[Elecraft] J.T.O.A

[Kenneth A. Christiansen]

I have been asked to put up a station for the local BSA troop to observe Ham
Radio on Saturday October 16th. My home shack is not usable so I plan to set
up my camper with the 23 ft center mast and 10 foot end supports for my 44
ft doublet fed with 22 ft of 450 ohm window twin lead. I will use my K2/100
sn1031 and KAT100 with a W2DU balun and my 105 Amp deep discharge battery
and an analog supply for power. I have had many camping CW contacts both QRP
and QRO with this set up. The location will be our Church parking lot near
the Boy Scout Xmas tree stand. This location has buried 110 VAC and is
several hundred feet from the nearest power line. Now I come to my problem.
The contest rules at ARRL call for a frequency of 14.070 MHZ for 20 and
3.590 MHZ for 80. I don't plan to use 80 but the 20 meter frequency is in
the middle of the PSK31 and Digital part of the band. Last year I tuned
around and never did hear any JOTA stations. I do have a microphone and
while I do not work much SSB that might be an option. I need your help to
let me know where the JOTA activity if any will be and will I be able to use
CW or has everyone moved to SSB. I could use some hints about working the
stations on SSB too as I don't have much experience with 20 meter SSB. There
might be some chance to work 40 meters too but in my experience we are so
far from the highly populated parts of the country, here in Fargo, ND, that
I expect 40 meters to be dead during the day.

Thanks for any ideas.

W0CZ Ken
kachristiansen at att.net