Don't Miss The 13 Colonies Special Event!

 

The 13 Colonies Special Event is one amateur radio event I never miss. The 2022 13 Colonies Special Event will be held from July 1st to July 7th. With my modest station, I make a real attempt to get the "Clean Sweep" added to my certificate by working all 13 colonies plus the WM3PEN Bonus station.  

 

Every year the certificate design of is different. Follow the link above to find out what the 2022 certificate will look like (I think it's pretty awesome). Waiting patiently for the beautiful certificate to arrive in the mail is part of the fun. 

 

Made The Clean Sweep again this year and all CW! Lets hope I can do it again in 2023! 

 Have fun and enjoy the 14th Annual 13 Colonies Special Event! 

Operating FT8 During ARRL Field Day 2022

The ARRL Field Day has been one of my favorite events to participate in each year. I have helped setup and operated field day in various locations around Suffolk County as a member of a few different clubs over the past 30 years. 

One of things that I have always enjoyed most about field day is helping new Hams make their first SSB HF contacts. In my opinion, seeing them get excited about making those first contacts makes the event special.

 Now that I am up in age, for the past 2 years I have been working field day from home. Over the years I had always spent my time in front of the radio working CW.  This year I wanted to try something new. 

I have a very modest home station which consists of an ICOM IC-7300 and a G5RV 40 - 6 meters. The LDG tuner gets me operating on all bands including 30 and 17 meters. 

This year I ran my station as 1D NLI and the mode was FT8. For the first time I did not operate CW. That was a real change for me and I actually missed it a bit. 

I have tried FT8 before but never during an event. With limited time to operate, I was quite pleased with the 50 plus contacts I was able to make running about 10 watts. I don't think FT8 will ever replace CW for sheer speed of making contacts during an event. 

However, I did like how FT8 logging is accomplished with a simple mouse click. Logging contacts manually is a bit of a pain but the N3FJP ARRL Field Day logging app makes it a minimal effort. 

Comparing CW to FT8,  I could have easily made 100 to 150 CW contacts in the time I spent making FT8 contacts..

What is your opinion of operating FT8 during contests?

The SLINKY Vertical HF Antenna Experiment

Last winter I made a simple drive over stand using a 3 foot pine board, a simple pipe fitting, 4 bolts and nuts and an 18" section of pipe. The setup provides a very solid base for deploying portable antennas. Breakdown and transport are also advantages of this simple stand.

Originally I used the drive over stand with a 20' fiberglass Shakespeare fishing pole and the QRPGuys Portable 40/30/20m Tri-Band Vertical Antenna. Texas, roughly 1400 miles from Long Island was the first contact using the stand/antenna combo.

For another crazy experiment, I bought a SLINKY from Amazon and a 9:1 UNUN from eBay. The UNUN helps to bring the impedance of the contraption into the ballpark. 

 

 

A small lanyard attached to the SLINKY connects to the eyelet
in the fishing pole. 

 

 

 

Soldering an eye connector to the other end of the SLINKY connects it to the antenna side of the UNUN.

 

 

 

Extending the fishing pole, excluding the top section gets the SLINKY fully opened. A the beach I rolled out a 33' counterpoise and attached it to the ground side of the UNUN. 

 

My old Kenwood TS50 and SLINKY performed better than expected. Located only about 50' from the Atlantic the ocean assisted me in getting my signal out. I made a bunch of stateside SSB contacts and a few into Europe.

 

  In summary, the drive over stand and SLINKY antenna was an inexpensive and fun experiment. Using an analyzer and making minor adjustments to the height of the SLINKY and the length of the counterpoise will help to better tune the antenna for a more efficient operating experience.

Related Posts:

The HB9SL 2 Element 20m VP2E QRP Antenna

The Elecraft AX1 Window Mount

The Slinky Vertical Antenna Experiment

Arborist Throw Lines For Portable Antennas

How To Build A Cheap Tilt Over Tower

72 de KE2YK

Operating QRP at Fire Island NY

One cold winter day I decided to operate from Smiths Point County Park on the south shore of Long Island. 

Smiths Point is about 3 miles south of my home QTH. In the state of New York everything costs money. However, there is no park entrance fee off season. 

To give you an idea what Suffolk County New York does to it's residents and visitors during the summer, residents have to buy a 3 year county green card for $60 and then pay an additional $9 per visit. (Seniors and Vets are "free" during the week provided you paid for a Green Card) That's the definition of "free" in Suffolk County New York. Non residents have to pay $18 per visit. The moral of the story is: Be thankful you don't live in Suffolk County New York.

 Fire Island National Seashore

 The county park is located on Fire Island but cannot technically be counted as an activation for the Parks on the Air program. 

The Fire Island National Seashore (FINS) preserve is adjacent to the county park but without walking in or buying 2 more annual passes for a 4 wheel vehicle you cannot enter FINS.

If memory serves me right I think you have to be in the park or within 100 feet of the entrance to start an activation for the (POTA) Parks on the Air program.  Unfortunately FINS (POTA K-0679) is not within 100 feet of the county parking lot. So activating it from within the vehicle in winter is not workable. 

Some of the Wildlife looking for handouts at FINS

Running the KX3 with a Hamstick screwed into a mag mount of the roof works very well from the county park. It's always fun and surprising to see the results of operating QRP portable with compromise antennas. Working Europe with 5 watts from that location is a bit of a challenge but a lot of fun when making contact. 

Hope you enjoyed my first QRP in the field post from the QRP Shack! 

Please comment and share your QRP operating experiences with other QRP enthusiasts!