|
 Most viewed - 2026 |
37 viewsThis past Thursday June 11, we activated Cloudland Canyon State Park from the Nickajack Trailhead site. The new concrete driveway was a welcome relief from the old bumpy gravel hill.
Allen KN4FKS set up under the picnic shelter and deployed his end fed half wave wire into a nearby pine tree. The rough bark nearly snagged his throw bag string but careful maneuvering finally got everything working. He then made 68 SSB contacts with 20 being on 20 meters and 48 more on 15 meters. He made 23 Park to Park contacts with 4 DX contacts to Slovenia, Canada, Mexico, and Brazil. While on 15 meters Allen heard a DX call, it was HF0PAS at the Polish Antarctica research station. He was working split because of the pile up coming from both Europe and North America. Try as he will 100 watts and a wire was not going to bust that pile up on this day. The cool thing if he had made the contact it would have been a P2P contact as that part of the continent is designated as a park with a POTA number.
John KB4QXI set up his roof mounted Hamstick on 20 meters and made 63 SSB contacts with 19 P2P as well.
Danny AG4DW set up his Pota Performer 17 ft. vertical with the elevated counterpoise and made 68 contacts, 34 SSB and 34 FT8 on 40, 30, and 17 meters. He had 9 P2P contacts and 3 DX to Canada.
Alan W4PLP came by just to visit everyone for a while and give encouragement.
Soon after we had arrived a young couple showed up at the trailhead to go hiking and the lady expressed having an interest in Ham radio over the years. So, quickly we gave her a tour of Danny's set up and explained about the different facets of the hobby. Luckily we had prepared information sheets to give her concerning an introduction to ham radio, an overview of the TSARC and what POTA is all about. Hopefully we'll see this young hiker again on the radio. We are all ambassadors so it is helpful to always be prepared with a smile and information.
|
|
36 viewsEven though our esteemed leader, Allen (KN4FKS), and I both had to go out of town this week, there was still a LOT of POTA activity despite there being no organized group effort!
Ed (KM6UTC) solved a but of a POTA activation problem/mystery this week that made a gigantic difference in the number of contacts! And it had nothing to do with his equipment! I mention this not to embarrass Ed but, rather, to point out how easy it is for us humans to make the wrong assumptions and maybe there is someone else wanting to do POTA that has made the same assumption. Up until this week Ed says that he thought the only calls you could log for a POTA activation were calls to another activator or a hunter answering his CQ POTA call! In fact, almost any valid QSO counts and can be logged (no repeaters can be used, however). You can answer someone else’s CQ and have a rag chew. It counts as a valid POTA contact. Make a contact with a DXExpediton? It counts!
Armed with the new knowledge, Ed activated US-0716, Chickamuaga and Chattanooga National Battlefield, from the Cravens House location on the North side of Lookout Mountain, on Thursday. hw wound up with 85 contacts for the day with a number of DX. The DX included the Dominican Republic, Cuba, Romania, Spain, France, Canada (eh), Puerto Rico, Italy, Azores, & Hungary.
Ed noted that the views from Cravens House were wonderful due to the excellent weather. He also commented on what appears to once have been a beautiful Mansion and adjacent Coach House at the Cravens House location and noted that the Nation Park Service seems to have allowed these structures to deteriorate, probably past the point of no return!
Ed asked if anyone had any information about this and someone sent a link to a 13-year old link to the Chattanoogan.com that sums it up quite well! A copy of the link is attached if you want to find out more!
https://www.chattanoogan.com/2013/3/25/247432/John-Shearer-History-Of-The-Hardy-Home.aspx
Before heading out of town Allen (KN4FKS) got away Tuesday afternoon for a few hours to Estelle Mine Road on Pigeon Mtn.WMA (US-3742). He set up his 25 ft vertical with the faraday cloth radials and mainly chased parks for P2P contacts. He had 22 SSB contacts with 20 P2P and 2 special event stations. Also one P2P to Puerto Rico. On 20 meters he had 16 contacts and 6 more on 40 meters.
AND… a bug congratulations to Dan Strickland (K2DTS) for achieving a Kilo (1000 activator contacts) from US-0716 on Wednesday. Dan has been working on this goal for a while and he can finally put that notch in his belt!
As for me, Danny (AG4DW), I had to travel to Florida for the weekend but did manage to activate two new-to-me parks in Florida on the trip down. Payne’s Prairie Preserve State Park (US-3647) and Price’s Scrub State Park (US-10463). These two parks are about 4 miles apart and are totally different! Payne’s Prairie has luscious tropical foliage and Spanish Moss everywhere and a large lake and picnic pavilions. Price’s Scrub is a relatively new park and is pretty primitive and expected to remain that way. One picnic table, one porta-potty and one trash can! I managed 25 SSB contacts on 20 meters at both parks!
And, in a first for me, we saw a park ranger pull in at Price’s Scrub in an unmarked truck and headed towards a small trailhead. He saw us watching him and backed up to us, identified himself, and told us he was there on official business! He was afraid we were going to call the cops and report HIM! You hear reports of rangers investigating POTA activators but usually not the other way around! We had a good laugh and he was very familiar with Parks on the Air. He said if the apocalypse ever happens, he is getting in touch with us POTA guys!
|
|
36 viewsThis past Thursday June 11, we activated Cloudland Canyon State Park from the Nickajack Trailhead site. The new concrete driveway was a welcome relief from the old bumpy gravel hill.
Allen KN4FKS set up under the picnic shelter and deployed his end fed half wave wire into a nearby pine tree. The rough bark nearly snagged his throw bag string but careful maneuvering finally got everything working. He then made 68 SSB contacts with 20 being on 20 meters and 48 more on 15 meters. He made 23 Park to Park contacts with 4 DX contacts to Slovenia, Canada, Mexico, and Brazil. While on 15 meters Allen heard a DX call, it was HF0PAS at the Polish Antarctica research station. He was working split because of the pile up coming from both Europe and North America. Try as he will 100 watts and a wire was not going to bust that pile up on this day. The cool thing if he had made the contact it would have been a P2P contact as that part of the continent is designated as a park with a POTA number.
John KB4QXI set up his roof mounted Hamstick on 20 meters and made 63 SSB contacts with 19 P2P as well.
Danny AG4DW set up his Pota Performer 17 ft. vertical with the elevated counterpoise and made 68 contacts, 34 SSB and 34 FT8 on 40, 30, and 17 meters. He had 9 P2P contacts and 3 DX to Canada.
Alan W4PLP came by just to visit everyone for a while and give encouragement.
Soon after we had arrived a young couple showed up at the trailhead to go hiking and the lady expressed having an interest in Ham radio over the years. So, quickly we gave her a tour of Danny's set up and explained about the different facets of the hobby. Luckily we had prepared information sheets to give her concerning an introduction to ham radio, an overview of the TSARC and what POTA is all about. Hopefully we'll see this young hiker again on the radio. We are all ambassadors so it is helpful to always be prepared with a smile and information.
|
|
36 viewsThis past Thursday June 11, we activated Cloudland Canyon State Park from the Nickajack Trailhead site. The new concrete driveway was a welcome relief from the old bumpy gravel hill.
Allen KN4FKS set up under the picnic shelter and deployed his end fed half wave wire into a nearby pine tree. The rough bark nearly snagged his throw bag string but careful maneuvering finally got everything working. He then made 68 SSB contacts with 20 being on 20 meters and 48 more on 15 meters. He made 23 Park to Park contacts with 4 DX contacts to Slovenia, Canada, Mexico, and Brazil. While on 15 meters Allen heard a DX call, it was HF0PAS at the Polish Antarctica research station. He was working split because of the pile up coming from both Europe and North America. Try as he will 100 watts and a wire was not going to bust that pile up on this day. The cool thing if he had made the contact it would have been a P2P contact as that part of the continent is designated as a park with a POTA number.
John KB4QXI set up his roof mounted Hamstick on 20 meters and made 63 SSB contacts with 19 P2P as well.
Danny AG4DW set up his Pota Performer 17 ft. vertical with the elevated counterpoise and made 68 contacts, 34 SSB and 34 FT8 on 40, 30, and 17 meters. He had 9 P2P contacts and 3 DX to Canada.
Alan W4PLP came by just to visit everyone for a while and give encouragement.
Soon after we had arrived a young couple showed up at the trailhead to go hiking and the lady expressed having an interest in Ham radio over the years. So, quickly we gave her a tour of Danny's set up and explained about the different facets of the hobby. Luckily we had prepared information sheets to give her concerning an introduction to ham radio, an overview of the TSARC and what POTA is all about. Hopefully we'll see this young hiker again on the radio. We are all ambassadors so it is helpful to always be prepared with a smile and information.
|
|
14 viewsSeveral members of our Parks on the Air group met up at the Ascalon Trailhead, on Lookout Mountain, for a day of activation. The trailhead is part of Cloudland Canyon State Park (US-2169). The weather was perfect, albeit a little warm for those who activated out in the sunshine. 20 Meters and 15 Meters cooperated somewhat, but most of the other bands were not kind today.
The day started off with our fearless leader, Allen (KN4FKS), feeling under the weather and unable to attend. Best wishes to Allen and get some rest, plenty of fluids and feel better!
Danny (AG4DW) and Barry (W4LKT) began the day with getting Barry's new Comet antenna tuned and mounted to his car. Using a NanoVNA we were able to adjust the 6 meter and 10 meter portions of the antenna to achieve the lowest SWR in those bands. Afterwards Barry spent several hours calling CQ on 10 meters but there was just nothing happening on that band today!
Danny (AG4DW) started the day off on 20 meters SSB and made a total of 30 contacts before switching to 15 meters. There he made one SSB contact and 24 FT8 contacts. DX included Canada (2), Colombia, Costa Rico, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. He also made contact with a DXpedition to the Russian island, Franz Joseph Land (RI1FJL)! This is the northernmost DXCC location in the world in the Arctic ocean well north of Russia!
Just when Barry and Danny thought they were going to be the only two activators, they were joined by Maurice (KO4MPH), Micha (K3WGC) and “Radio Matt” (AF4MH), around 11:00 a.m. Also, bravely giving up some of his beauty sleep 🤣, John (KB4QXI) joined us around 1:00 in the afternoon!
Matt (AF4MH) worked 20 Meters with his vertical antenna and worked hard to make a total of 12 contacts with 7 park-to-parks, including one to Canada. Halfway through his activation, another ham took over his frequency and he had to QSY. To be fair, the bands were so screwed up that I don't think the other guy could hear him when he asked if the frequency was in use!
Micha (K3WGC) set up his 40 Meter vertical antenna using a drive on support stand and collapsible flagpole but was unable to make any contacts on 40 meters.
Maurice (KO4MPH) set up his tri-pod mounted vertical and called CQ on 17 Meters for a few hours but, in the end, was not able to make any contacts.
John (KB4QXI) worked from his automobile using a 40 meter hamstick and made a total of 10 contacts with one park-to-park.
In other POTA activations this week:
Ed (KM6UTC) activated on Thursday from the Brown’s Ferry Tavern Historic Site, which is a Trail of Tears site (US-3791), and It was a tough day from that location. Almost ALL of the signals coming in were registering as negative dB on the FT8 screen. Even after cleaning and reconnecting antenna connections the incoming signals were still weak. Despite that, Ed was able to make 56 contacts, mostly on 20m FT8. A scattering of FT4 and other bands were thrown in. DX included Cuba, Costa Rica, Germany, Haiti, and Canada.
|
|
14 viewsSeveral members of our Parks on the Air group met up at the Ascalon Trailhead, on Lookout Mountain, for a day of activation. The trailhead is part of Cloudland Canyon State Park (US-2169). The weather was perfect, albeit a little warm for those who activated out in the sunshine. 20 Meters and 15 Meters cooperated somewhat, but most of the other bands were not kind today.
The day started off with our fearless leader, Allen (KN4FKS), feeling under the weather and unable to attend. Best wishes to Allen and get some rest, plenty of fluids and feel better!
Danny (AG4DW) and Barry (W4LKT) began the day with getting Barry's new Comet antenna tuned and mounted to his car. Using a NanoVNA we were able to adjust the 6 meter and 10 meter portions of the antenna to achieve the lowest SWR in those bands. Afterwards Barry spent several hours calling CQ on 10 meters but there was just nothing happening on that band today!
Danny (AG4DW) started the day off on 20 meters SSB and made a total of 30 contacts before switching to 15 meters. There he made one SSB contact and 24 FT8 contacts. DX included Canada (2), Colombia, Costa Rico, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. He also made contact with a DXpedition to the Russian island, Franz Joseph Land (RI1FJL)! This is the northernmost DXCC location in the world in the Arctic ocean well north of Russia!
Just when Barry and Danny thought they were going to be the only two activators, they were joined by Maurice (KO4MPH), Micha (K3WGC) and “Radio Matt” (AF4MH), around 11:00 a.m. Also, bravely giving up some of his beauty sleep 🤣, John (KB4QXI) joined us around 1:00 in the afternoon!
Matt (AF4MH) worked 20 Meters with his vertical antenna and worked hard to make a total of 12 contacts with 7 park-to-parks, including one to Canada. Halfway through his activation, another ham took over his frequency and he had to QSY. To be fair, the bands were so screwed up that I don't think the other guy could hear him when he asked if the frequency was in use!
Micha (K3WGC) set up his 40 Meter vertical antenna using a drive on support stand and collapsible flagpole but was unable to make any contacts on 40 meters.
Maurice (KO4MPH) set up his tri-pod mounted vertical and called CQ on 17 Meters for a few hours but, in the end, was not able to make any contacts.
John (KB4QXI) worked from his automobile using a 40 meter hamstick and made a total of 10 contacts with one park-to-park.
In other POTA activations this week:
Ed (KM6UTC) activated on Thursday from the Brown’s Ferry Tavern Historic Site, which is a Trail of Tears site (US-3791), and It was a tough day from that location. Almost ALL of the signals coming in were registering as negative dB on the FT8 screen. Even after cleaning and reconnecting antenna connections the incoming signals were still weak. Despite that, Ed was able to make 56 contacts, mostly on 20m FT8. A scattering of FT4 and other bands were thrown in. DX included Cuba, Costa Rica, Germany, Haiti, and Canada.
|
|
14 viewsThursday was POTA day. I had not been out in a while and it was good to get back on the bands in the big woods. We activated a three-fer, Prentice Cooper State Forest US-5499, Prentice Cooper Wildlife Management Area US-3791 and Wilson Cumberland Trail State Park US-2955, The three POTA intidities come together at one small trailhead / picnic area on the huge forest.
Ed KM6UTC used his back seat shack and the ATAS auto adjust antenna and Made 34 FT8 contacts on 20 meters, 27 FT8 contacts on 30 meters 16 FT8 contacts on 17 meters and 17 FT8 contacts on 12 meters. For Ed jumping around the bands is easy with the Yaesu ATAS system. He had DX contacts to Canada, Dominican Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Belgium, El Salvador, Azores, Puerto Rico, Belize, and Venezuela.
Danny AG4DW had 140 total contacts using his elevated radial vertical antenna system. On 40 meters he had 27 SSB contacts and 4 FT8 contacts. On 20 meters he had 75 SSB contacts and 18 FT8 contacts. He finished up on 15 meters with 16 FT8 contacts. He had 18 DX contacts with 13 Canadian contacts then 2 Itilians, Cuba, Spain and Luxembourg.
Allen KN4FKS Had 54 total SSB contacts using his end fed wire antenna. He had 41 contacts on 40 meters and 13 contacts on 20 meters. He had 22 Park to Park contacts and an unusual contacts with Big Foot. A special event station W8I was Big Foot on the radio!. Also of note was a Park to Park from Dom NC4XL in costal North Carolina. Dom has 1077 activations and an absolutely astonishing activator contact total of 262435. That's two hundred sixty two thousand plus contacts. WOW !!!
Barry W4LKT came by with his wife and set up his 20 watt Radioddity radio into a trunk lip mounted mobile antenna. !0 meters was just not happening for him or anyone else for that matter. Motivation to get that General upgrade and bring some other bands and some power into the POTA game.
Micha KO4MPH avoided the RF crash of the trail head and set up a short distance away down the road using his G-90 and his drive over mast with a ham stick dipole. He made 20 SSB contacts with 19 Park to Park contacts. One contact was a Seven-fer. On the National Mall in Washington DC there is one place where this is actually possible.
It was a wonderful day in the big woods with several hikers using the trailhead taking a moment to see what we were doing with our strange radio stuff. Handed out several POTA brochures and TSARC fact sheets.
|
|
13 viewsSeveral members of our Parks on the Air group met up at the Ascalon Trailhead, on Lookout Mountain, for a day of activation. The trailhead is part of Cloudland Canyon State Park (US-2169). The weather was perfect, albeit a little warm for those who activated out in the sunshine. 20 Meters and 15 Meters cooperated somewhat, but most of the other bands were not kind today.
The day started off with our fearless leader, Allen (KN4FKS), feeling under the weather and unable to attend. Best wishes to Allen and get some rest, plenty of fluids and feel better!
Danny (AG4DW) and Barry (W4LKT) began the day with getting Barry's new Comet antenna tuned and mounted to his car. Using a NanoVNA we were able to adjust the 6 meter and 10 meter portions of the antenna to achieve the lowest SWR in those bands. Afterwards Barry spent several hours calling CQ on 10 meters but there was just nothing happening on that band today!
Danny (AG4DW) started the day off on 20 meters SSB and made a total of 30 contacts before switching to 15 meters. There he made one SSB contact and 24 FT8 contacts. DX included Canada (2), Colombia, Costa Rico, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. He also made contact with a DXpedition to the Russian island, Franz Joseph Land (RI1FJL)! This is the northernmost DXCC location in the world in the Arctic ocean well north of Russia!
Just when Barry and Danny thought they were going to be the only two activators, they were joined by Maurice (KO4MPH), Micha (K3WGC) and “Radio Matt” (AF4MH), around 11:00 a.m. Also, bravely giving up some of his beauty sleep 🤣, John (KB4QXI) joined us around 1:00 in the afternoon!
Matt (AF4MH) worked 20 Meters with his vertical antenna and worked hard to make a total of 12 contacts with 7 park-to-parks, including one to Canada. Halfway through his activation, another ham took over his frequency and he had to QSY. To be fair, the bands were so screwed up that I don't think the other guy could hear him when he asked if the frequency was in use!
Micha (K3WGC) set up his 40 Meter vertical antenna using a drive on support stand and collapsible flagpole but was unable to make any contacts on 40 meters.
Maurice (KO4MPH) set up his tri-pod mounted vertical and called CQ on 17 Meters for a few hours but, in the end, was not able to make any contacts.
John (KB4QXI) worked from his automobile using a 40 meter hamstick and made a total of 10 contacts with one park-to-park.
In other POTA activations this week:
Ed (KM6UTC) activated on Thursday from the Brown’s Ferry Tavern Historic Site, which is a Trail of Tears site (US-3791), and It was a tough day from that location. Almost ALL of the signals coming in were registering as negative dB on the FT8 screen. Even after cleaning and reconnecting antenna connections the incoming signals were still weak. Despite that, Ed was able to make 56 contacts, mostly on 20m FT8. A scattering of FT4 and other bands were thrown in. DX included Cuba, Costa Rica, Germany, Haiti, and Canada.
|
|
12 viewsSeveral members of our Parks on the Air group met up at the Ascalon Trailhead, on Lookout Mountain, for a day of activation. The trailhead is part of Cloudland Canyon State Park (US-2169). The weather was perfect, albeit a little warm for those who activated out in the sunshine. 20 Meters and 15 Meters cooperated somewhat, but most of the other bands were not kind today.
The day started off with our fearless leader, Allen (KN4FKS), feeling under the weather and unable to attend. Best wishes to Allen and get some rest, plenty of fluids and feel better!
Danny (AG4DW) and Barry (W4LKT) began the day with getting Barry's new Comet antenna tuned and mounted to his car. Using a NanoVNA we were able to adjust the 6 meter and 10 meter portions of the antenna to achieve the lowest SWR in those bands. Afterwards Barry spent several hours calling CQ on 10 meters but there was just nothing happening on that band today!
Danny (AG4DW) started the day off on 20 meters SSB and made a total of 30 contacts before switching to 15 meters. There he made one SSB contact and 24 FT8 contacts. DX included Canada (2), Colombia, Costa Rico, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. He also made contact with a DXpedition to the Russian island, Franz Joseph Land (RI1FJL)! This is the northernmost DXCC location in the world in the Arctic ocean well north of Russia!
Just when Barry and Danny thought they were going to be the only two activators, they were joined by Maurice (KO4MPH), Micha (K3WGC) and “Radio Matt” (AF4MH), around 11:00 a.m. Also, bravely giving up some of his beauty sleep 🤣, John (KB4QXI) joined us around 1:00 in the afternoon!
Matt (AF4MH) worked 20 Meters with his vertical antenna and worked hard to make a total of 12 contacts with 7 park-to-parks, including one to Canada. Halfway through his activation, another ham took over his frequency and he had to QSY. To be fair, the bands were so screwed up that I don't think the other guy could hear him when he asked if the frequency was in use!
Micha (K3WGC) set up his 40 Meter vertical antenna using a drive on support stand and collapsible flagpole but was unable to make any contacts on 40 meters.
Maurice (KO4MPH) set up his tri-pod mounted vertical and called CQ on 17 Meters for a few hours but, in the end, was not able to make any contacts.
John (KB4QXI) worked from his automobile using a 40 meter hamstick and made a total of 10 contacts with one park-to-park.
In other POTA activations this week:
Ed (KM6UTC) activated on Thursday from the Brown’s Ferry Tavern Historic Site, which is a Trail of Tears site (US-3791), and It was a tough day from that location. Almost ALL of the signals coming in were registering as negative dB on the FT8 screen. Even after cleaning and reconnecting antenna connections the incoming signals were still weak. Despite that, Ed was able to make 56 contacts, mostly on 20m FT8. A scattering of FT4 and other bands were thrown in. DX included Cuba, Costa Rica, Germany, Haiti, and Canada.
|
|
12 viewsSeveral members of our Parks on the Air group met up at the Ascalon Trailhead, on Lookout Mountain, for a day of activation. The trailhead is part of Cloudland Canyon State Park (US-2169). The weather was perfect, albeit a little warm for those who activated out in the sunshine. 20 Meters and 15 Meters cooperated somewhat, but most of the other bands were not kind today.
The day started off with our fearless leader, Allen (KN4FKS), feeling under the weather and unable to attend. Best wishes to Allen and get some rest, plenty of fluids and feel better!
Danny (AG4DW) and Barry (W4LKT) began the day with getting Barry's new Comet antenna tuned and mounted to his car. Using a NanoVNA we were able to adjust the 6 meter and 10 meter portions of the antenna to achieve the lowest SWR in those bands. Afterwards Barry spent several hours calling CQ on 10 meters but there was just nothing happening on that band today!
Danny (AG4DW) started the day off on 20 meters SSB and made a total of 30 contacts before switching to 15 meters. There he made one SSB contact and 24 FT8 contacts. DX included Canada (2), Colombia, Costa Rico, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. He also made contact with a DXpedition to the Russian island, Franz Joseph Land (RI1FJL)! This is the northernmost DXCC location in the world in the Arctic ocean well north of Russia!
Just when Barry and Danny thought they were going to be the only two activators, they were joined by Maurice (KO4MPH), Micha (K3WGC) and “Radio Matt” (AF4MH), around 11:00 a.m. Also, bravely giving up some of his beauty sleep 🤣, John (KB4QXI) joined us around 1:00 in the afternoon!
Matt (AF4MH) worked 20 Meters with his vertical antenna and worked hard to make a total of 12 contacts with 7 park-to-parks, including one to Canada. Halfway through his activation, another ham took over his frequency and he had to QSY. To be fair, the bands were so screwed up that I don't think the other guy could hear him when he asked if the frequency was in use!
Micha (K3WGC) set up his 40 Meter vertical antenna using a drive on support stand and collapsible flagpole but was unable to make any contacts on 40 meters.
Maurice (KO4MPH) set up his tri-pod mounted vertical and called CQ on 17 Meters for a few hours but, in the end, was not able to make any contacts.
John (KB4QXI) worked from his automobile using a 40 meter hamstick and made a total of 10 contacts with one park-to-park.
In other POTA activations this week:
Ed (KM6UTC) activated on Thursday from the Brown’s Ferry Tavern Historic Site, which is a Trail of Tears site (US-3791), and It was a tough day from that location. Almost ALL of the signals coming in were registering as negative dB on the FT8 screen. Even after cleaning and reconnecting antenna connections the incoming signals were still weak. Despite that, Ed was able to make 56 contacts, mostly on 20m FT8. A scattering of FT4 and other bands were thrown in. DX included Cuba, Costa Rica, Germany, Haiti, and Canada.
|
|
12 viewsSeveral members of our Parks on the Air group met up at the Ascalon Trailhead, on Lookout Mountain, for a day of activation. The trailhead is part of Cloudland Canyon State Park (US-2169). The weather was perfect, albeit a little warm for those who activated out in the sunshine. 20 Meters and 15 Meters cooperated somewhat, but most of the other bands were not kind today.
The day started off with our fearless leader, Allen (KN4FKS), feeling under the weather and unable to attend. Best wishes to Allen and get some rest, plenty of fluids and feel better!
Danny (AG4DW) and Barry (W4LKT) began the day with getting Barry's new Comet antenna tuned and mounted to his car. Using a NanoVNA we were able to adjust the 6 meter and 10 meter portions of the antenna to achieve the lowest SWR in those bands. Afterwards Barry spent several hours calling CQ on 10 meters but there was just nothing happening on that band today!
Danny (AG4DW) started the day off on 20 meters SSB and made a total of 30 contacts before switching to 15 meters. There he made one SSB contact and 24 FT8 contacts. DX included Canada (2), Colombia, Costa Rico, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. He also made contact with a DXpedition to the Russian island, Franz Joseph Land (RI1FJL)! This is the northernmost DXCC location in the world in the Arctic ocean well north of Russia!
Just when Barry and Danny thought they were going to be the only two activators, they were joined by Maurice (KO4MPH), Micha (K3WGC) and “Radio Matt” (AF4MH), around 11:00 a.m. Also, bravely giving up some of his beauty sleep 🤣, John (KB4QXI) joined us around 1:00 in the afternoon!
Matt (AF4MH) worked 20 Meters with his vertical antenna and worked hard to make a total of 12 contacts with 7 park-to-parks, including one to Canada. Halfway through his activation, another ham took over his frequency and he had to QSY. To be fair, the bands were so screwed up that I don't think the other guy could hear him when he asked if the frequency was in use!
Micha (K3WGC) set up his 40 Meter vertical antenna using a drive on support stand and collapsible flagpole but was unable to make any contacts on 40 meters.
Maurice (KO4MPH) set up his tri-pod mounted vertical and called CQ on 17 Meters for a few hours but, in the end, was not able to make any contacts.
John (KB4QXI) worked from his automobile using a 40 meter hamstick and made a total of 10 contacts with one park-to-park.
In other POTA activations this week:
Ed (KM6UTC) activated on Thursday from the Brown’s Ferry Tavern Historic Site, which is a Trail of Tears site (US-3791), and It was a tough day from that location. Almost ALL of the signals coming in were registering as negative dB on the FT8 screen. Even after cleaning and reconnecting antenna connections the incoming signals were still weak. Despite that, Ed was able to make 56 contacts, mostly on 20m FT8. A scattering of FT4 and other bands were thrown in. DX included Cuba, Costa Rica, Germany, Haiti, and Canada.
|
|
12 viewsThursday was POTA day. I had not been out in a while and it was good to get back on the bands in the big woods. We activated a three-fer, Prentice Cooper State Forest US-5499, Prentice Cooper Wildlife Management Area US-3791 and Wilson Cumberland Trail State Park US-2955, The three POTA intidities come together at one small trailhead / picnic area on the huge forest.
Ed KM6UTC used his back seat shack and the ATAS auto adjust antenna and Made 34 FT8 contacts on 20 meters, 27 FT8 contacts on 30 meters 16 FT8 contacts on 17 meters and 17 FT8 contacts on 12 meters. For Ed jumping around the bands is easy with the Yaesu ATAS system. He had DX contacts to Canada, Dominican Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Belgium, El Salvador, Azores, Puerto Rico, Belize, and Venezuela.
Danny AG4DW had 140 total contacts using his elevated radial vertical antenna system. On 40 meters he had 27 SSB contacts and 4 FT8 contacts. On 20 meters he had 75 SSB contacts and 18 FT8 contacts. He finished up on 15 meters with 16 FT8 contacts. He had 18 DX contacts with 13 Canadian contacts then 2 Itilians, Cuba, Spain and Luxembourg.
Allen KN4FKS Had 54 total SSB contacts using his end fed wire antenna. He had 41 contacts on 40 meters and 13 contacts on 20 meters. He had 22 Park to Park contacts and an unusual contacts with Big Foot. A special event station W8I was Big Foot on the radio!. Also of note was a Park to Park from Dom NC4XL in costal North Carolina. Dom has 1077 activations and an absolutely astonishing activator contact total of 262435. That's two hundred sixty two thousand plus contacts. WOW !!!
Barry W4LKT came by with his wife and set up his 20 watt Radioddity radio into a trunk lip mounted mobile antenna. !0 meters was just not happening for him or anyone else for that matter. Motivation to get that General upgrade and bring some other bands and some power into the POTA game.
Micha KO4MPH avoided the RF crash of the trail head and set up a short distance away down the road using his G-90 and his drive over mast with a ham stick dipole. He made 20 SSB contacts with 19 Park to Park contacts. One contact was a Seven-fer. On the National Mall in Washington DC there is one place where this is actually possible.
It was a wonderful day in the big woods with several hikers using the trailhead taking a moment to see what we were doing with our strange radio stuff. Handed out several POTA brochures and TSARC fact sheets.
|
|
| 132 files on 11 page(s) |
|
|
|
|
6 | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
