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Field Day 2009 @ Richmond Amateur Radio Club, Richmond, VA – W4ZA
Saturday morning, the club’s technical committee and friends got together to celebrate the Field Day Kickoff with the "Raising of the Tower". The tower is a military surplus radio tower nicknamed "the rocket launcher". Just getting the thing to the church where we set up is sure to raise some eyebrows. As you sit at the light and the folks in the next car do a "unified threat profiling" stare - you just look back and say "rocket launcher", and wink!
Assembly of the tower and attaching the antennas is a real team effort and galvanizes the group for the rest of the event. In just a few hours we had a Cushcraft MA5V vertical on top of the 40’ mast along with a Buckmaster OCF dipole. A B&W-90, an OCF Zepp, and a 20 Meter dipole were also installed. Four HF stations, including our W4FJ GOTA station were quickly put together and we were ready for Field Day!
After a great lunch, the rigs were fired up and the fun began. We operated as W4ZA 3A-VA and had W4FJ as our GOTA station call. The rigs stayed busy and at times there were folks lined up to take a turn operating.
Representatives of VDEM (Virginia Department of Emergency Management), and ARES were on hand to add to our overall points as well as show off the new Emergency Communications vehicle to members and visitors.
No, we didn’t finish in the top 10%, but we all had a great time and enjoyed each others company. We are already looking forward to next year’s event.
RARC meets the second Friday of each month. We would love for you to join us. You can find out lots more about the club at www.rarclub.net.
Rob Thomas
"Let's see now - where's that piece go?" Ronnie KG4QIV, Mel W4AHC and Ron KD4XA make sense out of last year's notes. |
Mel W4AHC, Tom KD4CMK, Mike K4RKO and Ron KD4XA getting started with the non-simple, base configuration assembly. |
Richard WA4FEH, Ron, Tom, Mike and Mel finalize the base assembly. Nothin to do now but start "chuckin tubes". |
After the first two sections, Richard and Mike add the Cushcraft MA5V, dipole pulleys and support guys before the final launch. |
Whoa! Finally! An awesome sight and some major technology. Lunch anybody? |
The crew and backup refuels ready for contacts far and wide. Hot dogs, fried chicken and other local delights were on hand to keep up the energy. |
W4TY instructs a potential ham on the intricacies of on the air decorum. Let alone find a contact in all the QRM!! |
I wanna do it myself, Dad! |
Finally gettin the hang of it! Did he say CQ W4ZA?? |
Time to pull out the heavy artillery - our extra members and logging pros. Art W4TY, Fred K4LJF and Judy N5JCH - a coordinated team! |
Greg KG4KWW shows us an example of "heads down contesting"! While the GOTA station is alive with activity in the background. |
And then you can always gang up on em with the teamwork approach! - - Photos KC4NYK |
NS1RA at Night |
Thanks
Eric, KA1NCF
NS ARES DEC
My first contest since returning to ham radio after a 26 year absence ...lots of fun. Working only the digital modes it was encouraging to see so many stations working PSK31 & RTTY. Transitioning from paper and pencil log and dupe sheets to computer assisted record keeping is a real improvement. Didn't pick up a pencil the entire contest!
The only down side, other than the fact that I couldn't stay up as long as I could in 1982, were the few VERY wide bandwidth, multiple harmonic, PSK31 transmitters.
W2GHD
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Group photo at the end of Field Day. |
Guss KF6ZXO and Mark AD6VN working 20m CW with our special event call sign W6A. Our club call is W6WGZ. You can visit us and see all the photos at w6wgz.org |
The kids gave the GOTA station a real work-out and they had a lot of fun learning about amature radio and making contacts. |
Field Day '07 for our family was at the QTH of KC5DCY in Livingston, Texas. The team consisted of Gene KA5FUJ, Norbert KC5DCY, and Jason KB5URQ (all Dugas').
Jason did almost all of the operating, but had significant help with antennas from both Gene and Norbert, as well as moral support, water, and food.
We had a 20m dipole up (not very high) and pretty much stayed on 20m. We did venture onto other bands such as 40 and 80m using a High Sierra mobile antenna mounted on an 8 ft. pole near the operating location. We ran on lead acid batteries.
All of the operations were done from the screened-in back porch of the house.
We used a couple radios during the contest-- but only one at a time.
In the future for next year, we hope to add a tower at the QTH for higher elevation and a higher score!!
We had fun working other stations and visiting off-the-air.
73 de KB5URQ
Norbert mounting the 6m Moxon onto the mast. We never made any Field Day contacts on 6m-- probably because the band didn't open up much where we were at. |
Gene (KA5FUJ) and Nob (KC5DCY) discussing the finer points in life and their deep understanding of ham radio. |
Jason (KB5URQ) looking towards Gene (KA5FUJ) to see why he has his receiver's AF cranked up so high. 'FUJ was just listening on the 80m band. |
KB5URQ copying down contact info. QRZ! |
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Gene & Nob pulling in the weak one on the big Yaesu. |
A look at the work-horse inverted V that we used. Proof that even a cheap wire antenna and little preparation will get you 300+ points in Field Day. |
AD5JT and KD5MML assemble a 6 meter yagi. photo by K5GWC |
The GoTA operating postion. AD5JT is on the left. KD5MMM helps some young visitors complete some contacts. photo by K5GWC |
Operated mix of Digital and SSB.
Copied special bulletin from ARRL.
The "Saltyhams" were out bobbing around on Narragansett Bay in Rhode Island for the NBARC Field Day event and we had a wonderful time.
The combination of great friends, great food, and incredible weather made for a very memorable weekend. The NBARC crew once again ran 2C with our CW station aboard the 30' Sloop Destiny and Phone station aboard the 46' Ketch Bellerophon. (Proudly flying the ARRL Battle Flag and NB1RI signal flags)
Brad KA1SVW and Steve KA1RCI purchased provisions for weekend and packed Bellerophon on Thursday night. They set sail from the Edgewood Yacht Club early on Friday afternoon June 22nd and watched the Blue Angles flying practice formations while sailing down to the NBARC field day site just off shore of Prudence Island outside of Potters Cove, RI. They arrived on station at their field day anchorage Friday evening and then Ernie N1SW arrived on station in Destiny early Saturday morning.
Saturday and Sunday we were just a few miles from the air show and got to watch all the fun from the boat while operating the ARRL field day event. The F-22 "Raptor" (I think that is what I was watching on Saturday) did a high speed low level pass directly over our boat that shook us! It was AWESOME!!! I think that we saw a vintage B-29 boomer too, is that possible?
Ernie N1SW did an Awesome job with the CW station operating for approximately 11.5 hours making 247 CW QSO's in 33 states for 494 points taking first place in our class at the national level again this year.
Brad KA1SVW and Steve KA1RCI operated for approximately 13 hours making 257 Phone QSO's in 36 states for 257 points.
Between both our CW and phone stations we worked 44 states and most of the Canadian providences for a grand total of 751 QSO points not counting any bonus points.
Brad has also taken a few hundred very high resolution photos, once time allows I will post them on our website http://saltyhams.org
Thank you, Steve
ARRL Rhode Island Section Assistant Section Manager Steven M Hodell, KA1RCI ka1rci@arrl.net
President - Narragansett Bay Amateur Radio Club steve@ka1rci.net
NBARC Information - NB1RI
http://saltyhams.org
nb1ri@saltyhams.org
46 foot Ketch Bellerophon proudly flying the ARRL Battle Flag and the Narragansett Bay Amateur Radio Club Call NB1RI with signal flags |
Ernie N1SW our CW operator on Destiny |
Brad KA1SVW making a phone contact on Bellerophon |
Steve KA1RCI working thru a 80 meter pileup on 3.882 MHz - He worked 58 stations in just over 60 minutes aboard Bellerophon |
The Phone station - 46 foot Ketch Bellerophon |
The CW station - 30 foot Sloop Destiny |
Brad's Signal Cannon - VERY LOUD - BOOM! |
Flying NB1RI The old fashion way... |
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