Working POTA stations

 I did something this Sunday morning that I haven't done in a while ..... I got on the air!

I decided to go down to the basement to hunt some POTA stations. I ended up working five in a very short time amidst working on a hardware issue. More on that later. 

If you like working POTA stations but haven't downloaded the POTA Spotter app, you're doing yourself a great injustice. I have mine on my cell phone and was going from spot to spot to spot.

I tried working Tom K4SWL and John AE5X. I think Tom had gone QRT and I heard stations working John, but could not make out AE5X himself. But it was fun working the five that I did and the POTA Spotter made it easier than it would have been just twiddling the dial. To some purists, that might be "cheating", but I don't have the PX3 panadapter, so the POTA Spotter makes life just a bit easier.

Getting back to the hardware problem. It was solved by making up a new power cord for the KX3, because as I was working K8P, my KX3 shut itself off (or lost power) twice. Hoping that there was nothing wrong with the rig itself, I hurriedly hooked it up to my Field Day battery only to find that everything was OK. Whew!

The power supply was still powered on and putting out the proper voltage. I unhooked the power cable that runs from the power supply to the KXPA100 and stuck some VOM probes into the Anderson power poles. No volts!  I checked the inline fuses and they were OK, so the problem has to be at the power pole end. The wires seem to be attached fine, but since there's no voltage present, there has to be a loose connection, or something, at the power pole end.

I don't have any spare power poles on hand, or the crimping tool, but I did have a spare 3.5mm power connector. I took some heavy gauge speaker wire on hand and SOLDERED myself up a good old fashioned power cable. That solved that problem and I went on to work a couple more before going QRT myself.

I had forgotten how much fun POTA hunting is. I'll have to do lots more in the future!

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!