[NLRS] KC0IYT/R June VHF+ notes

[Glen Overby]

That was a busy weekend!

A big thanks to everyone who followed me all weekend!  I have 34 unique calls
in my log.  Here's the RoverLog summary:

RoverLog QSOs by Activated Grid:
Grid	QSOs	Grid	QSOs	Grid	QSOs
EN23	36	EN24	48	EN33	70
EN34	37	EN25	17	EN43	29
EN35	20	EN44	19	

RoverLog Score Summary, Using new rover rules:
Band	QSOs	Value	QSOPts	Mults
50	31	1	31	14
144	63	1	63	14
222	42	2	84	10
432	47	2	94	12
903	20	4	80	6
1.2	24	4	96	7
2.3	18	8	144	3
3.4	19	8	152	4
10	12	8	96	4

Grids activated: 		8

Totals:	276		840	82	

Claimed Score: 68880

I haven't sent my log in yet; I need to review it once first.

I operated from 8 grids.  Of those, I worked W0GHZ from 7, N0KP from 6, K9MU &
N0VZJ from 5.  It was great to hear from distant stations and rovers!  Roving
adds another dimension to rover following!  I picked up unique grids from
K0MHC/R, W0ZQ/R, and KF0Q/R.  K0AWU found me from EN37 a couple of times.
KM0T came in 5/9 early Sunday morning when I was in EN23, but I missed him all
day Saturday and later in the day Sunday.

It seems that when there was good propagation on 6 and aurora on 2, everyone
disappeared!

I didn't realise how directional my 2m antenna really is.  I built long
antennas for gain, but as a result I don't hear much off the sides.  I'll be
looking into solutions to this for next time.  Loops, maybe?  I heard a lot
more stations when I started using headphones.

In the weeks before the contest, I built transverter kits for 2304 and 3456
and used them to drive amps from "Pyro Joe".  I got 2304 working, with some
improvisations, with less than a week to go.  3456 wasn't ready until late
Friday evening, and I was apprehensive about how ready it was.  I was almost
short an antenna cable, but a short patch cable allowed 902 to reach into the
car, thus freeing up it's cable for 3456.  All the equipment worked out in the
end.  I had frequency stability problems on everything from 902 on up.  

My antennas were mounted on my car using a tripod (an idea from W0ZQ).  This
put the lowest antennas about 3' up, with 3' of mast above that.  I used a
thrust bearing to hold the mast so it could rotate - this worked very well, as
I was able to peak up on people quickly and without requring a lot of space to
turn the car.  I made many contacts with my arm out the window holding ropes!

Saturday morning, I headed for my first stop earlier than I had planned to.
On Highway 52 to Rochester, I was passed by a few semi trucks whose wake shook
the antennas very hard.  I was afraid the whole thing was going to be torn off
the car!  I decicded to reroute to avoid truck traffic as much as possible.  I
stopped at an exit to read a map, and checked the antenna stack.  I found the
shorting bar of the 2m T-Match was disconnected and dangling.  Uh-Oh!  I used
the extentable mast for 6m to slide the part off the driven element so it
wouldn't go through someone's windshield.  With a hightened stress level, I
pushed on while thinking about how to fix my antenna.  My best solution was to
find a park and stand on a picnic table.  I found a park in St. Charles, but
the picnic table wasn't high enough.  I had a large toolbox that is safe to
stand on and with it on top of the table, I could just barely reach the
antenna.  With the antenna fixed, I proceeded to my first stop (EN44),
arriving only a few minutes late.

Sunday Morning in EN23 brought a new problem: sunlight.  Equipment in direct
sunlight gets hot.  The noise floor on my 1296 went from < s1 to s7 in the
sun, blotting out signals from the twin cities missed a couple of people due
to the noise.  I think 432 had the same problem earlier, causing distortion.
I turned off some transverters and tossed a towel over the transverters to
keep the sun off, and they worked better after cooling (my windshield sun
shade would have done a better job).

Sunday afternoon in EN35 I was looking towards EN37 when a deputy sherrif
stopped by.  He was very friendly and asked me a lot of questions about ham
radio.  No hassles at all, but I spent about 20 minutes talking to him while
occasionally hearing someone calling me.

I've got a new set of things to work on before RoverMania.

Glen, kc0iyt