[Elecraft] ?ELECRAFT NVIS field day?

[Ed Cole]

Just a comment on low dipoles:

On the Iditarod Dog Sled Race (Alaska) we had ham stations located in 
remote located checkpoints (total bush-no telephone or other utilities). 
  We used 80m and 40m to communicate with race HQ in Anchorage over 
paths of a couple hundred miles to 600 miles, or so.

80m worked well at night and 40m during the daytime.

Since one packed their station in a couple boxes to be hauled in small 
airplanes to these remote locations, antenna was a simple 80m wire 
dipole with clip-out sections to convert to 40m.

Usually antennas got strung from trees or buildings only high as one 
could reach or maybe using a stepladder.  They were NVIS by definition.

I recall some hung only 8 to 12 foot high, yet they worked fine with 
100w.  Not every station could reach HQ so quite a bit of relaying race 
traffic was done (reporting times in/out of checkpoints).  The race 
extends 1100 miles over a 8 to 20-day period as the dog teams varied in 
speed.

Ham radio is no longer used as the officials went to using sat-phones. 
But I was lucky to go out eight years on the trail as ham operator in 
the 1980's.  Used barefoot TS-180S and dipole (plus 600w Honda Gen).

You never lived until you slept in a wall tent at -60F outside (and -15F 
inside the tent).  Radio worked but LCD display took a little time to 
start when cold.

73, Ed - KL7UW