Today was Polar Bear Moonlight Madness Event! I wore my new Polar Bear hat and it brought me luck. I setup in the 3 story prayer tower at Pioneers, my ministry headquarters. That kept me out of the weather and got me up in the air a bit which helped my W3EDP antenna do its thing.
Pioneers Headquarters Prayer Tower on left
Bands were pretty good and there were a lot of QRP signals out there as well as SKCC and FIST ops. I worked a few of my fellow Polar Bears:
Then I worked a few non-PB’s and had some good QSO’s with SKCC members.
Next weekend is the FYBO and the Central FL QRP Group will be operating its first multi station- multi operator event at Sylvan Lake Park in Sanford, FL. If you’ll are down this way look us up. If not, give a listen for K4AHO which is the call sign we will be using.
Here’s to many good QSO’s. Thanks to all the good ops with good ears that heard my peanut whistle 2 watts today.
Almost time for another Polar Bear Moonlight Madness Event! Grrrrrrrrr! This coming weekend, Saturday 14 Nov 2009, Polar Bears will be clamoring for position in the ice field and slammin pawerful signals into the air. Bring a rig and join us.
K4UPG Bear pounding brass and gittin' ready for the PBMME!
K4UPG Bear #173 is excited because some other bears is gonna be gathering with the Central Florida QRP Group which is scheduled to meet that same day! So come on out to the Cracker Barrel in Sanford, FL for some sammin pancakes or sumpin else at 0730 EDT breakfast time. If you cannot make the feeding, then meet up with the rest of us bears at Sylvan Lake Park in the A Pavillion area at around 0900 EDT. Ya’ll come, hear??? Grrrrrrrrr!
72,
Kelly K4UPG
Since I was not feeling well, I did not push myself too hard. But I did set up my Buddistick in the back yard between the condo’s here in Orlando. There is a bit of QRN from the TV’s, Computers and Air Conditioners, but it is tolerable.
I used a step ladder for a support for the painter’s pole and that seems to work fine in this location. It is fast and simple though I do guy the pole just to make sure it doesn’t blow over in the frequent gusts of wind.
40m was in poor shape so I quickly shifted to 20m and got tuned up easily with a 1:1 to 1 SWR. Sweet! Made a handful of QSO’s with NY, CT, TX, PA and heard CA, ME, WA, IA and a few others but did not make the connection.
Lord willin’ I’ll be able to make a few on Sunday too. Here’s some pics from today’s effort with my Sierra and J-47 key.
Buddistick in the backyard between condos
Back Porch portable at my condo
Grrrrrrr! Brand new Polar Bear #173 ventured out to Lake Fredrica today to stir up some fellow PB’s on the air. Setting up the mini bac Delta Loop Beartenna went well and I started on 40m. The band was OK, but I couldn’t seem to raise any BSO’s with my fellow Polar Bears. After a few minutes I switched to 20m with my Wilderness Sierra and WOW! The band was full of California ops in some sort of contest. Most of them blew me away with their fast CW and very strong signals but it was good to hear so much cw activity and the band was pretty good.
I setup my trusty Buddistick for 30m and almost got a perfect SWR. My Wilderness SST on 30m was hearing a good bit of activity and I managed brief qso’s with fellow Polar Bear QRP members W05X and N9SKN despite pretty heavy QSB on both signals. I heard W6BBQ and WG0AT but could not get a reply when I called them.
A bit later the band opened to Europe and I also was hearing West Coast (California and Washington) stations. I came back to S57MU and he gave me a 559 into Slovenia! Not bad for 2.1 watts out and it was a good way to end a fun day.
Thanks to the Polar Bear QRP Group for allowing this baby bear to participate. I look forward to future portable events and I’ll keep workin’ on a super-duper Beartenna so I can hear ya’ll even better. Grrrrr!
PBMME Oct 09 portable site at Lake Fredrica Orlando, FL
Tuning for Bears on 30m
My project this week was a Ten Tec 1051 Noise Bridge. I used a Ten Tec enclosure and it all went together quickly and even worked on the first try! It is a sweet tool for tuning an antenna when using a tuner without putting a signal on the air. I think it will help me and my BLT+ find the sweet spot a good bit faster than doing it otherwise. In the future, I plan to upgrade it to a full RX bridge so I can do some measurements too. Here it is…
TT 1051 rear view
TT 1051 Noise Bridge simple front view
I took my radio with me to St Louis and tried my hand at Hotel Portable ops. The conference schedule did not allow me much time, but I did get a break one afternoon and took 30 min to play radio in the courtyard. I threw my Coleman Clothesline reel over a tree limb at about 15 feet and paid out about 30 feet of wire and placed about 16 feet of wire on the ground as a counterpoise. It loaded well on 40m with my BLT+ and I worked three stations in about 20 min. Not bad!
St Louis Hotel Portable Airport Hilton
St Louis Airport Hilton Loading the Window frame!
After returning home, the weather in Orlando was great and I hit the nearby lake park for some antenna testing with a Mini Bac in various configurations. I was really happy with the Delta Loop which loaded well on 20m and 40m. This antenna is a keeper and I’ll be doing more testing and learning about how to deploy it.
Lake Fredrica operating position
Buddistick deployed for comparison
Here is the Delta Loop! Can you see the 26 gauge teflon coated wire? Here is a link to an outlined view of the Delta loop. CLICK HERE. The Red line is the feed line which is twisted 1 turn per foot and held together with masking tape. Pretty slick. The “insulator” I used is also masking tape, as are the corner point markers and peak of the Delta. As I measured it I stuck a small piece of tape on the wire.
Mini Bac antenna in 14MHz Delta Loop Configuration
At last! We finally had a break in the weather and did not have thunderstorms and rain all weekend! Although it was hot, it was really nice to be out byLake Fredrica and set up antennas again. My trusty slingshot worked well and I managed to get a line over a couple limbs on the tall pine trees for a 40m dipole up at 40 feet. The dipole was fed with 300 ohm twinlead and loaded up well with my BLT+
Can you see that dipole in between the pine trees?
Kept moving to stay in the shade!
20 ft Jackite pole and 44 ft doublet first test setup
Dr Pepper and CW QSO's what a treat!
My wife saved the day by bringing me a cold Diet Dr. Pepper after I’d been baking in the Florida sun for about 4 hours. What a treat that was, eh?
Band was not too great with a lot of QRN and some SSB and RTTY QRM later in the day. My 20 ft Jackite pole and 44 doublet as an inverted vee with the ends 3 ft off the ground was disappointing test. My BLT+ would not tune it on any band I tried.
I posted that result to QRP-L reflector and the MQFD list and got a good number of replies. Seems that anything less than 6 feet above ground makes the 44 ft doublet difficult to tune! So I’ll be trying different configuration the next time out and see how it goes.
Maybe I’ll have my new halfwave end fed tuner completed soon and have some time to test it out and report those results soon too. I love this QRP stuff!
My hat made a good sunshade for the Sierra
Sylvan Lake Park CFL QRP Group getting setup
The Central Florida QRP Group meeting will be at The Cracker Barrel, Saturday, September 12th at 7:30 AM on Hickman Drive, Sanford. The Cracker Barrel is very close to the I4 and Hwy 46 junction, 1 light to the east (toward Sanford and turn East(left), down about a block on the left).
MAP to Cracker Barrel Click Here
Please bring your “Show and Tell” if you like. At approximately 9:00 AM we will reconvene at The Sylvan Lake Park, Picnic area “A” to setup our QRP rigs and operate a bit. The Sylvan Lake park is on Lake Markham Road off Hwy 46 approximately 4 miles West of the I4/Hwy 46 Junction.
MAP to Sylvan Lake Park Click Here
If you can’t make the breakfast come join us at the Sylvan Lake Park. We will plan future activities of the CFQG. We look forward to seeing you there.
72
Jim Diggs K4AHO
I have been like a kid on Christmas Eve thinking about this event. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate and I chose to stay closer to home than originally planned. In this low power (QRP) ham radio event, the Bumblebees were to hike, bike, or travel via water to the spot they would operate. As bee #86, I donned my backpack (overly packed by the way) and headed to the lakeside park in our housing development which is about 3/4 mile from my home. It was about 90+ degrees Farenheit at 11 am when I set out to my site.
The sky looked good, except the clouds were building to the Southwest… So I setup camp and decided to use the shelter rather than be out in the open in case rain came. Good choice!
So I setup my Buddistick for 20m using my MFJ 207 Analyzer. I soon had the SWR down to 1.3/1 and after hoisting the antenna into the air on my semi-official BEE colored painter’s pole it went down to less than 1.2 to 1! Good enough for this ham! Signals were a bit down and there was a good bit of QRN which would get worse. Since it was early, I ate lunch and watched the herons work the shallows of the lake while I waited for the 1 PM starting time.
Bumblebee 86 on the way out~ note the BEE colored hat
Buddistick up and away
She's up and ready to rock n roll
From the bottom looking up!
My Rig setup. Nice view, eh?
Unfortunately, the weather decided to roll in and 15 minutes after the start I made my first qso. Then the lightning sirens went off and I pulled down the antenna and played it safe. After two hours of watching the rain and lightning show and a few herons on the hunt for food, I got a window of good weather and put the station back on the air. Two more qso’s in the next 20 minutes and then the rain and lightning moved back in on me.
Here comes the lightning and rain again!
So with only 39 minutes to go, I decided to roll up the coax and trek home. I had lots of fun despite the challenges. I’ll be there next year, the Lord willing!
The last couple weeks have been busy at my office. This weekend we took some time off and headed to St Petersburg Beach. Since it was ARRL Field Day and I have not participated in that great event in almost 30 yrs, I took my Wilderness Sierra and Buddistick antenna and did some LAZY operating from the beach. My little 2.5 watts out didn’t break through too many pileups, but I had a great time listening to all the activity and being at the beach too.
You can only take so much Florida sun in one day… gets might hot. So I found a fine alternative and perhaps set a historic way to use the Buddistick. Check out my Hammock Mobile operating site. Buddistick is on the support pole.
Starting to look like something good!
Spent my weekend building my Wilderness Sierra kit! What a fun kit and a real looker too! Now to get the KC-2 installed and align and calibrate things! Yahoo! Stay tuned for updates.
Now that's a looker! Top view before KC-2 Install
Beautiful layout pre-KC2 install
Gorgeous packaging! Wait until the KC-2 is installed.
