Catching Anything?

Well yes some DX and some state side. Marv KK4DKT invited me out for some impromptu portable ops at the Panama City Marina Saturday AM. His wife Melissa joined us. Marv's setup was his FT 897 and the Buddipole. Marv had a good time working DX on 10 meters like Brazil and Bonaire. We figure the DX was a straight shot South over the water from Panama City. I setup my mast and a half wave wire for 30 meters. My rig was the Youkits HB-1B. I worked a couple of TN a TX and a VA. They had some QSB on my signal. Maybe it was my wire waving. Then I had a solid QSO with Tom K0FCG in West Plains MO. My best contacts on 30 meters have been to MO recently. So we stood out a little bit from the rest casting off the dock. I think we caught more than they did! Bob WB4BLX also dropped by and we enjoyed the visit. Greg N4KGL

Destin QRP Opportunity

My wife had some business in Destin FL. So I had a couple of ours to enjoy QRP portable ops. I went in the Bass Pro Store for the first time and looked at their crappie pole selection. I did not find any suitable poles. I did spy a interesting item called a fish-n-mate sand spike. It turns out it will mate with 1.5 inch PVC pipe which mates with my 20 foot crappie pole. I tried it out in an empty lot next door to the Bass Pro. I lofted a slightly less than half wave wire for some 30 meter contacts. I had a couple of tough contacts but the last one was a good one with Rich AC0MP in Columbia MO. The sand spike will come in handy I am sure. See the photos below.

End Fed Half Waves with 43 Foot Mast

The new wrinkle is extending my military mast sections vertically with the 20 foot crappie pole. The 1.5 inch "four way" PVC adapter will fit over the end of of a military mast section. Note for this application I sawed off the male end of one military mast section. The crappie pole will fit into a 1.5 inch two foot PVC pipe. This in pushed into the top of the "four way" The butt of the crappie pole is locked in. So with five four foot mast sections plus the three foot one with the adapter this yields 43 feet. This assembly is attached to a hitch adapter on the back of my truck. I hope the pictures help.

I tested this configuration out in the driveway and at this month's rocket launch. The height of the mast lets me have a 30 meters half wave pretty much vertical and operate beside the truck. I used a separate wire attached lower on the mast for a 20 meters half wave. I was able to tune them end fed with both the Hendricks BLT and SLT+ tuners. I was also successful tuning the 30 meter half wave wire on 40 meters. So I have made contacts on 40, 30 and 20 with this arrangement. I had a nice long contact with KB4JR Bernie in Lake Wales FL on 30 meters from the rocket field.

Another small detail, I found that "snap" crimp connectors from Home Depot are my answer for joining wires. They push together similar to banana plugs.

Polar Bear and Grid Squares

I went out with the Panama City club today to a bay side park in Lynn Haven, FL. My setup was the Inverted U supported by a mast off my truck hitch. It is 52 feet of wire center fed via 300 ohm line to a BLT tuner. My rig was the HB1B at 5 watts. My goal was to work Polar Bears and the QRP ARCI Grids Square Event. I nailed both by working Kelly Bear K4UPG right off the bat on 40 meters. He was participating in the Grid Square event at EL98. I continued on 40 meters working Lake Wales and Miami FL. Then I retuned for 20 meters and worked W5ESE at EM00 and W4MPS at FM05. So it was fun to get some contacts and mix with the club members. Marv KK4DKT brought his daughter Sydney and she had her first contact on Marv's new FT-897 rig.

Greg N4KGL

Rainy Day Kit Build

Saturday was a rainy day in Panama City and I took advantage of it to build the Hendricks SLT+ 80-10 Meter Half Wave Tuner from WWW.QRPKITS.COM. I bought it in part because it covers 80 meters as most QRP tuners don't. The kit is excellent. Of course there are a few toroids to be wound. The tuner is an L circuit. It uses a polyvaricon type capacitor. So Sunday the weather cleared and I joined Marv KK4DKT who was already setup with his Buddipole at a local park. I setup three 20 foot crappie poles to support 124 feet of wire. I tried the 69 foot counterpoise but it was tripping up some of the other park goers so I shortened it up. Note, the wire was a little short of a half wave as recommended in the instructions. The tuner did a good job of tuning to 1 to 1 SWR on 80 meters but hey nobody was there to work. It also tuned up on 40 as a full wave. I did snag KT4TN as you can guess was in Tennessee. Getting pretty chilly I called that a success. I am looking forward to using this tuner on other bands. It seems to work well on the first try. BTW Marv had a blast snagging DX on his Buddipole including stations from Spain.

Rocket Launch Portable Ops

It was a pleasant surprise to have Marv KK4DKT and his wife Melissa to make the trip from Panama City FL to Samson AL for the Feb 25th SouthEast Alabama Rocketry Society (SEARS) Rocket Launch. I had setup my Portable Inverted U Doublet before he arrived. Marv arrived and setup his new Buddipole. Marv operated on 20 meters SSB. He did not have any luck with the Buddipole initially. Conditions were not the best. Then Marv switched to the vertical configuration and snagged a station operating off of a frozen lake combining ice fishing with portable ops.

This was Marv's first launch and he saw lots of launches including my Gizmo rocket on an I sparky motor. Marv and Melissa were a great help spotting the two pieces of my Estes Tornado rocket that got carried away in the stiff breeze we had.

My operating included QRP on 30 and 40 meters. I had several contacts with poor reports for my signal. Then on 40 I had a 559 report from John W3BNO in Huntsville AL. Of course portable ops at the rocket launch is perhaps doing too many things at once for my brain power. Also my portable inverted U got one arm removed when a rocket drifted by under chute. There actually was no damage as the arm was a friction fit with a little bit of tape. So the arm came off and was suspended by the 26 gauge antenna wire.

Enjoy the photos.

Portable Inverted U Doublet

After locating some 20 foot crappie poles, I wanted to try a new way to use them. The idea was to mount them on the military mast poles I have. I had used the military mast off a hitch mount on the truck to support hamstick dipoles before. With two 20 foot poles that yields a 40 foot span, plenty for a full size dipole at 20 meters.

Now as for mounting the crappie poles on the mast. I found that a 1.5 inch PVC four way fitting slides nicely onto the military mast. I had to take the mast into Home Depot to find that out. Then I needed some short lengths of PVC out the sides. Well Home Depot sells 2 foot lengths. Very handy! The 20 foot crappie pole fits into the 1.5 inch PVC and the butt end won't go through. When the PVC length is put into the fitting this secures the poles into the fitting. Cheap and easy!

I thought I would try a 40 meter dipole with the ends hanging down. Well yes it can work but the ends hang down so close to the ground I needed to tie them off with a guy. line. That is fine but I could support the ends with more poles if that is the case.

The next idea was a shortened dipole on 40 and hope I could use it on 30 and 20 meters also. I setup a dipole or doublet I have that has reels to adjust the length. I just eyeballed a length that would keep the ends above head level. So 40 foot across the top and the reels hang straight down. This is the inverted U shape that W4RNL wrote about. After I took it down, one end was 27 feet and the other 25 feet. So next time I'll make them 26 and 26 for the total length of 52 feet.

And now the happy ending. I setup the HB1B and the BLT tuner. The doublet is fed with 300 ohm line. It did tune on 40, 30, 20 and 10 meters. So now to try it out. My first contact was W4FO in Tampa on 30 meters, next was K4GXY in Lakeland on 40 meters and last why not take advantage of the DX contest. So on 20 meters I worked PJ4X Bonaire, PJ2T  Coral Cliff Curacao, and then TI5W in Costa Rica. OK enough to say this one works and I will keep it in mind for future portable ops. All this was in my driveway at home. Keep in mind this one will get some looks from passer-bys.

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