[nrv-hams] A Forward to the club from Donnie AB4I --Try 2

[Carter Craigie]

Thoughts on Field Day 2013:
Another Field Day is now history and I am writing these thoughts while
the muscles still ache and I still remember how they got that way.
There was a lot to like about this FD and a fine time was had by
hopefully all.  However, there are also always a few kinks that
crop-up, which is an opportunity for us to make things better the next
time around.

I especially enjoyed the opportunity to use N6QDO's Elecraft KX-3 rig.
The little rig is just a delight and I was very impressed by its
performance, even though the experience will cost me some money,
because now I have to have one!  My K2 has always been my favorite
Field Day rig, but I can see the KX-3 having an edge in several areas,
one being the native integration of voice, CW, and digital operations.
You could use all three modes with this rig on the fly, which would
make it fantastically flexible as a Field Day rig.

It was great having multiple K2's on site!  I understand that was
actually an accident, since the TS-440 developed a problem and had to
be replaced.  The word went out for replacement rigs and what arrived
were both K2's that were provided by N3AO's and N4HY.  Naturally, I
also brought my own QRP K2, as I always do, so there were three of
these elegant little rigs at the NRVARC Field Day.  Bob and I operated
our K2's through the night QRP CW, as Carter's higher power K2 had to
go home at night. It would have been nice to have two Phone stations,
but working with what we had, we collectively made something past 700
QSO's for the three stations.

We do need to work on some procedural issues, one being the use of the
bandpass filters.  The filter for the phone station was damaged by
transmitting high power on the wrong band, which burned out one of the
coupling capacitors.  The repair will be easy though, as we built the
filters the way that we did knowing full well that this would happen
eventually.  That's to be expected from time to time, bleary eyed
sleep-deprived humans being as they are.  I will make a PDF on the
proper use of the bandpass filters and we should also make an
instruction card to be attached to each unit.  The filters worked
well, as I do not recall hearing any interference from the other two
stations, but being able to operate two transmitters on the same band
and the same times requires good separation of the  antennas, since
the filters cannot help that situation.

The logging software had a couple of little issues that took a few
minutes to sort out.  One laptop was dedicated to being the master
computer, but a different laptop was started first and thought it was
master.  AJ4HJ gave  telephone support and we collectively convinced
the errant laptop that it was really not the master and N4HY was able
to get everything reset and even merged the separate log that had been
growing independently into the master.  We thought we had lost some
15-meter QSO's, but they are there and, as best as I can tell, the log
is okay.  There was a momentary scare in the morning, when the master
computer went to sleep after I finally had to sleep, but everything is
okay before dawn when the computer and CW op both woke up and started
operating again.

The ergonomics of the stations left a bit to be desired, which was the
source of a fair number of aching muscles. Among other things, we
needed much better seats, with much thicker padding.  After hours of
operating, I had visions of a nice hammock chair with lumbar support
and a lot less cramped than a picnic bench covered in cables that had
to be dodged.  There were a few times that I wished that the computer
mouse was separate as some of laptops were a little finicky. Also,
let's tape the CAT-5 network cabling to the table top to keep it out
of harm's way.

The coffee was excellent, BTW.  One young gentlemen made awesome
coffee several times, which kept me going for hours. Life was good.
:-)

I understand an unsuccessful attempt was made to copy the ARRL Field
Day message from W1AW on phone. Bummer.  A voice recorder is the way
to go for a phone message.  Copying the message is much easier on CW
and of course the digital modes are a natural.  Hopefully we will be
successful next year and if not then shame on us, since as the message
is transmitted multiple times on multiple frequencies in data, CW, and
voice--so take your pick.

We still need to do some work on our antennas.  This years arrangement
was a good layout and looked nice too.  We could have used better
frequency agility in the antenna on the far end, maybe a properly
designed 5-band Off-center Fed Dipole (OCFD) or a wire antenna fed
with tuned feeders and a remote antenna tuner.   BTW, the so-called
G5RV antenna is a pretty fair antenna, but is actually far from
optimum.  The G5RV is fundamentally a 20-meter antenna that also works
to an extent on some other bands, but it involves accepting some some
amount of loss in doing so.  The loss is not so bad on 20, 40 & 80M,
but pretty high on 15 and 10-meters and we make it worse with long
coaxial feed lines.  There are better antenna designs that work well
on multiple bands and we may want to add some new stuff to our antenna
farm next time.

BTW, I did a search on DXSCAPE to see if N4NRV appeared on the DX
clusters and discovered that we were spotted on 80M CW!  Cool.  I also
checked to see if there was any 160-meter activity during Field Day
and saw that several stations were active.  I have an idea for a
lowband vertical that would work on 40-meters and down that may net us
a few 160M QSO's and maybe Alaska and Hawaii on 80M.  I really wanted
a vertical on Sunday morning at dawn when I heard Hawaii on 80M very
well, but he could not hear me.  :-(

Projects and prospects for next year:  Another bandpass filter so we
can operate a GOTA station and still have three other stations?
Definitely!   Better antennas?  Intercoms and headsets w/mics for all
the stations to make logging and teaching and learning easier?  Good
non-butt-destroying seats? (PLEASE!)  VHF operations?  Do satellite
operations with our new Moxon antennas?  Packet? Digital?  How about a
bicycle with a generator for making human-powered contacts? Solar
power?  Field Day is an opportunity to experiment.

Thanks to all for a great Field Day.  Looking forward to next year.  :-)
73,
Donnie, AB4I