Club Member POTA Activations
K2ZA’s Field Activation Report
By John Zaruba Jr K2ZA
This is the first in (hopefully) an ongoing series of reports on my field operations.
As I’ve gotten older, the glow of winter weather wears off pretty quickly. My POTA mentor, Joe Everhart N2CX (SK) did a lot of activating from the car, so taking a page out of his book, I got a mobile station set up in my truck.
The Yaesu FT-857D and ATAS-120A antenna are as close to a multi-band plug and play HF installation as you can get. The antenna also works with Yaesu’s current HF mobile rig, the FT-891. The antenna is automatically tuned with a button press on the radio and covers 40m - 6m. Since the antenna is a compact design, the RF performance is not as good as a full sized wire antenna. Normally, I’m a QRP guy when running bigger antennas, but in this case I was running 50 watts to make up for the deficit.
As part of the installation, there is are 2 LiFePO4 batteries under the back seat of the truck, one 10 Ah, and one 15 Ah, giving me enough battery capacity for most activations with the engine off. To keep from having to fish wires through the truck’s firewall, I use a Powerwerx DCDC LiFePO4 battery charger (1) connected to the 13.8 VDC power point in the back of the cab. Thanks to Kirchoff’s Current Law, when the radio pulls more current than the power point can supply, the batteries take up the slack. In receive mode the power from the truck recharges the batteries making this set up useful for both stationary and mobile operations. For this activation, the engine was running for heat, effectively giving me unlimited run time.
This was also my first use of the Putikeeg Mini Morse Code Key (2) which Dean Marzocca N2TNN introduced me to at a recent Tech Saturday. The paddles are very reasonable in cost and rival the feel of my BamaTech TP3 paddles. Unfortunately, the German maker of the TP3 recently became a silent key, his family liquidated the business and the remaining stock sold out in an instant.
By John Zaruba Jr K2ZA
This is the first in (hopefully) an ongoing series of reports on my field operations.
As I’ve gotten older, the glow of winter weather wears off pretty quickly. My POTA mentor, Joe Everhart N2CX (SK) did a lot of activating from the car, so taking a page out of his book, I got a mobile station set up in my truck.
The Yaesu FT-857D and ATAS-120A antenna are as close to a multi-band plug and play HF installation as you can get. The antenna also works with Yaesu’s current HF mobile rig, the FT-891. The antenna is automatically tuned with a button press on the radio and covers 40m - 6m. Since the antenna is a compact design, the RF performance is not as good as a full sized wire antenna. Normally, I’m a QRP guy when running bigger antennas, but in this case I was running 50 watts to make up for the deficit.
As part of the installation, there is are 2 LiFePO4 batteries under the back seat of the truck, one 10 Ah, and one 15 Ah, giving me enough battery capacity for most activations with the engine off. To keep from having to fish wires through the truck’s firewall, I use a Powerwerx DCDC LiFePO4 battery charger (1) connected to the 13.8 VDC power point in the back of the cab. Thanks to Kirchoff’s Current Law, when the radio pulls more current than the power point can supply, the batteries take up the slack. In receive mode the power from the truck recharges the batteries making this set up useful for both stationary and mobile operations. For this activation, the engine was running for heat, effectively giving me unlimited run time.
This was also my first use of the Putikeeg Mini Morse Code Key (2) which Dean Marzocca N2TNN introduced me to at a recent Tech Saturday. The paddles are very reasonable in cost and rival the feel of my BamaTech TP3 paddles. Unfortunately, the German maker of the TP3 recently became a silent key, his family liquidated the business and the remaining stock sold out in an instant.
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My last few field operations I’ve been using an iPad Pro for logging and this time used the Ham2K Portable Logger (PoLo) app. It’s very full featured and once you get used to the work flow it really makes logging easy. Unfortunately, PoLo is a mobile app only, currently no laptop version exists, unlike HAMRS (3) which has versions for Windows, MacOS, Linux, and Raspberry Pi. HAMRS is also a very useful logger, but the workflow is different so jumping back and forth requires |
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some adaptation. On the plus side, both PoLo and HAMRS are available in the Google Play store for Android phones and tablets.
One other new addition was using APRS to spot myself. This was a good opportunity to test since the park has good cell coverage and I’d be able to self spot if the APRS method didn’t work. To self spot using APRS, send a message to the call sign APSPOT in the format “! POTA US-1626 14.059 CW”. If successful, you will receive an acknowledgement message and you are spotted!
One other new addition was using APRS to spot myself. This was a good opportunity to test since the park has good cell coverage and I’d be able to self spot if the APRS method didn’t work. To self spot using APRS, send a message to the call sign APSPOT in the format “! POTA US-1626 14.059 CW”. If successful, you will receive an acknowledgement message and you are spotted!
At The Park
Parvin State Park has several trails with periodic benches that can be used for operating, and while I’ve never had any interaction with rangers, using self supporting antennas rather than putting them in trees is a good choice. If operating from the car, there are three parking lots. The first is the large main lot off of Almond Road at the beach entrance, a smaller lot at the lake dam called Fisherman’s Landing, and another large lot at the Thundergust Day Use Area (See Figure 3).
My activation was successful, 25 QSOs (23 US, 2 DX) (See Figure 4) in a little over half an hour. Parvin is a great place to go, RF quiet and easy access, but can get a little crowded in the nice weather. When you get done operating, make sure to take a walk. The trails are well groomed and well marked. There are camping spots for tents and smaller RV and cabins in the Thundergust loop, but no electrical or water hookups at the camp sites.
I hope you found this report helpful, feedback and questions can be sent to [email protected].
Notes :
1. https://powerwerx.com/dcdc-charger-lifepo4-8a-adjustable
2. Putikeeg Mini Morse Code Key - CW Dual Paddle with Magnetic Base, Magnetic Return Paddles Morse Lambic Key for Amateur Ham Radio (Silver) (Purple) https://a.co/d/eTBvJ4S
3. https://hamrs.app
Notes :
1. https://powerwerx.com/dcdc-charger-lifepo4-8a-adjustable
2. Putikeeg Mini Morse Code Key - CW Dual Paddle with Magnetic Base, Magnetic Return Paddles Morse Lambic Key for Amateur Ham Radio (Silver) (Purple) https://a.co/d/eTBvJ4S
3. https://hamrs.app