Yesterday, I was the CW guy (aka “ringer”) on a team consisting of yours truly and Thom, W8TAM, that activated the Brighton (MI) Recreation Area, known to Worldwide Flora and Fauna (WFF) nuts as KFF-3384. It was a beautiful day with sunny skies and temperatures in the mid-70s. Thom did most of the heavy lifting; I just brought my lunch and my Kent paddle.
About 11:30 am, Thom drove up, I grabbed my briefcase, and we were off to the park. It only took us about 45 minutes to get there, and within a half hour of our arrival, our station was up and running.
I say “our” station, but it’s really Thom’s. He has quite a bit of experience doing this kind of thing, including many National Parks on the Air (NPOTA) activations last year. He’s really gotten quite good at this.
The station yesterday consisted of Thom’s FT-450D, a battery pack that he assembled from some golf-cart batteries he purchased on eBay, and and 80m doublet antenna. The key to the antenna is the SpiderBeam 30-ft. fiberglass mast, shown in the photo at right.
Setup was very quick. Thom attached the mast to a volleyball net support with a couple stout straps. This provided more than enough support for the light winds we had yesterday. Then, he attached the center insulator to the tip of the mast and extended the mast to its full height. We then extended the antenna elements into an inverted-V and secured them with a couple of seven-pound dumbbells. No stakes to leave a mark!
The feedline was a length of 300 Ω twinlead. It runs down the mast and connects to a Viking Matchbox antenna tuner at the base of the antenna. See below.
If, for some reason, he can’t get a good match, Thom has a number of different lengths of 450 Ω ladder line that he can easily connect in and out. You can’t see it very well in the photo, but each length is terminated with PowerPoles, to make this operation quick and easy.
The beauty of this antenna is that we were able to work practically all of the HF bands with it. We started out on 20 m, where Thom was able to make a few SSB contacts.
20 m wasn’t in great shape, though, so we decided to try some 30 m CW. In a fairly short time, I managed 11 or 12 contacts, thanks in part to someone spotting us. When the activity on 30 m petered out, we switched to 40 m SSB, and Thom racked up a bunch of SSB QSOs, working many of the same stations we had worked on 20 m and 30 m. Finally, we switched to 40 m CW, and I managed to log another half dozen or so.
We had intended to try 80m late in the afternoon, but we ended up leaving a little earlier than we planned. Throughout the entire afternoon, we had the park pretty much all to ourselves, but just before 4:00 pm, a horde of graduation partiers descended on us. They kindly informed us that they had reserved the pavilion that we were using and that we weren’t invited to the party. Since there were many more of them than us—there must have been between 30 and 40 people by the time we left—we decided that we had better pack up.
Even though we had to quit early, I had a great time. As noted earlier, the weather was just perfect, and the band conditions were pretty good, too. Of course, it helped that we were using a full-size antenna, mounted at a decent height.
I’m already looking forward to my next activation. I know that I won’t always be able to count on Thom to do all the heavy lifting, so I’m going to have to acquire some more portable gear myself. I have pretty much everything I need, except for a decent battery pack. I’ve been using a small gel-cell thing designed for campers to power my KX-1 and KX-3, but I’m going to need more amp-hours to operate longer and with more power. It should be fun getting it all set up, though, and getting out to the parks again.
Ed B. says
That doesn’t sound very portable, with golf cart batteries, an FT-450, and a Viking Matchbox. A nice 100w setup though…
Dan KB6NU says
I guess it depends on your definition of portable. This is definitely not something you cart around in a backpack, but it all fit quite nicely, along with the two of us, in Thom’s Prius.
Thom w8tam says
Ed,
The batteries are 40ah LiFePo4 cells, they are pretty light, not at all like lead batteries. The 40′ Spiderbeam mast is light enough to backpackable. I’ve carried it on a backpack.
The matchbox is the lowest loss turner I own, so I choose that when I can, but I have smaller tuners… but most of them include a balun which introduces loss. The 80m doublet is made of 22awg stranded wire, and 300ohm TV twin lead. It’s pretty light, weighing in just over 17oz. It’s kind to the fiberglass mast.
The FT-450d includes a handle for moving it around.
I pick my gear for the best overall operating experience. Since we were able to park near our operating position, the bigger batteries and 100w radio made sense.
I also own a MTR5b & QRPGuys halfwave endfed tuner, which I can power with a 9v battery. That’s the most portable station I own, but lacks some features compared to the station we put up for this activation.
73,
-Thom
w8tam
Thom w8tam says
Here’s some links.
US WWFF program ‘parks on the air’. http://www.parksontheair.com/
Michigan State Parks On The Air. http://www.mspota.org/
73,
-Thom
w8tam
Hank says
Nice writeup! You did great!
Thom w8tam says
Thanks Hank! We just got back from another activation at Waterloo. Tonights radio work was done on a floating fishing dock. Very cool operating position!
Vance N3VEM says
Sounds like you guys had a blast! My CW is still only tolerable at best (5-8wpm) but if I had heard you on the air I would have tried to catch you!