[Fists] First mobile

Buck - N4PGW n4pgw-list1 at towncorp.net
Mon Mar 21 00:59:08 EST 2005


I often travel mobile and even run counties on 14.336 from my car.  I love
it.  I also love CW. Lately I have been working with my kids and a half
dozen locals trying to get their CW passed so they can upgrade.  As a
result, I have been bitten by the bug again.  

I actually enjoy CW more than any other mode, but for some unknown reason, I
spend more time on some form of phone.  However, today, when I took my rig
to the car, I also dragged along my paddles.  After running a lot of SSB
mobile operation, I pulled onto an open hill area, parked and plugged in the
paddles.  I only made two contacts in the 40 minutes I was there, one with a
contester - hit and run, and one QSO that I had to discontinue due to QRM,
QRN and QSB.  However, I enjoyed it.  

It is much easier making 40 meter CW contacts from the full sized dipole,
but we managed today in spite of the conditions.  

I have been keeping my CW keyer down to about 12 wpm, but today I found I
was answering faster CW than I am sending so I guess it is time to raise it
a little.  I can send much faster, but I find that most of the time, I
receive faster replies than what I am sending so I dropped my speed and
enjoyed the leisurely pace.  Of course, the more I operate, the less rusty I
am.  (I am known for being perpetually rusty as I only operate often enough
not to keep up to rusty.)

Well, maybe I'll have to do that more often.  I'll have to retune my 20
meter antenna if I want to operate CW, and I can forget 80, my antenna won't
tune that low.

Hope to see some of you there.

73 for now.
Buck
N4PGW





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