A Busy Ham Radio Weekend

It was a busy ham radio weekend at KB6NU/WA2HOM.

Saturday, I didn’t get down to the museum until after noon. As usual, I went scouting around for special event stations. I bagged three of them:

• K2G (Babylon, NY). K2G was taking part in the commemoration of the 70th anniversary of Coast Guard Auxiliary. According to the ARRL website, there were at least a dozen on the air, but I only worked this one and heard another in PA. A number of them were supposed to be operating CW, but I didn’t hear any of them.
• W3S (somewhere in MD). This station was operating from a Boy Scout camp. I didn’t get its exact location as they were kind of weak.
• WB8REI (Tiffin, OH). This was a Halloween operation of the Seneca County Amateur Radio Experimenters (SCARE). The certificate will look nice next to our QSL card from N0F (Frankenstein, MO), a station we worked last Halloween.

I was hoping to work N1P, Number One Pumpkin, the special event station at the Franklin County Pumpkin Festival, but I guess the skip was too short.

Saturday night, I prepared for the hamfest this morning. Several hams in the area have donated equipment and other stuff for us to sell to help finance our operations at the Hands-On Museum. I was going through the stuff when I found a Bunnel #9 key (see below).

This is a very cool key. I don’t think it’s worth all that much—many thousands were made during WWII by several different manufacturers—but it does have a nice action, and I like it. Unfortunately, it’s missing the knob. Anyone know where I can get a knob for this key? After playing with the key for a while, I packed up all the stuff I was taking in the morning, and loaded up my Freestyle.

Sunday morning, I got up at 5:30am. I ate breakfast, showered, and hopped in the car at about 6:30. I had to drive about an hour to get to the hamfest, and I wanted to get there with plenty of time because I never got a confirmation that the organizers had received my check, and I wanted to get that all straightened out—if it needed straightening—before the hamfest started. Fortunately, there was no problem, and I got set up quickly.

The TS-820 station (including antenna tuner, bandscope display, speaker, etc.) went very quickly. I was asking $600 for it. Around 8:20 am, a guy came over and offered me $500 for it, and when I turned down that offer, $550. I decided to take that. He counted out 28 $20 bills and told me to keep the change.

Jim, K8ELR, had given me a box of 12 rolls of leadless solder to sell to the EAE Sales guy. He said that he would only buy five or six rolls at $7-8/roll, but to get with him later as he was still setting up. I did go over there later and offered him the whole box for $40, which he accepted. (I hope that was OK, Jim!)

I sold about $200 worth of books. In fact, I’m almost down to a single box of them. I’ll be a little sad when they’re all gone. I might have to start looking for electronics books or buying books from Ann Arbor library sale to re-sell at hamfests.

I packed up about 10:30, then cruised the aisles a little. Didn’t see anything I wanted, so I hopped into the car and got back by noon. That ended my weekend in ham radio. I ate a little lunch, took a nap, and then my XYL and I went to a movie.