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 Previous: RFI course starts in February |  Next: The K7VVV Solar Update |
By Charles Vogan, KD5KA
November 26, 2002
Another radio sortie along the western highways--this time with CW and APRS.
 KD5KA's three trips out West. |
The February 2002 issue of QST featured an article I wrote about my motorcycle trip out to Colorado back in July 2001 ("A Virginia Ham Goes West"). Actually, that was our second trip out west. A glutton for punishment, I decided that I hadn't seen everything out there yet, so back we went. This time I wanted to ride my bike in the American Southwest in the summer--and try out new ham gear and techniques while I was at it.
What a trip! I found out that Arizona really is hot in the summer. This time we had my motorcycle (a 1999 Kawasaki Vulcan) and our family car. Aside from me, three hams went on this trip: my wife Elma, KG4LRG, my youngest son Benjamin, KG4IWA, and a family friend, Young Choe, KG4TZI. Young got his ticket just in time for the trip; he and Benjamin would operate the radio in the car.
This year I wanted to try APRS--it's a new (for me, anyway) way of tracking vehicles and other objects by means of ham radio. After working for weeks with my local APRS guru (Jason, N4DSL), I was ready. The 50-W Icom IC-207 transceiver would beacon our position (from the GPS unit, also in the car) via the Kantronics KPC3+ TNC every 10 minutes. The nice thing was that anybody could follow our position on the map if they had a computer--they didn't have to have a radio to track us. All they had to do was use the FINDU utility on the Internet.
What we didn't know was whether there would be enough digipeaters out West to pick me up wherever I happened to be. Civilization gets a little sparse out there. But it worked beautifully whenever I remembered to remind my crew to turn all the equipment on! The GPS would instruct the APRS to signal my exact location, altitude and even the speed of the vehicle. It showed up on three map scales: 1000 ft/in, 10 mi/in, and 50 mi/in.
What I really wanted was to be able to send
messages back home through the APRS. However, I couldn't get the knack of
making my Palm V (loaded with PocketAPRS)
send those messages. Of course, it had worked back home before the trip!
 The author taking a break at Wyoming's Tetons. |
In Salt Lake City, we stopped in to see my wife's niece for the night. Someone stretched their feet in the car and disconnected the cable behind the radio that goes to the TNC. So for the next 2000+ miles, the radio was on, the GPS was on, the TNC was on--but no signals were getting out! Everyone back home became worried that we had broken down in Utah and they were ready to send a search party. When we arrived in Pennsylvania and I received an e-mail about the problem, I found the disconnected cable and plugged it back in. So, I learned that the APRS equipment works fine--but the crew is going back for more training!
Most nights we managed to pull into camp on time (we tented the whole way) so I could keep the CW schedule with the folks at home. Each night I would start at 0200 UTC on either 7.040 or 14.060 MHz and try to call someone. WD4RXU, K4LXG and K4DJG were my nightly contacts on 40 and 20 meters. One night it was puzzling trying to follow K4LXG; I thought for sure he could send better code than that! It turned out that his key had failed, and he was reduced to tapping two wires together to finish the QSO!
As on the 2001 trip, our 2-meter radios kept
the vehicles and the people together. We used them on the road, in grocery
stores and WalMarts, across town--they saved us many times from becoming
separated. Benjamin made the trip a little more exciting when he took off on a
hike across the Wyoming landscape on foot to get a better view of the Tetons.
An hour later he came breathless into the camp--he had dropped his brother's
handheld somewhere along the way and couldn't find it. For the next hour, my
wife kept up a continual chatter on the car's radio while the three of us
fanned out across the half-mile long field in search of the missing transceiver.
Finally, as the sun was setting, we heard her voice among the sagebrush.
Fortunately, he had turned the rig on before he lost it!
 Radioing home from Rapid City, South Dakota. |
On the first trip, I was a brand new ham and could hardly operate my handheld. The second trip was a thrill, because my CW equipment worked across the country. This last trip's plans required new equipment and techniques, but I'm finding that all the planning and operating is coming easier now. And I can share my experience with others; I've already spoken at two club meetings about "QRP on the road."
All told, I've driven through 31 states and logged over 19,000 miles in 8 weeks of summer riding--all on my motorcycle. Would I do it again? Well, I think I'll take a break next year. I'll just go to the beach and take it easy for a change. CW works from the oceanfront too!
Charles Vogan, KD5KA, of Weyers Cave,
Virginia, has been a ham since June 2000. He favors QRP CW. The pastor of a
small church, Chuck has managed to get three sons, his wife and two friends
started in Amateur Radio. You can contact the author at cvogan@shentel.net.
| Previous: RFI course starts in February | Next: The K7VVV Solar Update |
