(This article is full of educational and fun links – click on as many as you wish)
Antenna tuning on Superb Owl Sunday
by Vince (VE6LK)
While many in North America were watching a number of Superb Owls move a pigskin around a playing field, I was off to play radio, successfully, for the first time in weeks. This is part of my goal to activate 200 CW POTA contacts per month this year.
During recent visit to Vancouver attempting to operate from within my hotel room, and utilizing the Edisonian Approach, I was shown -more than once- what did not work. This will no doubt be a discussion point on an upcoming Ham Radio Workbench Podcast. I was therefore in very bad need to get back on the air while operating portable. I was close to feeling twitchy and in need of some POTAXXIA (Hyperradio Moduzolium). A plan was needed!
My goals were to trim out a new-to-me EFHW (thanks VE6VID), and make some contacts while operating outdoors. The weather was forecast for 50F, but turned out to be unexpectedly windy. Also, when the wind comes off the Canadian Rockies in Southern Alberta, it cools the area where I’d be (downwind), so a choice of operating location was key. I love going to this park for the moment that you drive west along Highway 533 and come around the corner as you see here in this short video.
Chain Lakes Provincial Park (VE-1168) is located between the Porcupine Hills and the Rockies on Highway 22 (locally known as the Cowboy Trail) in Southern Alberta, about 90 minutes south of Calgary. It’s especially gorgeous at sunrise and sunsets. A campground, lake with boat launch and a day use area all adorn this park created for water management with an earthen dam. While it is in a valley, the wind can be howling on some days. On this day it would prove to be just above a nuisance, sort of like mosquitos in the spring -you can live with the nuisance, but only for so long before you blow a proverbial gasket.
I located a lovely spot below the dam -and the majority of the wind- however it was outside of cellular range. I’d need to rely on the Reverse Beacon Network to spot me. The RBN will, in turn, post your spot to the POTA website once it hears you if you schedule your activation in advance.
RBN showing spots on 30 to 10mOverhead site view showing my two operating positions
The place I found would only be more perfect were it warmer than 45F and without wind. A babbling brook was by the picnic table, and a nearby footbridge had built-in supports for my painter’s pole that would serve as the far end support. I’m pretty sure that they weren’t intended for me specifically, but they were the perfect size to simply slide the pole into place and hold it firmly. By luck I parked the truck the correct distance away with it’s drive-on mount and 28′ Fibreglass Flagpole from Flagpoles-To-Go via Amazon. Continue reading VE6LK: Antenna tuning on Superb Owl Sunday→
On Friday, January 27, 2023, I dropped off one of my daughters at the library for a creative writing session.
Hazel was along for the ride, so we decided to hike on the nearby Mountains To Sea Trail (MST) while my daughter was in the meeting.
During the hike, I realized that I should have taken my field radio pack along because it would have been so easy to activate both the MST and Blue Ridge Parkway as a two-fer.
Instead, Hazel and I enjoyed our hike and got back to the car with about 35 minutes or so to do an activation–including set-up, on-air time, and pack-up. That would leave me just enough time to pick up my daughter at the library before they closed for the day.
Challenge accepted!
Because I had been using the Elecraft KX2 and AX1 recently, I had both packed in my Spec-Ops EDC backpack. In theory–even filming a video at the same time–I knew I could probably fit in a whole activation with 25 minutes on the air. I only needed 10 contacts, and I’ve never been in a situation where the AX1 couldn’t achieve that goal.
As I mentioned in my previous field report, on Saturday, January 21, 2023, I had just enough time to activate two parks in short order on the way back to my QTH
I thought it might be fun to perform both of these activations with the Elecraft KX2 and AX1 combo because they’re so speedy to deploy.
Once again, I wanted to show the whole KX2/AX1 set-up and pack-up process in my activation video.
Lake James State Park (K-2739)
As I pulled into the Lake James Catawba River access, I discovered that there were few other guests there that day. I was expecting more people on a Saturday especially since the weather was so pleasant and South Mountains had been so busy earlier that morning.
Then again, the Catawba River access always has less visitors than the Paddy’s Creek area (which is really the main public access point for Lake James).
I pulled into a parking space, found one of the closest picnic tables, and set up the station in short order.
At South Mountains State Park, an hour earlier, I performed the entire activation on 20 meters. To shake things up a bit, I decided to perform the one at Lake James on 17 meters (note here that the AX1 only works on 20 and 17 meters unless you have the coil which adds 40 meters). Continue reading KX2/AX1: Second quick activation of the day at Lake James State Park!→
I also assume the 3Y0J team would need to create an account and submit their logs to the POTA system for LA-2524 hunters to get credit.
It would be pretty amazing to confirm LA-2524 because it’s doubtful anyone will activate Bouvet Island anytime soon after this current DXpedition team.
3Y0J
Bouvet Island (Source: 3Y0J Facebook Page)
Bouvet Island is one of the rarest DX entities on the planet: it’s number two on the DXCC Most Wanted list (at time of posting), second only to P5 (North Korea).
I don’t consider myself a DXer or contester, but many of my local ham radio friends are hard-core DXers.
I do have some DXing and Contesting exposure, though, because I typically attend and volunteer to help at the annual W4DXCC conference in Tennessee.
One of the things I’ve learned attending the W4DXCC conference is the incredible amount of energy and resources it takes to execute a DXpedition like 3Y0J. It takes many years of planning, lots of money, lots of permits, top-notch healthy operators, and, frankly, lots of good old fashioned luck.
Steve Hass posted this image on Facebook and noted, “3Y0J camp location on the hill.”
The 3Y0J team had difficulty (understatement) setting up on the island due to weather conditions. Here’s one of their latest updates detailing how they landed via their Facebook page:
3Y0J Bouvet Island 2023 Update [February 7, 2023]
Interview with 3Y0J Team Co-Leader Ken LA7GIA.
“Everything is OK in the camp. The guys are good. We have a few antennas up. Running some pileups and preparing for the storm which will arrive in a few hours and last until Thursday. The boat will pull away from the island a bit. The antennas and camp are being secured. The winds are expected to be 60 knots. 9 members will stay in the camp during the storm. They will try to run two bands this evening and tomorrow. They will take down one antenna. They will run 30m and 17m using the Spider Pole on 17 and the aluminum DX Engineering antenna on 30m.
The operation has proved to be extremely difficult. The most extreme expedition I’ve been to. Setting up the camp has been a lot of work.
We will focus on CW and phone but there will be FT8. We have just discussed this today. We are running low power, only 100w. We have no amplifiers. We have three antennas set up. We are considering setting up 20m as well. So we will have 30, 20, 17, 15.
The beach landings were accomplished by holding onto a line attached to a buoy and floating 15 meters to the beach in our survival suits. This is quite extreme. We float in all the equipment as well. Then carry the equipment 800 feet up to the camp. We have videos of this. We spent a few days to set up the antennas and tent then prepared for the storm that is coming.
Everybody is in good shape. It’s quite hard to stay here. A lot of wind, but today was a quiet, nice, and sunny day . This will change, and there will be a lot of rain. The day we arrived was a lot of wind and rain. Activating Bouvet is not like activating an island in the Caribbean. It is really windy, cold, and exhausting to bring equipment up here. It’s a different DXpedition than we thought we should do. It’s a challenge, but we hope we can stay on the island for some more days.
Regarding dupes, please only call us if you hear us. We have very good receive here on [Bouvet] Island. We do not have any facility to upload the log on the island. We are saving on fuel and connection for this. When we get back to the vessel, we will likely upload. We don’t know when the first upload will be. Going to Marama is very time consuming project because of the procedure involved. (Ken describes it.) The first upload may be in the weekend. Again, if you don’t hear us, don’t call us.
Nothing more to report. Hopefully people understand the complexity of this operation. Hopefully we will be able to stay another 7 to 10 days. We are working on plans for how to continue the operation despite the difficult weather conditions here at Bouvet.”
73, Steve N2AJ Media Officer & NA East Coast Pilot 3Y0J Bouvet Island 2023 DXpedition
They’re hunkered down in their tent and doing all they can to be on the air during this bout of rough weather.
Let’s hope they can move more gear, operators, and antennas to the island in the coming days.
Logging 3Y0J
One of the 3Y0J crew on Bouvet Island. (Source: 3Y0J Facebook Page)
I’m going to give it my best effort to log 3Y0J.
It’s not going to be a cake walk.
For one thing, this may very well be the last time Bouvet is activated by people (boots on the ground) in our lifetimes. I think you’ll find that DXpeditions like this–those that are very high risk–will soon be activated remotely. A remote, fully-self contained station will be set up on-site and most of the contacts will be made using remote ops in the boat or from across the world from the comfort of their own QTH.
As mentioned in the announcement above, the 3Y0J team hope to be on the air for a bit more than a week (7-10 days from February 7). DXpeditions like this are often cut short when weather forecasts indicate difficulty getting people back to the ship in one piece. If you feel you must log 3Y0J, I wouldn’t wait a few days for the pileups to subside.
Speaking of pileups, the 3Y0J pileups are some of the largest I’ve ever experienced. It will take skill to log 3Y0J if you don’t have a blowtorch station.
And then there are the QRMers
Gjermund LB5GI on watch duty onboard Marama (Via the 3Y0J Facebook Page)
This is the side of amateur radio none of us like to see or hear. Frankly, I don’t even like mentioning it, but I think it’s important for newcomers to understand what they’re experiencing as they try to work 3Y0J (in split mode always) and also understand that there are some deceptive stations out there.
This being such a highly-anticipated DXpedition with so many folks tuned to 3Y0J calling frequencies, it gives an extremely large audience for jammers and QRMers to cause a maximum amount of disruption.
I hesitate to call these folks “LIDs” because the origins of this term refer to inexperienced ops who may simply be making mistakes out of inexperience or ignorance. With any DXpedition, there are always newbies who don’t understand split operation and call on the TX frequency. That’s to be expected and, frankly, I’m forgiving about that. Once a good op makes the mistake, they’re unlikely to ever do it again.
Sadly, the intensity of intentional jammers–those deliberately causing harmful interference to 3Y0J’s operations–is just insane. This is happening on both SSB and CW frequencies. I’m sure they’ll try to interfere with FT8 as well.
On top of that, there are a number of “pirates” posing as 3Y0J and spotting themselves to the DX cluster. If you’ve worked a 3Y0J station and felt it wasn’t too difficult because the signal was strong and there wasn’t a lot of competition, then you’ve likely worked a pirate. Double check for a confirmation after the 3Y0J team does a log upload. Also, check for announced frequencies on the 3Y0J Facebook page.
It’s a bit of a circus and it’ll likely take all of your skill to work 3Y0J. I think FT8 (in F/H mode) will turn out to be the path of least interference to logging Bouvet.
Video interview with 3Y0J Team Co-Leader Erwann (LB1QI) earlier today
Have you logged Bouvet?
Please comment when/if you confirm Bouvet! I’m very curious if they’ll submit their logs via POTA to give hunters credit for this rarest of parks!
You might have noticed that I’ve been taking the Elecraft AX1 antenna out quite a lot recently. At time of posting, I’ve almost used it for a month’s worth of activations.
In December, I thought it might be fun to only use the AX1 for one 2023 calendar month–say, the month of March–but since I evaluate and review radios and antennas, it’s just not realistic to make that kind of commitment.
That said, I did decide to simply start using the AX1 as my primary field antenna for roughly a 30-ish day period and, so far, that’s working out very nicely. I thought it might give some real-world context and usage for those who still believe I’ve just been lucky the days I use the AX1 in the field. No better way to test that theory than to just do it!
Mini rove!
It’s been a while since I’ve had time to do a proper park rove. I hope to do a five park rove within the next month or so, if I can clear out space in the schedule. I find roves so much fun and a nice change of pace.
On Saturday, January 21, 2023, on the way back to my QTH in the mountains of WNC, I had just enough time to activate two parks in short order. Having just been challenged by a short activation window at the Vance Birthplace (which, turned into a normal length activation due to a schedule change in my favor) I thought it might be fun to once again, show the whole KX2/AX1 set-up and pack-up process in my activation video.
South Mountains State Park (K-2753)
I chose South Mountains State Park as my first stop.
South Mountains has a number of public access points. I decided to drive to the main park entrance and set up at the equestrian picnic area. Choosing the main park entrance added about 15 minutes to my overall driving time; the Clear Creek access would have been quicker, but I’d been there only recently. Continue reading A quick two park KX2/AX1 POTA run starting at South Mountains State Park!→
Many thanks to Alan (W2AEW) who shares the following guest post:
New AX1 POTA Activation
by Alan (W2AEW)
I have to admit, I have been bitten “hard” by the POTA bug! (I blame Thomas!) It started for me in August 2022 while I was on vacation at the Jersey shore. Since that time, I have completed 48 activations at 19 different parks. All of these have been QRP, and almost exclusively on CW. This story is about one of my recent activations, which was unique for a couple of reasons. Read on…
The Park
My job puts me on the road, covering a large portion of the northeastern United States. When my schedule permits, I’ll hit the road earlier than needed in order to potentially stop for a quick activation along the way (usually giving up a lunch-on-the-road stop in favor of a bit of QRP CW operation at a park).
This particular park was not your typical state park. It wasn’t a nature preserve, or a mountain lake, or a hiking or picnic paradise. No, this park is decidedly urban, occupying 2 blocks in the city of Holyoke, MA. This is K-2439, Holyoke Heritage State Park. According to the state park website, this park celebrates the rich industrial heritage of the city of Holyoke. The park also includes a Children’s Museum, a Volleyball Hall of Fame and a restored antique Merry-Go-Round.
The park is situated along a canal that once powered some of the mills that were located on the property.
It certainly is not like any other state park that I’ve been to!
One of the reasons I chose to stop at this park is that it had only been activated 4 times in the past. In retrospect, I suppose this could’ve been because of the city/industrial setting. Was it going to be noisy? Maybe this was a bad idea.. Thankfully, it wasn’t… Another thing that appealed to me is that it had not been activated on CW before. So, my activation would be a CW ATNO (All Time New One) for this park, which is kind of cool.
I believe I mentioned in the past that when I first purchased my Elecraft AX1, I assumed it would be a bit if a toy or novelty item. I thought it was a fun concept–and that’s why I bought it–but I remember the first time I took it out to the field on an activation, I thought I’d be demonstrating that a compromised antenna delivers compromised performance.
In short? I was wrong.
The AX1 has instead become one of the most valuable tools in my antenna arsenal.
When you are the DX–activating a park or summit–the AX1 is more than capable as long as you live in an area with a reasonable amount of hunters/chasers within your normal propagation footprint.
Speed
The AX1’s secret power, as I mention in the title, is speed of deployment.
Although I can launch a line into a tree and deploy an end-fed half-wave pretty quickly–I’ve literally done this hundreds of times–I can deploy the AX1 even more quickly without breaking a sweat.
Case in Point: Zebulon B. Vance Birthplace (K-6856)
On Tuesday, January 17, 2023, I had a day full of errands and projects in town, but needed to pick up my daughters at a school function around 15:00 local. There were too many variables to accurately predict where I would be at what time, so I didn’t schedule an activation that morning.
As the day progressed, though, I realized I had a very short window and K-6856 was practically en route to the pickup point. After I finished my last errand in south Asheville, I made my way north and based on Google Maps, I had no more than a 25 minute window to fit in a full activation from deployment to pack up.
I stopped in a parking lot en route, pulled out my iPhone, and scheduled an activation at K-6856 on POTA.app.
Keep in mind that my activations are typically short, but 25 minutes for set-up, on-the-air time, and pack-up leaves very little margin for error.
The AX1 is perfect for this type of activation.
A little time math
It takes me two easy minutes to set up the AX1 and maybe one minute to pack it up. If I wanted to, I could speed that up a bit (I take much longer on camera talking my way through the process). So that’s roughly three minutes to both deploy and pack-up the AX1.
My speaker wire antenna, on the other hand, is also very quick to deploy. With my arborist throw line, I can easily prepare that antenna in four minutes and pack it up in three minutes. Thus, I need to allow roughly 7 minutes to both deploy and pack-up the speaker wire antenna (we have to assume it might take 2 launches of the throw line to snag a branch).
On Wednesday, January 11, 2023, I was on my way back to the QTH after a brief trip to Raleigh, NC.
Later in the afternoon, I needed to take my daughters to a class, thus I had a strict deadline to meet. Still, it was a beautiful day so I decided to pop by Tuttle Educational State Forest for a nice walk and possibly an activation if I time allowed. I’d spent so much time in my car the previous couple of days, I really wanted to stretch my legs.
After that casual walk, I found that I had a good 45 minute window–no more–to fit in a full activation including set-up/take-down. Very doable!
The radio I had packed away for this road trip was my Elecraft KX2 field kit which included a Tufteln no-transformer random wire antenna (compact equivalent of my 28.5′ speaker wire antenna) and my AX1 portable antenna. I had this particular kit because I’d hoped to do an urban park activation in Raleigh, but simply didn’t have the time to fit it in.
Many thanks to Dan (W9SAU) who shares the following field report:
My first Straight Key POTA Activation
Dan (W9SAU)
1/22/2023
After 3 weeks of working Straight Key for SKCC, SST, and POTA QSOs, and a lot of practice, I wanted to try a Straight Key POTA Activation, using a Cootie paddle.
My Cootie/Sideswiper is a modified Vibroplex Single paddle, with a switch installed. Converting a paddle to a Cootie is done by jumpering the dot and dash wire connections. Then turn the Electronic Keyer off. The switch allows for Cootie or Keyer operation.
Pullman National Monument (K-7917) is only 10 minutes from my QTH. Pullman is unique, with the National Park borders surrounding a portion of the Pullman factory and neighborhood. You can operate from anywhere within these borders. I operated from the parking lot of the Pullman National Monument Exhibit Hall.
In this busy area in the City of Chicago, the noise floor was near S-Zero. There is occasional interference from a passing Illinois Central Electric Train, with QRN that obliterates everything. Not many trains on a Sunday morning.
With snow falling, my operating position was inside the vehicle, using a Yaesu FT-891 set to 5W for QRP, with a Shark 20 meter Hamstick on the roof.
Some anxiety, starting at 13wpm, but I quickly became comfortable with 15wpm. My goal was to complete the Activation with 13 or 14 contacts.
I finished with 22 in the log in 35 minutes. I appreciate the patience of all who slowed down for me.
I had plenty of protection from Chicago’s Finest! Across the street are the Pullman Horse Stables. All employee and visitor horses were housed and cared for here, in the late 1800’s.
Working the Cootie is a lot of fun! I find it easier than the traditional up/down key. But each character still has to be formed manually. I will be doing more of this type of POTA Activation.
A bonus is Ops who sometimes initiate a SKCC QSO when I work them for POTA. I was happy to accommodate them, but using a Keyer, I could not take SKCC credit. With the Cootie, I can use the credit to work towards the next SKCC achievement level. All while working Parks On The Air!
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