Field Day 2010 Operations
Filed in Contests on Jul.07, 2010
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.
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…
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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