random wire antennas in the car (PackTenna, Tufteln, etc.), but I did have another solution: the Chameleon MPAS Lite.

The cool thing about the CHA MPAS Lite is that while it’s primarily designed to be a vertical antenna with counterpoise, it can be reconfigured and deployed a number of ways including as a simple end-fed random wire antenna.

After giving it some thought, I decided it might be fun to deploy it as an inverted V random wire. In fact, here’s a diagram from the MPAS Lite manual of exactly what I planned to do.

I’d be using the MPAS Lite counterpoise as the radiator, so I wouldn’t have the optional second counterpoise as seen in the illustration above. That’s okay, though, because I was feeding the antenna with Chameleon’s 50′ RG-58C/U cable with in-line choke; the shield of the coax would act as the antenna counterpoise.

This is the same coax cable I used the previous day. Continue reading POTA Plan C: Swapping antennas and rigs at Tuttle Educational State Forest →

Accessories, FT8, How To, News, QRP

How Joe keeps his Icom IC-705 cool during long FT8 sessions

6 Comments

Many thanks to Joe (KD2QBK) who writes:

Hi Thomas:

I’ve recently discovered QRP FT8, which I’ve been working with my Icom IC-705. I run with an end-fed sloper that runs out of my 2nd floor shack window using a 49:1 unun and a length of RG-58. I’m also using an Emtech ZM-2 tuner between the antenna and the radio when needed.

The set up works really nicely, except for the way FT8 heats up and overtaxes the radio after a while. Searching around a bit, I’ve found just the right solution for that issue. The AC Infinity MULTIFAN S1 USB-powered table fan.

https://amzn.to/3DvqemJ (affiliate link)

It’s basically just a 3-inch square fan like you’d find in a computer or some other electronic devices, with rubber “feet” attached. It can stand upright or lay flat depending on your need. it’s stated purpose is to cool or ventilate routers, game consoles, audio equipment, etc.

The AC Infinity MULTIFAN S1 includes a speed control switch and an inline USB socket to daisy-chain other devices. One caveat with the inline socket: because it’s placed in the line between the fan and the speed control switch, the switch must be set to high speed else the socket won’t have adequate power for the attached device.

All I do is plug the fan into a USB socket and place it at the rear of the radio, sans battery, to keep it cool. I have it set up to blow onto the radio. Obviously I need to power the radio with an external source when the battery isn’t attached. I’ve not tried to use the fan with the battery attached, but I don’t think it would help much. The ventilation slots next to the battery compartment don’t seem wide enough to let much air in. Continue reading How Joe keeps his Icom IC-705 cool during long FT8 sessions →

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