On The Road Again!

Pretty soon, Marianne and I will be making our annual Summer sojourn up to Lake George. We've been going up there very year since 2003 - 22 years now - wow!

What to bring with me Ham Radio wise?

I'm thinking the KX3 and just the AX1. The antenna worked so well for me when we went up to Alexandria Bay last October. I'm fully confident that it will do well again for me as I activate Adirondack State Park for POTA again this year.

Why not the QMX? I could, but I know the KX3 like the back of my hand and it's an old familiar friend. I'm such a creature of habit that I'm seriously thinking of divesting myself of the QMX. It's the 80- 20 Meter version, was not used much and is in excellent shape, both cosmetically and electronically.. It's really redundant to my needs, so if you're interested, or know of someone who might be, I'll let it go at a very reasonable price. Just drop me a line at w2ljqrp@gmail.com

It's a fantastic little rig, but I'm not one of these guys that needs a radio for each finger of both hands. You can use only one at a time, right?

One other last Field Day thought. My batteries! Bravo ......superb job, batteries!  I used my 12Ah lithium battery and I loaned my 12Ah SLA to Bill W2AOF for his KX3. Both lasted for the entire Field Day effort, allowing the KX3's to deliver a full 5 Watts out for the duration.

They are still in my ammo box in the baxk of the Jeep. I'll have to bring them inside tonight and hook them up to my smart charger.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Sizzling.

 I think you can flip New Jersey over - this side is done.

We are entering a three day period (Monday thru Wednesday) of excessive heat with temperatures above 100 F (38C) and heat indices of 105-100 F (40 -43C). Yesterday only reached into the 90s, but the humidity was out of sight, causing it to feel much, much warmer.

Of course, W2LJ lives in the "purple".

The morning actually started out cool and we had most of our windows open for fresh air. Around 11:30 AM or so, a thunderstorm rolled through and all I can say is "Wow!". I had dozed off on the couch in the rec room and even then, I saw a flash with my eyes closed. The resulting thunderclap seemed to last for minutes and the house shook and vibrated. If there was no storm, I would have sworn we had experienced an earthquake, that's how much the house vibrated.

After the storm went through the heat began to build up again. By the time dinner time came around, it was almost unbearable to go outside to cook on the grill.  Sleeping was not so great last night. We have central AC, but it's older so it's not zoned. The downstairs stays decently cool, but the upstairs can get stuffy.

When I was a kid, the heat didn't bother me as much. I grew up in a house without air conditioning. In fact, I much preferred Summer to the Winter. I still do, but the heat gets to me much more quickly now. I guess that's just a consequence of growing old. My ideal would be anywhere from 65 F to 80 F year around. Like that's gonna happen!

That being said, Field Day preps have begin for me. I made sure all my batteries are charged up for next weekend. I actually have enough "juice" for a week's worth of operating at 5 Watts between a lithium and two SLA batteries. I also have my two little "blue bricks" that  I use for portable ops like FOBB and the Skeeter Hunt. I should be in good stead.

Speaking of the Skeeter Hunt, we've had 113 people sign up for Skeeter Hunt numbers over the weekend. That warmed the cockles of my heart. I'm hoping that by the day before the Hunt, we will have some 200+ people signed up. The more, the merrier!

The VE Session at the W2QW Hamfest on Saturday went well. I was expecting four candidates. One cancelled late Friday night and there was one "no show". Two were successful - one brand new Tech and one upgrade to General. The weather was nice with no breeze. The breeze was probably wished for by the flea market attendees, but I welcomed the calmness as it made for no blowing away of paperwork. Such are the hazards of an outdoor VE Session.

After the exams were over, I left. I had been there since 5:00 AM helping to direct vendors to their spots. I still had the grocery shopping to do and there's nothing that I really need, Ham Radio-wise, so I bid my good-byes and got on with my day.

UPDATE:

At 4:30 PM, we broke 100 F, with a THI of 124.3F.

From my weather station.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

The dangers of lithium batteries

I don't know if I mentioned this or not, but while Marianne and I were away at Alexandria Bay, I was receiving notices from our Ring doorbell about heightened activity on our street. It turned out that our neighbors, two doors down had a fire in their garage. totally destroying it.

Luckily, the house was not involved as the garage is detached and no one was injured in the incident. According to reports I have heard, my neighbor thinks the blaze may have started from lithium batteries that were charging - possibly for his ride-on lawn mower. Or maybe from some kind of other yard tool. It's not totally clear at this point.

While I was putting up the MFJ-1982 HP antenna on Saturday, and I was moving that center support mast further back into our yard, I was able to see past my neighbor's backyard into theirs..

As you can see our common neighbor's vinyl fence melted, but what you can't see is that the vinyl siding on the back of the house where the garage fire occurred has totally melted, also. That's how intense the blaze was.

Call me paranoid, but this is why I NEVER leave lithium batteries charging at home if we're away. I don't care if it's HTs or laptop computers or tablets or phones. If we're away and no one is home, those devices are off and unplugged. Period. Same with any lithium batteries that I use for my HF radios. The risk is just not worth it.

Stay safe, my friends.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

QMX pack is lighter now.

I ditched the "AA" lithium batteries for another of the exact same battery that I use with the KX3. (Boy, did it drop in price since I last purchased one!) I mentioned before of having to make an adapter from 3.5mm to 2.1mm for the QMX and it came out fine. I couldn't just change the plug outright because it's used not only to power out, but also to charge the battery. So I took what I needed from an older one that bulged and cobbled together what I needed.

And I also acquired a smaller key that I first saw on Craig WB3GCK's blog:

Craig had some issues with getting used to the action on his, and I assume the action on mine is identical to his - but I'm fine with the stiffer feel. I adjusted the contact spacing to the point where I was getting continuous dis and dahs and then backed off a 1/2 turn with the Allen wrench. I like the feel of this much better than the other paddle that I had used in Upstate NY. The Morse I was sending from my two POTA activations in NY was atrocious and embarrassing, in my own estimation. This stiffer spring pressure allows me to send with less errors. When the tension is soft, I get sloppy. To make sure, I plugged this little guy into my shack KX3, turned off the VOX to essentially turn the KX3 into a code practice oscillator and was able to send Morse comfortably at up to 25 WPM with no extra dits or dahs. I can show my face on the bands again!

Here's a video from YouTube that i found about the paddle.

'I disagree with him on several points, but like he said - it's his opinion. I think it's a great little portable ops paddle, the price was right, and I think it will hold up well -it's not like i'm going to be using is 365 days a year.. The magnet on the bottom of mine seems to be on very securely - I'm going to disagree with his "F" for mounting. And I stated above, what was most important to me was the feel.

I've got a VE session this morning, followed by grocery shopping. I'm hoping that maybe I can get away for an hour or two to activate either the Edison Memorial or perhaps the Washington-Rochambeau Trail, which is a lot closer to my house.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Surprise, suprise!

One thing about me, and maybe it's in my Polish genes, I can be stubborn at times. 

Case in point, I really didn't understand how that PowerWerx deep cycle battery could go bad in just a year. It was purchased new, and has not gone through many recharge cycles at all.

I decided to hook it up to my older ACME SLA charger. I figured that I didn't have anything to lose, even though my new fangled "smart charger"  was telling me the battery would not accept a charge.

As soon as I hooked it up, the indicator on the ACME glowed amber. This means the battery was not full and was accepting a charge. After some time, it eventually turned to green, meaning the battery is fully charged and was then in a trickle charge state.

So now the conundrum. Bad battery, or bad charger? I'm going to give it some work and see how long it's legs last. If it doesn't crap out on me and holds its charge well, I'm going to have to assume it's the charger.

Time will tell.

72 de Larry W2LJ 

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Another one bites the dust

During the middle of the night on Saturday/Sunday, I got a low battery voltage warning on the KX3. That struck me as odd, as I had recently charged up my 12V 10 Ah battery. I was expecting it to last the entirety of Field Day.  But in the heat of battle you really don't think twice about it, so I took it off line and hastily replaced with a recently purchased 12v 5 Ah battery that I had gotten about two weeks ago. THAT battery lasted the second half of Field Day without a whimper.

When I got home from work on Monday, I put the 10 Ah battery on my charger and was getting a battery failure indication. It was reading at a level of 10V and 0% capacity and would not accept a charge, I was wondering how can this be? It was purchased new and I haven't put it through nearly enough cycles to have exhausted it. I figured it must be a battery charger fault, so I hooked up the 5 Ah battery to the charger to see what it said. The 5 Ah (which was in use for roughly the same amount of time, if not more) was down to only 11.8 Volts and had 89% capacity left in it! And the charger's fan started running as soon as I hooked it up.

No charger fault - I got a bad 12V 10 Ah battery. Dang!

I don't remember where I purchased it, whether it was from eBay or Amazon, but it doesn't matter. Its not like you can return a battery some 11 months after you've bought it online. I had purchased it after the 2023 Skeeter Hunt when my last deep cycle battery gave up the ghost. I don't want to be scrambling for electrons during the Hunt this year, so I went on eBay and found an economically (cheaply) priced 12V 10 Ah Deep Cycle Gel Cell battery.

I know, you guys are probably thinking, why didn't he go lithium?  Price mainly, but also because I don't feel like purchasing a dedicated lithium battery charger. I once ruined a small lithium battery by not using the correct charger on it and I don't want to relive that escapade. I learned that lesson well. However, should this battery not last longer than a cycle or two, I guess I'll bite the bullet. Maybe spending a little more right now would be the right thing to do in the long run, but I guess I'm too frugal to have reached that point yet.

It should be at my house in about a week - long before it's needed for the Skeeter Hunt on August 18th - which, by the way, we've had 93 sign ups so far and the 1st Day of Summer was only 6 days ago!

And looky see what came in the mail yesterday!

Not an ATNO, but an ATNC - All Time New Confirmation. I've worked Easter Island before, but never got a QSL card.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

New piece of gear

I know there are a lot of Baofeng haters out there, but ......... for the limited time I spend on VHF/UHF, I'd rather put the big bucks into HF gear or accessories.

I purchased this Baofeng K5 Plus after hearing glowing reports on the nightly Middlesex County Chat Group Net from two local Hams for whom I have deep respect, Marv K2VHW and Dave K2ULF.  $29.00 from Amazon - how could you go wrong? I was ordering a new cordless phone for the house (yes, we still maintain a landline) on Sunday and decided "Why not?" and added it to My Cart. I was surprised as all get out when both the phone and the HT arrived the next afternoon, and I did not pay for expedited shipping!

The main reason I purchased it is because it is a tri-band radio including the 1.25 Meter band - 220 MHz. I do own a dedicated 220 HT, but it's so much more convenient to have all three bands in one radio - no juggling required.  Last night I successfully programmed in the NJ2EM repeater, which is owned and operated by the NJ State Police and is one of our main ways of communicating with them via Amateur Radio on behalf of Middlesex County AUXCOMM. The repeater is down the road a ways - pretty close to Trenton. Even so, I was able to raise the repeater and the S-Meter on the radio was almost full scale as it identified. That's not hard to believe as their antenna is near the top of the old UHF TV Channel 52 tower, which has to be one of the tallest in the state. It truly has statewide coverage, as during  monthly "test nets" I have heard every county in New Jersey check in without difficulty.

I did not purchase a programming cable and had a little trepidation about that. I was relieved to discover that manually entering repeater information is quite intuitive and not complicated at all, and once you've programmed in a memory or two, it gets even easier. When you use CHIRP, it's so easy to fill up memories with repeaters you never frequent, or are perhaps almost dead for the amount of inactivity on them. Manually programming the radio may take a bit more time and effort, but it should eliminate needless frequencies

Another neat thing about the radio is that when you press the "0" key for about three seconds, the most local NOAA weather station will pop on. I used to program that into my hand helds, but it became a nuisance when you go into scan mode and the scanning stops whenever you come to that memory. Another thing that I really like about this HT is that charging can be accomplished via a USB-C port that is located on the battery. I can charge my phone AND my HT from the multi-device charger that we have in our kitchen. Of course, the radio comes with the standard drop-in charger for "conventional" charging as well. I'm sure there are other features that I will come to know and appreciate as I use it more and more. 

There is one thing about this radio that exacerbates my OCD. The "EXIT" button that you press to get out of the menus is actually screened on the key as "EIXT".  I noticed that pretty much right off the bat as my brain went into "What !?!?!: mode. 

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Some things coming

I wouldn't say I'm excited about a few things that I've got coming - but I'm looking forward to their arrival. One is that 15 Ah battery that's coming from Sunny California. It's made it's way to Texas as of the last time I checked the tracking number. It should be here this week. I did not get a chance to get to Federal Metals on Saturday with the old batteries. That will happen this coming weekend.

I also have a set of SideKx end plates and a cover coming for the shack KX3. I was horrified by how dusty and dirty it had become when I took that picture that I featured in last week's blog post. The lighting down in the basement isn't the brightest, so the camera revealed what my eyes didn't notice. I went down to the shack last Wednesday evening with some Windex, Q-Tips and some paper towels. It didn't take long to get it looking factory new.

The problem was, I knew it was only going to happen again. It's the basement and it's not a finished basement. I went on eBay and just for the heck of it, typed in "SideKX KX3" and much to my surprise a set came up! These were from an estate sale from an SK. According to the description provided by his daughter,  they were just sitting down in the basement and from the photos provided, it looks like they were never used. There was a "Buy It Now" option for $25 and after looking at the SideKX website, I knew that was a bit more than 50% off. I grabbed that set in a hurry.  I already have a set of SideKX on the portable ops KX3, so I've installed them before. This shouldn't be a problem.

The other thing that I have coming and will probably be my last Amateur Radio purchase for a long time is another QYT K-8900D for the shack. The one I had in the car and brought downstairs - well ....  when I damaged the coax to the antenna, I must have fried the finals. It will still transmit, but I cannot bring up repeaters that I can easily hit with a handheld. To prevent that from ever happening again to the mobile unit, I re-routed the coax to a position where it does not get crunched or pinched by the rear hatch door. You'd think that being a Ham for over 40 years, I would have done that the first time. Sometimes, my stupidity knows no bounds, and even surprises me now and then.

The QYT is not coming until Thursday according to Amazon, which is OK, but our ARES/RACES District Bureau Chief asked me to run the monthly nest Tuesday evening, as he'll be away on business. Luckily, the repeater has such excellent coverage that using a handheld won't be a problem or even noticeable. I guess I'll just temporarily attach the handheld to the J-Pole coax and will run the net that way.  The Northern New Jersey ARES Net follows a half hour later and the repeater on which that net  occurs does not have as good coverage. Sometimes 5 Watts doesn't make it when that repeater is in a cranky mood.

Lastly, I checked into the St. Max HF Net again last night on 75 Meters at 24:00 UTC. Those ferrites that I put on the coax - WOW! I was able to hear everyone last night! The past few weeks, the weaker signals were "getting lost in the sauce". Not last night! Yes, it was probably in part due to better band conditions as several of the check-ins had commented on, but the background noise was so much lower than it has been. I can't chalk that up to band condition alone, the ferrites had to play a big part in that , too.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Battery City saga continues

I'm going to be dropping off all my SLAs at a metals recycling facility in South Plainfield, either this weekend or next, depending on available time and the weather. I would like to do it tomorrow, but tomorrow is our monthly VE Session. We only have one candidate, but he's attempting a land speed record by trying to go from 0 to 100 MPH in one sitting. For those not getting my joke, he's going to attempt to go from unlicensed to Amateur Extra in one session. He seems to feel confident, God bless him. I hope he makes it, but God knows how long this is going to take. After that is the weekly grocery shopping trip and it's supposed to be stormy all day, so battery drop off may have to wait until next Saturday.

Getting back to the battery situation. I saw a 12V 12Ah Li-ion battery with charger up for auction on eBay for $29. I detailed that story of my tiny bidding war in my August 30th post. I paid for it immediately and unfortunately, it's been sitting for a week with a FedEx label made - but that's as far as it got. 

My current position here at work is Logistics. I deal with both FedEx and UPS every ..... single .....day. I know firsthand that when you track something and all you get is a "Label Created" status, that means that the item has never been picked up by or dropped off to UPS or FedEx. Both shipping companies are adamant about scanning packages before taking possession of them. It's a chain of evidence - proof of ownership thing.  It's their "If we didn't scan it, then we didn't get it" protection.

I complained to the seller that not shipping within a week after immediate payment was unacceptable and that I wanted a refund. I got an answer that FedEx must have "lost the package" so we're refunding your payment. That's pure and utter horsehockey. FedEx never got the package to lose. Someone in their shipping department either lost it or shipped it somewhere else in error.

I went back to eBay this morning and found a brand new 12V 15Ah SLA Deep Cycle battery for $26.00 (free shipping!). Yeah, it's an SLA so it's older battery technology, and yeah, it'll be heavier than a lithium battery, and yeah, it won't make it to nearly the same amount of charge cycles - but the price was right, and it should be here by next Tuesday.  A lithium battery of comparable voltage and capacity comes way closer to $100 and even over for some brands. I already have a charger that works fine with SLAs, and won't need to worry about getting a special "BMS" charger, so there's a savings there, too. So not only am I a dinosaur, but I'm a cheap dinosaur, too! 

Actually, either "frugal' or "thrifty" sound much better!

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

New set up

I changed things around in the Jeep. This was the old set up for my little QYT-K8900D. I had it mounted to a board on the side of the center console. I put Velcro over the nuts on the console side of the board, so there would be no ugly scratches. The board extended back a ways and was held in place, quite snugly, by friction between the seat and console.

The sad thing is that W2LJ's eyes ain't what they used to be. It became hard to see what frequency the rig had stopped on when the scan function happened upon a QSO. At certain times of the day when it was especially bright outside, the display became even harder on these ol' peepers of mine.

It worked well enough, except for those drawbacks, which were unfortunate but not all that prohibitive. In actuality, I could have lived with it, but then one day I happened to run across this on eBay:

It's a bracket that fits in the cup holder. Perfect, as the cup holder was only being used for holding extra coins and the microphone, anyway.  The rig is now closer to my eyes and I can now easily see what repeater the radio has stopped on when a conversation is taking place.

If you're wondering - no, it does not get in the way of the gear shifter, nor does it prevent access to the parking brake release, even though the angle of the camera may make it look that way in the photo. I was a bit skeptical that road vibration and bumps in the roads would cause this bracket to jostle around from where I had set it, but no, so far it's been rock solid. Not bad for a piece of plastic that cost me about 20 bucks (with shipping).

My only complaint is that the microphone hanger that came with this brackety-thing is a hook type. The microphone supplied with the rig has no loop - just a mushroom type of button that protrudes from the back. The radio did come with a compatible microphone hanger clip, but the friction holding the mic in it's clip is so great that the clip HAS to be screwed in place somewhere on the dash, and I don't want to put holes in anything. You never know what wiring is hiding right behind the surface of anything in cars these days.

The microphone will call the other cup holder its home, unless Marianne is with me and she wants to use that one for its intended purpose.  For that brief amount of time, the microphone can ride shotgun in my lap, or on my seat next to my leg.

I know what you might be thinking - what's LJ doing with a piece of Chinese ......... in his car? Why not a Yaesu or an Icom?  The answer is that, like Ivory Soap, I end up listening for 99 and 44/100ths percent of the time. I rarely speak into the mic, unless it's to check into a net or perform some kind of ARES or CERT function. The receiver in this little rig is as good as any, and the 10 or 25 Watts that it puts out for such brief amounts of time serve the purpose. So why pay hundreds? I can put those $$$$ towards something I really want! (I'd rather be on HF anyway!)

While I'm thinking about HF - a few other things:

1)  The log summaries for Skeeter Hunt are coming in like gangbusters! There's still a week to go. I'm hoping that we come closer to 50% participation this year. There were some new callsigns that entered this year and from the comments I've read, it seems just about everyone had a good time!

2) My results:

Larry - W2LJ - NJ

Skeeter #181 - All CW

Single Op

Skeeter QSOs - 27

Non-Skeeter QRP QSOs - 0

Non-Skeeter QRO QSOs - 0

S/P/Cs - 14

Station Class Multiplier X4

Bonus - The number of "Bonus Skeeters" that I worked - 3

not bad for limping around with suspect batteries, hunting and pouncing with only  2.5 Watts!

3) Speaking of the batteries - the little SLA looks like it's going to be fine. The larger SLA looks a bit on the iffy side. The Powerwerx battery indeed looks to be shot.

To end things today - we had our first "kiss" of Autumn this morning and I guess that's appropriate for the 1st day of September. When I awoke this morning and looked at the weather station display it was 55F (13C). It hasn't been that cool in the morning since last May - maybe even April.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Battery City

Progress, of sorts.

I think that the little SLA that I used on Sunday is OK. I put it on my little ACME battery charger (No. I did not get it from Wile. E. Coyote!) Sunday evening and the voltage indicator light changed from amber to green overnight. I checked the voltage again when I got home from work last night and it was still holding steady at 12.9 Volts, so I don't think it's internally discharging at any great rate.  Of course the proof of the pudding will occur when I attach the KX3 to it to see how it handles a load. I'm kind of confident in this one, though.

The bigger SLA has been charging for two overnights (6:00 PM to 5:00 AM) now. I don't run the charger during the day when no one is home - call me overly cautious. It still has not changed from amber to green, which I thought it would have by now. That indicates to me that something might not be up to snuff - but I'll give it a bit more time. I have a feeling it's lost some capacity to actually hold a charge. While on the charger the battery is cool to the touch, though, so it's not like it's going to burst into flames or anything. Again, I'll have to closely monitor the voltage drop if and when I connect it to the KX3.

The big deep cycle Powerwerx battery - not sure what to do there. I'm going to attempt to charge it up once again this weekend and will monitor the voltage drop under load. I still have a feeling this one is shot.

To that end, I purchased a deep cycle 12 Ah Li-ion battery and charger through eBay.  I put a bid on it the other day and quickly got outbid. The auction ended at 10:00 PM last night and with about 4 minutes to go, I upped my original bid by $ 4.00.  Luckily, that was enough to win, and it should be here by the end of next week - maybe as early as this coming Friday.

In any case, going forward, I will have that battery, and the smaller SLA in the ammo box. I will also have another small, cell phone sized "blue pack" battery in the backpack. With all three, I should have plenty of electrons for any POTA outing, QRP Sprint and even for Field Day.

Funny - when I just mentioned the "blue pack" battery, I was originally going to describe it as "about the size of a pack of cigarettes". How times have changed! I think there's probably more folks out there who have never purchased a pack of cigarettes than there are that have.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Recharging

I have the day off today for a little expanded Independence Day weekend. So in addition to recharging myself, I'm also topping off my deep cycle battery after Field Day.

That's Harold, stretched out on the grass, enjoying a little sunshine as well.

I didn't work either Fox in the 20 Meter QRP Foxhunt last evening. Steve WX2S, who is just 18 miles away from me was just too close for 20 Meters. Brian K0DTJ in California was a whisper all evening - perhaps 229 at best. He wasn't loud enough to send my call and perhaps QRM someone who had a legitimate shot at working him.

So I twiddled the dial and worked 5 Colonies in the space of about 20 minutes. K2K in New Hampshire on 160 Meters, K2E in Delaware on 40 Meters, K2I in New Jersey, K2H in Massachuesetts, and K2D in Connecticut all on 80 Meters - and I wasn't even trying real hard. And all with 5 Watts.

Don't know if I'm going to continue to hunt down the remaining eight. We'll see how the weekend progresses.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Gearing up for Field Day

Actually, there isn't that much to do. We had our last South Plainfield Amateur Radio Club meeting on Zoom last night to go over details.

Most of us will be operating from our respective homes as 1E NNJ (low power) and we're all going to denote the club affiliation with the South Plainfield Amateur Radio Club.  I think most of us, if not all of us have bought a Field Day copy of N3FJP's Amateur Contact Log.

Dave KD2FSI reminded everyone to look at the rules and not to forget the bonus points - such as copying the W1AW Field Day Bulletin. I reminded everyone about bonus points for social media posts.

We're going to lose a lot as a club this year for not being in a public location, having municipal officials visit, etc. But the weather forecast for the weekend is for temperatures in the 90s (33C), so being in a tent while wearing a face covering isn't something that's all that attractive, anyway.

Conversely, NOT being in a tent and operating from home leads to more ....... shall we say ..... distractions? For me, at least, being close to the fridge, the bathroom and all the conveniences of home makes sitting in the chair pounding out Morse for hours on end all that much harder. I know for a fact that once those 80 Meter and 160 Meter contacts dry up at night, I'll be hitting the sack instead of going to the Jeep for a short snooze. I think this year, there will be no such thing as a "short snooze" - LOL!

I was mulling over setting up the KX3 and the PAR END FEDZ in the backyard and operating that way - and I may still do that. All operating will be accomplished using my PowerWerx deep cycle battery which has been charged up via my Harbor Freight solar panel.  Thinking about it as I type this, I probably WILL set up that way for daytime operations and once the evening hours come, I'll just slide down to the basement (with the battery) so I can use the W3EDP for 80 and 160 Meter contacts.

I wasn't all that juiced up for Field Day this year, but after last night's meeting, I'm feeling a bit more excited about it. However, it is my deepest wish that for 2021 Field Day, we can go back to "normal". The thing I will be missing the most is the social aspect of it - toughing it out for 24 hours with my SPARC compadres.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!

All WX Solar Powered Amateur Radio Field Station

Julian OH8STN is featured on my blog roll, to the right. Just a few days ago, he made a video about operating a field station totally from solar power, off the grid.  The South Plainfield Amateur Radio Club does this every Field Day, by using solar power to charge up our batteries. Our radios run from this power source for the entire 24 hours.

Last year, I purchased a portable, brief case type of solar panel, along with a charge controller in order to accomplish the same goal.  I haven't taken it out to the field yet, but I have used it from the back yard; and I know it will work if needed in an emergency situation.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

An addition

I was surprised to come home from work last Friday evening to see a small package sitting on the front steps.  It was small, but yet a little too big to fit into the mailbox. I haven't purchased anything lately, so I figured it was something for either my wife Marianne, or perhaps for my daughter Cara, or my son Joseph.

But no, it was addressed to me; and when I looked at the return address, I saw that it was a package from my good friend and Ham Radio mentor, W3BBO. I opened the package like a kid opening presents on Christmas morning.  When I opened the box I was able to detect a whiff of "fresh paint" smell. Oh goody, a homebrew project!

It turned out to be a home made DC Voltage monitor, manufactured from a voltage display that Bob had picked up at a local Hamfest, near his home in Erie, PA.  We either spoke about this topic, and my need for such a device during one of our weekly Saturday chats, or Bob is a talented mind reader! Wow!  Adding mind reading to his impeccable talents as a master builder / home brewing craftsman is quite the combination.

This is just the addition that I was looking to cobble up myself for my portable ops battery box.  I know that I can monitor the input battery voltage on the main screen of my KX3; but I prefer having an off board meter.  I can keep a tab on things when I use my batteries as well as when I charge them.

This ammo box, that I purchased from Dick's Sporting Goods holds my PowerWerx deep cycle battery as well as a smaller 5Ah SLA.  The two plastic boxes hold a battery charger and the associated cables that I need to connect these babies up to the KX3.  Now Bob's DC Voltage Meter is a welcome addition that will reside in the same container.

Yesterday, Labor Day was spent performing CERT duties for our town. We host a parade in the morning, a big "lawn party" on the grounds of the Middle School in the afternoon and then a fireworks display in the evening.  Our duty was to aid the Police Dept with crowd control duties so that no onlookers would get hurt.

There was a break between the lawn party and the fireworks, so I went home to grab some dinner and relax for a bit. I grabbed my tablet to check out e-mail and to take a quick look at our town's Facebook page to see what the reactions were to the parade.  Most were positive; but a couple were quite negative.  To the naysayers, I suggested that perhaps they should join the Public Celebrations Committee and help make the parade better next year.  You would think that I had just announced that Santa Claus had been shot dead by the Easter Bunny!

It's really sad that often, the people who complain the loudest are also the least willing to roll up their sleeves to help make things better.  My Mom always said that there are some people who just aren't happy unless they're miserable.  I think she was right.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Going solar

Well ...... kinda sorta.

I went to Harbor Freight yesterday during lunch to buy a 15" soft tool bag that I had a coupon for. The purpose of the bag is to haul around the disassembled pieces of my magnetic loop antenna.

While I was there, I started walking up and down the aisles, looking and knowing I had a 20% "off" coupon in my pocket.  You can get into a lot of trouble this way, but I got myself into only minor trouble, I guess.

I purchased one of these:

 

It's an attache` case sized solar panel with 12V and 24V - (unregulated) outputs.  It's rated at 13 Watts. This will be head and shoulders above the mini panels that I use now for charging 12V SLAs.  Knowing the output is unregulated, I then proceeded over to Banggood and picked up one of these:

So not only will I be able to charge deep cycle batteries in an environmentally friendly manner (we all gotta do our part!); but I can even run the KX3 (after mucho testing, of course!) off the panel for Field Day as this little unit will regulate the panel's output to a steady 12V.

Both units ran me less than $75.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Miscellania

Despite being on a very tight budget, with very little room for Amateur Radio purchases this year, I bit the bullet and made a purchase from eBay this morning:

This was purchased specifically with Field Day in mind. It's pre-owned and was a very reasonable $35. It's a 20Ah SLA and even if it has deteriorated a bit from use, it should power one of my KX3s for the entire 24 hours. At a whopping 13 lbs, this is not a battery that I will use for anything other than Field Day, or perhaps some sprints from the back yard.

Speaking of Field Day, the South Plainfield Amateur Radio Club has gone into full planning mode. This year, we are going to switch over to the 3A Battery category and will be adding a digital staion, in addition to the standard SSB and CW stations.  We will also have a GOTA station and are hoping to hold some kind of educational event for some local Boy Scout troop(s).

One of our club members who has had success working the satellites is planning a satellite QSO this year. We had a planning meeting last Thursday evening and I came away excited at our prospects for this year. No matter the outcome, it's going to be fun again, that's for sure.

The bands seem to be slowly coming back after last week's St. Patrick's Day solar storm. I worked S59N and EA6VQ during lunch time today, so DX is once again workable using 5 Watts and the Buddistick. I did hear 9Q0HQ on one of the bands, but very weakly.

It was only 19F (-7C) when I woke up this morning, but despite that, Ol' Man Winter's days are numbered. Time to start thinking about getting the portable ops batteries charged, portable antennas ready and all that kind of stuff. It won't be long before QRP To The Field is here to kick off the official 2015 Summer Outdoor QRP season.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Battery problems and a solution

My Chinese Li Ion battery "ol' Blue" (upper right) has given up the ghost, much the same as Mike VE3WDM has written over at his blog.  In my case, the battery will not take a charge.  The output from the wall wart charger is perfect, but no matter how long it's connected to the battery, the battery itself will not charge.

I suspect either a faulty cell or perhaps a fault with the little regulator board that's inside the blue shrink wrap. So the decision had to be made.  Even though the price is relatively cheap, do I buy another Chinese battery or try something else? Do I go back to hauling around my small, but heavy, 5 Ah sealed lead acid battery?

I have a charger that will handle 18650 type Li Ion batteries, as these are what go into the tactical flashlights that I keep in my CERT pack and my radio "Go Pack".  So I figured that since I already have half of what I need, that I would go a different route this time.

I purchased a pack of 10 type 18650 batteries (upper left) from an American vendor.  The ones I bought are 3.7V and have a rating of 5300 mAh.  I also purchased two of the 4 cell holders that you see above. This gives me two 14.8V, 5300 mAh batteries. All I had to do was solder on the connector that goes directly into the KX3.

I tried them out today and they seem to work without any problems.  I will use a fresh charged pack tomorrow for FOBB and will see how long one pack lasts before I have to switch over to the backup pack.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Field Day 2014 - Wow!

That's all I can say - wow!  A magnificent time was had at the first Field Day for the South Plainfield Radio Club.  I posted the following to QRP-L, and I'll insert some other thoughts at the end.

The South Plainfield Amateur Radio Club operated Field Day in Spring Lake Park in South Plainfield, NJ. We used Club call NJ2SP, and ran as 2A (Battery). The "2A" were two Elecraft KX3s. The CW station ran to a EARCHI antenna (53 foot radiator, 9:1 UNUN, 25 foot length of coax). The elevated end of the EARCHI was about 30-35 foot up in a tree. The SSB station used a G5RV, about the same height between two trees.

Our operating position behind our club banner. 
And if you look closely (click on the picture for a bigger image) you can see the EARCHI antenna sloping upward and away towards the tree it was anchored in.

The EARCHI antenna was a resounding success. The KX3's internal tuner handled it exceedingly well on all bands. We made just a tad over 270 CW QSOs, with our best DX being Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands and the Cayman Islands.

Dave W2OIL and Marv K2VHW working on deploying G5RV feedline.

The G5RV worked exceeding well, also. The KX3 again tuned without a hiccup. The SSB team completed just over 100 SSB QSOs - these guys are all QRO ops and they were skeptical about completing even a single QRP SSB QSO. They ended up surprising themselves, and they ended up being quite amazed at what they were able to accomplish. Yes, it was not as easy as using 100W rigs, but even in keeping with the ARRL's 5 Watt limit for the battery category, they were quite pleased.

 Power source for the laptops

Power source for the CW station

We operated on solar charged batteries all weekend without a hitch. The energy hogs for the weekend were the two laptops that we used for logging. The Field Day rules state that since we were not using the laptops for rig control, we could have powered them from mains (which we did not have) or a generator (which we had, but didn't use). In keeping with our self imposed "severe emergency capability" theme in order to make this a drill as much as possible, we also powered them off a deep cycle battery using an inverter. We needed to switch the laptops over to a fresh battery somewhere in the mid morning hours, Sunday.

SPARC's first Field day was an outstanding and unqualified success, and I think we 'busted' the myth that Field Day has to be QRO to be fun.

~~~~~~~~~

The EARCHI worked great and way better than I dared hope for. With less exceptions than I can count on one hand, I was able to work everyone that I tried to.  Being on an energy budget because of the batteries and wanting them to last all weekend if possible, I didn't try calling CQ or running a frequency (it was S&P all weekend).  I will reserve that for FOBB and the Skeeter Hunt, which are only four hour events. I can afford to be a little "battery foolish" during those, and I expect the EARCHI to work just as well during those two events.

Our publicity table.

The other Godsend of the weekend? That Joplin ARC antenna launcher kit that I purchased and built up. We were able to place antenna lines pretty much exactly where we wanted with hardly any effort at all.  That thing is one of the greatest things since sliced bread! One or two of the guys were skeptical about being able to place an antenna line so easily and accurately with such little effort. The old saying is "That seeing is believing". They're believers now!

The VHF/UHF antennas for our GOTA station.

Protection from South Plainfield's Finest!

We had wonderful support from our Mayor, Town Council, Office of Emergency Management and our Police Department.  They even parked a car by our site for the overnight, to act as a deterrent against any potential mischief makers!

Tim AB2ZK making SSB QSOs in the dead of night.

Marv K2VHW taking a late night turn at the CW station.

Dawn breaking over South Plainfield on Sunday morning.

Field Day aftermath. 
After being awake for 24+ hours, I fell asleep while waiting for the Mayor to show up late Sunday morning. I woke up in time for his visit, though!

Being in the park, we had a lot of curious people come by.  We answered any and all questions and we handed out quite a bit of ARRL printed material about Amateur Radio. An encouraging sign was that several parents came by and wanted more information for their tech minded offspring.

Squeezing out some last minute QSOs as Field Day draws to a close. Tim AB2ZK on phone, W2LJ on CW.

The moral of the story is that Field Day is fun!  It doesn't have to be elaborate to be a success. With two wire antennas and two QRP rigs anchored at 5 Watts, we had a blast.  Oh, and we made the local paper, too!  http://tinyurl.com/ls56z6u  Some of the details were not exactly reported accurately, but it was good exposure for Amateur Radio nonetheless!

In closing, I'll answer a question that was posed to me by a member of the visiting public, the way I wanted to answer it. A woman asked me if it was a bit extreme staying awake throughout the 24 hours of Field Day. Of course, I gave her the answer of "In the event of an emergency or a natural disaster, sleep may very well be a luxury, ......." Yadda, yadda, yadda.

What I wanted to say was any of the following:

1) It's Field Day! Sleep is overrated!
2) Heck no Lady! Field Day is fun!

Or I could've gotten all Clint Eastwood and said:
3) Ma'am? I'll sleep when I'm dead!

One final, last added mention.  Last year, Marv K2VHW introduced me to Deep Woods Off moist towelettes.  They are a must for the Field Day Go Package. They worked extremely well, and I was not bothered by a single "Skeeter" (pesky little fellows, I should have had them pound brass!) all night long.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Now THAT was fun!

I participated in the QRP-ARCI Summer Homebrew Sprint for only a very little this afternoon.  But thankfully, quality is not defined by quantity, so the QSOs, while few in number were great in fun.

I began by operating on 20 Meters.  The Buddistick was set up with two 11 inch arms, the coil and the super long whip atop the Jeep on the magmount.  With my coil tapped in the normal 20 Meter spot that I am accustomed to, the Autek analyser displayed an SWR of 1.4:1.  I hit the ATU button anyway, for a very short "Brrrrp" and got a 1:1 match.

While on 20 Meters, as I was calling "CQ QRP" for a bit, and much to my surprise I was answered by Fred G4HOM out of Birmingham, England.  He was much louder than the stateside stations that I was working; so I immediately thought "tower and beam". Nope!  Fred was using his K2 at 10 Watts to a simple wire - propagation, being what it was, favored a QSO between Lake George and Birmingham.  Signal reports were good both ways.

Shortly thereafter, I switched to 40 Meters by undoing the tap from the coil to take advantage of the entire Buddistick coil, and I added two more 11 inch arms.  After a bit of a scare that I won't go into here (due to my own stupidity), the KX3 had matched the Buddistick to 1.4:1 on 40 Meters. I had several QSOs down around 7.030 MHz, including one with my very good friend Bob, W3BBO.  This was our first QSO while I have been at Lake George.  He had a good 579 signal and gave me a good report as well.

The Buddistick on the magmount, using the vehicle as a ground plane is great combination.  Thanks to W3BBO for getting me to try that.  It works so well that I may just forego using the EFHW wires unless I am on the hiking trail later this week.

Oh, I don't remember if I mentioned this; but I decided to leave the Lead Acid battery home.  I am going strictly with the Lithium Ion this week.  It held up very well this afternoon.  I never dropped from 5 Watts output throughout the couple of hours of operating time this afternoon, including a few prolonged "CQ QRP" sessions.  I think "The Little Blue Guy" will be quite adequate for my needs.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!