[PVRCNC] 2026 IOTA K4TMC IOTA NA-112 SOLP 24Hr SSB Unassisted

[Henry Pollock - K4TMC]

Call: K4TMC
Class: SO24SSB LP
QTH: NC - IOTA NA-112
Operating Time (hrs): 16

Summary:
 Band  CW Qs  CW Mults  Ph Qs  Ph Mults
----------------------------------------
   80:
   40:                                   8                 5
   20:                                   144            36
   15:                                    49             17
   10:                                    4                2
----------------------------------------
Total:   0        0                   205             60  Total Score =
116,700

Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club
Logging: N1MM+

Comments:
Portable IOTA Island Station on Bogue Banks, NC (IOTA NA-112). Station
house located on ancient sand dune at 15 ft ASL.
Rig: Elecraft K4D with Heil HC4 mic element
Antennas: Buddipole BuddiHex at 30 ft; PAR EF-QUAD Inverted-L vertical with
feed point at 12 ft off ground

Another chapter in the one man portable beach contester saga…On the heel of
some email discussions with PVRCer Tim, N3QE about portable 20M yagis, I
started a quest to find a feasible 4 element 20M yagi that could be managed
by the one-man portable contester. EZNEC gave me dimensions of basically 34
ft elements on a 34 ft boom. In normal yagi antenna construction that would
result in a heavy antenna requiring a substantial vertical support. So, in
keeping with my use of portable antenna parts via Buddipole, I chose to use
coil-shortened elements on a rope boom between two vertical masts. With a
ready supply of Buddipole accessories of long telescopic whips and
accessory antenna arms, and a quantity of 3/8-24 couplers, I only had to
buy some of their small mini coils. More on that later…

The XYL did not feel like making the trip, so dog Zoe and I headed to the
beach Thursday after lunch. It rained all the way during the 3-hour drive,
and into the evening. I managed to get the BuddiHex antenna assembled
between the heavy showers. Friday morning found the rain continuing even
harder, but was able to get the hexbeam up in the few periods of light rain
and no lightning before lunch. Zoe and I drove/paddled/sloshed through a
significant downpour to reach our favorite brisket smokehouse for lunch.
Spent the afternoon getting the 40-10 end fed halfwave inverted-L erected
on the upper deck. Luckily the winds were mild, but a fully extended 44 ft
heavy smooth fiberglass pole can be a little slippery with rain water
streaming down the sides. After a short break, it was on to the 20M yagi
project. Raised the 2 Blue Sky Mast systems, and assembled the elements and
boom cords out of the rain. In the process of raising the elements they
slid a few inches along the grass before lifting up in the air. As I was
attaching the coax to the driven element I noticed that some of the coil
tap pigtail wires were dangling loose. Upon closer examination, the wires
had broken off the end of the mini-banana pin that fits into the coil tap
J-connector pieces. With no spare pigtail wires and no easy way to repair
them, the yagi project was suspended. It was late in the afternoon, still
raining, and I was too tired to try anything else. In retrospect, I should
have pulled out a stored Spiderbeam, assembled and raised that with just
the three 20M elements. As a result of all the rain and clouds,
temperatures were mostly pleasant for the beach in July, which made for
less personal physical and mental health conditions, versus last year’s
effort.

This was the first time using the new-to-me used K4D; more about that at
the end. I entered the contest as a SO LP SSB-only 24hr unassisted Island
Station category effort. Started the contest at 1200Z on 20M running at the
bottom of the General portion of the band. No EU stations, only US and VE
stations, and it was a slow rate. Picked up 6 NA island mults. Then moved
to 15M and finally at 1331, got the first European, followed by lots more,
by S&P using the K4’s panadapter to find them. Over a 30 min period picked
up 3 EU island mults. Over the rest of the morning and into the afternoon I
alternated between 20 and 15 doing mostly S&P and collecting 4 NA, 7 EU and
1 SA mults. I checked 10M often and finally got a 4M5 at 1810, and PJ4 and
9Z4 at 2040. The only other 10M stations were domestic rag-chewers. Back on
20/15M In the 2100 hour I collected 3 AF island mults. After having missed
S77 earlier in the morning by not being able to break through the pileup of
EU stations, I finally worked them in the 2100 hour, and 3V8 in the 0000Z
hour, both on 20. Finally, after several attempts at running, I got lucky
with a large pileup in the 2300 hour and collected 8 new EU mults along
with lots of previous mults. Between 0000 and 0200 I continued to bounce
back and forth between 20 and 15, with a few short trips to 40 and 10, S&P,
collecting 6 more new island mults. I was back at the rig Sunday morning
for the last 2 hours and collected 4 more new mults. I finished with 205
QSOs and 60 mults for a score of 116,700. Compared to last year’s effort, I
had about 200 less QSOs but 3 more island mults.

The only PVRCer I worked was Nate, N4YDU who was running on 20. I later
found out that perennial IOTAer W4KAZ did not make it this year to the
Outer Banks due to loss of power at his home QTH. I did hear N8II on 40
working a EU station.

The K4D worked well. I found the receive audio more pleasing to my old
ears. Although the bands were never super crowded, I found that I could
work weaker stations close to loud stations easier than with my K3. I have
not yet tweaked the AGC settings, so there may be even more improvement.
This was my first time really using a panadapter to search for stations.
That worked well, not as much knob twirling. Still, you may miss those weak
stations that are right in the noise that only your ear can detect as you
slowly turn the VFO. For this contest, I felt that the stations I worked
had more trouble hearing me than my hearing them. Some, or all, of this may
have just been the band conditions. I may need to play with the mic gain
and compression settings to make it work better with the HC4 dynamic
element.

Looking forward, the next beach portable activity will probably be a SB10
effort in CQWWDXSSB in October.

73,

Henry – K4TMC