Field Day 2010 Operations

 

Field Day 2010 Operations

Conditions were generally not as good this year as last.

We found that the settings for the antenna tuner that we made last year were still completely valid. The only problem we had was when we had the 160 meter switch turned on for 80 meters at one point, which may have led to some dismal results there.

Ken (KF7FAM) joined John and I for his first Field Day this year. He started out by helping out with antenna construction, then by watching and logging while he learned the flow of the Field Day contact.

 
Ken logs as Randy operates
 
 

Later, he got more ambitious, and had his first HF contact, followed by several more throughout the weekend. I think he enjoyed each new section he contacted. As usual, we wern’t trying to maximize points, but were more interested in the technical setup, and the challenge of contacting as many sections as possible.

 
Ken making one of several HF contacts
 
 

There were a couple of other new things we tried this year. Once we figured out how to make the new 43′ vertical work (at least on bands above 80 meters), we mostly used it for our contacts. The signals were not significantly higher, but the noise level was quite a bit lower, so almost all stations were much easier to hear on the vertical. I know that goes against conventional wisdom for verticals vs horizontile diploles. Perhaps it is due to the generator being within 30 feet or so of the doublet, but about 200 feet from the vertical. Or maybe its because the doublet has so much more wire in the air to pick up noise.

Another new thing to try was the MMR-40 QRP kit constructed during the year. It had been tested on the bench, but had never been put on the air. After completing our 5 natural power contacts with the TS-480 Kenwood at 5 watts, we switched over to the MMR-40. We completed another 5 contacts at 5 watts with this rig, with no comments of being weak or garbled or anything. So it appears to work!

 
Installed in Case
 
 

We also were able to put the new homebrew Receiver Noise Bridge to good use in troubleshooting the vertical problem mentioned in a previous post.

So what were our results? Here is a shot of the sections worked:

 
 

The map for 2010 shows that we lost a couple of sections from the “7” call area, probably due to our lack of 80 meter contacts at night.  We also lost quite a few sections from the “0” call area.  Not sure why, maybe the 6 meter opening wasn’t quite as good as last year.

 
Sections worked Map 2010

And we’re still having a hard time to the east of the Mississippi, particularly the southeast.  I’m guessing that Black Mountain, straight east of us, has something to do with that.

Our operating time pretty much shut down after 11:00pm local, as 80 meters was bad, and we just lost interest this year. We didn’t start back up until 8:00 am or so…

 
Operating Graph

Finally, here is our log from this year:

     Call Used: WB0SMX  Class: 1A                  ARRL Section: AZ

40   PH    2010/06/26  19:42:48  KI6ZQL     5A     ORG
40   PH    2010/06/26  19:44:30  W6PWT      2F     ORG
40   PH    2010/06/26  19:53:10  WG7G       4A     AZ
40   PH    2010/06/26  19:55:54  K7GGG      1B     AZ
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:03:54  W6DOJ      3E     SV
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:08:38  W7SA       5A     AZ
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:11:44  WA6BGS     6A     SDG
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:15:29  W6ZE       4A     ORG
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:18:09  N6R        20A    SB
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:22:30  W7IO       3F     AZ
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:25:40  W6NWG      6E     SDG
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:28:55  W6GNS      2A     LAX
40   PH    2010/06/26  20:38:56  W6ICR      2F     SDG
15   PH    2010/06/26  21:04:08  NH6P       1D     PAC
15   PH    2010/06/26  21:19:48  KH6RS      1A     PAC
15   PH    2010/06/26  21:26:57  NR5M       2D     STX
15   PH    2010/06/26  21:36:49  W5HUM      2A     AR
15   PH    2010/06/26  21:38:27  W7WA       1E     WWA
15   PH    2010/06/26  21:52:28  VE6AO      1D     AB
15   PH    2010/06/26  21:55:06  W7SAA      10A    OR
20   PH    2010/06/26  22:32:29  N7TT       1D     WWA
20   PH    2010/06/26  22:50:56  W0CBH      3A     CO
20   PH    2010/06/26  22:55:02  KL7AA      3A     AK
20   PH    2010/06/26  23:07:17  WB5UDI     2D     CO
20   PH    2010/06/26  23:12:10  VE7BC      1E     BC
20   PH    2010/06/26  23:28:39  WS4Y       2A     KS
20   PH    2010/06/27  00:02:00  W0NT       12E    CO
20   PH    2010/06/27  00:17:24  NR5M       2D     STX
20   PH    2010/06/27  00:27:04  K0KKV      3A     NE
20   PH    2010/06/27  00:31:27  VE5NN      1A     SK
20   PH    2010/06/27  00:32:14  KH6RS      1A     PAC
20   PH    2010/06/27  00:34:02  WJ5J       4A     NTX
20   PH    2010/06/27  00:37:05  NH6JC      1D     PAC
10   PH    2010/06/27  00:44:20  W4UG       5A     VA
40   PH    2010/06/27  02:49:19  K6LRG      3E     EB
40   PH    2010/06/27  03:01:12  W5KS       4A     OK
40   PH    2010/06/27  03:18:33  W0DK       1A     CO
40   PH    2010/06/27  03:22:22  W6CX       3A     EB
40   PH    2010/06/27  03:26:49  K6TZ       2A     SB
40   PH    2010/06/27  03:49:24  N1SV       1E     EMA
40   PH    2010/06/27  04:07:08  KU6S       3A     EB
20   PH    2010/06/27  04:16:35  W9BJ       4A     WI
20   PH    2010/06/27  04:25:30  W4DXA      3E     SC
20   PH    2010/06/27  04:37:57  W1NVT      2A     VT
20   PH    2010/06/27  04:46:57  W8HP       5A     MI
20   PH    2010/06/27  04:53:45  K8UU       4A     OH
20   PH    2010/06/27  04:56:36  W7WLL      1D     OR
20   PH    2010/06/27  04:59:45  KJ6RA      1E     SV
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:03:36  W3AO       24A    MDC
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:05:09  NH7O       1E     PAC
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:07:30  K8BF       4A     OH
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:08:11  K5FD       2A     WTX
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:10:34  N4TP       2A     WCF
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:12:41  KH2JU      1E     PAC
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:13:39  W3HGT      1E     WPA
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:21:34  KD6LM      3A     SF
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:30:15  K1TTT      8E     WMA
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:31:51  NX0G       2A     CO
20   PH    2010/06/27  05:37:44  NE7WY      2A     WY
80   PH    2010/06/27  05:49:05  W6LIE      5A     SJV
80   PH    2010/06/27  05:53:09  W6ITN      1A     SV
80   PH    2010/06/27  05:58:07  WR6HMB     2A     SCV
6    PH    2010/06/27  15:44:11  K0HA       1D     NE
6    PH    2010/06/27  15:50:43  K0LMD      1E     CO
6    PH    2010/06/27  15:58:11  NW0K       2A     KS
6    PH    2010/06/27  16:01:52  W5ANR      5A     AR
20   PH    2010/06/27  16:51:43  W7SUR      2A     UT
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:03:06  W7FO       1F     MT
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:10:36  KE0PX      1B     CO
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:12:00  K6LY       3A     SCV
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:17:44  W6R        2A     SB
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:18:53  VE7CVA     2F     BC
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:21:17  VE6AO      1D     AB
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:29:01  K7UM       4A     UT
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:31:03  K7MPR      7A     AZ
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:38:46  AB7QG      1B     UT
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:42:00  K6QM       3A     SDG
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:45:44  W8SWB      1B     ORG
10   PH    2010/06/27  18:03:21  W0TX       6A     CO
10   PH    2010/06/27  18:04:49  N6RK       1E     SV
10   PH    2010/06/27  18:07:00  KE6IEL     1D     SCV
20   PH    2010/06/27  18:13:17  W0IVJ      1C     CO
20   PH    2010/06/27  18:22:12  K7DNH      1B     NV
40   PH    2010/06/27  18:24:04  NU6N       1E     SJV
20   PH    2010/06/27  18:33:32  W7PIG      3A     WWA

Natural Power QSOs were:
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:10:36  KE0PX      1B     CO
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:12:00  K6LY       3A     SCV
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:17:44  W6R        2A     SB
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:18:53  VE7CVA     2F     BC
20   PH    2010/06/27  17:21:17  VE6AO      1D     AB
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:29:01  K7UM       4A     UT
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:31:03  K7MPR      7A     AZ
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:38:46  AB7QG      1B     UT
40   PH    2010/06/27  17:42:00  K6QM       3A     SDG

I’ll post more about Field Day when I see Ken and collect his pictures.

 

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