ARRLWeb: ARDF Update: Trophies Await at USA's First Blind ARDF Championships

A very special transmitter hunting event takes place during the 2007 Dayton Hamvention in May. Spread the word!

Dennis Schwendtner, WB6OBB, and Linda Reagan, KF6MOB

Although totally blind, Dennis Schwendtner, WB6OBB, has participated in mobile and on-foot transmitter hunts for three decades. Here he is during an on-foot hunt at the ARRL Southwestern Division convention in 1995. At that event, rules allowed him to have an assistant (Linda Reagan, now KF6MOB) to help him avoid obstacles. [Joe Moell, K0OV, photo]

Frank Shannon, KR6AL, and Carol Blake KF6LQQ

Frank Shannon, KR6AL teaches the basics of VHF direction finding to Carol Blake KF6LQQ, a sight-impaired attendee at a Courage Handi-Ham Radio Camp in Malibu, California. [Pat Tice, WA0TDA, photo]

Bob Frey, WA6EZV, Dick Arnett, WB4SUV, and Matthew Robbins, AA9YH, of OH-KY-IN Amateur Radio Club are three presenters of the First USA Blind ARDF Championships. [Matthew Robbins, AA9YH, photo]

Two examples of 80-meter ARDF receiver/antenna sets from Europe. At left is a loop antenna model from Ukraine. The ferrite rod antenna unit at right is from Germany. [Joe Moell, K0OV, photo]

"I love the ham radio! It opens me to the world!" Those were the excited words of a patient in the rehabilitation unit of a hospital where my wife April, WA6OPS, held weekly Rehab Radio sessions for over 15 years. To us, there is no doubt that the activities of our hobby can be especially stimulating and motivating to persons with physical limitations.

The therapeutic benefits of ham radio aren't limited to ham shacks. Outdoor sessions of Amateur Radio Direction Finding (ARDF) can also be a boon to the disabled. With some adaptive gear and an "extender", handicapped hams and non-hams have experienced on-foot radio foxhunting alongside the fully able at conventions and other events in southern California and at Handi-Ham Radio Camps.

Foxhunting for the disabled will be taken to the next level when the First USA Blind ARDF Championships take place in Dayton, Ohio on the last day of Hamfest 2007. The welcome mat is out. No experience is necessary. Extenders will not be needed this time.

Like formal ARDF for the sighted, ARDF for the blind is a European innovation. No country has more of it than Croatia, where the first such special foxhunts began in 1995 and have been well attended. The Louis Braille Radio Club for the Blind, part of the Blind Association in Zagreb, sponsors annual events complete with trophies and a banquet afterwards.

Rules and procedures for USA's first national ARDF event for the blind will be adopted from the Croatian's rules, which were originally written by Zeljko Ulip 9A2EY. There are some similarities to championship ARDF rules for the sighted, such as the frequency bands and the division of competitors into age/gender categories. Scoring is first by number of transmitters found and second by elapsed time.

A site for Croatian-style blind ARDF must be flat and open, perhaps a large lawn, with no obstacles such as holes or tree stumps. This frees the participants to walk or run as fast as they are able without fear of tripping over something hazardous. Sinclair Park in Dayton is ideal.

Standard ARDF under international rules has five unattended automatic "foxes" on a course of about 5 kilometers, with power up to 3 watts. Foxes transmit one at a time on the same frequency for 60 seconds each in rotating sequence. Competitors can find them in any order. Participants are started at five-minute intervals, at the moment #1 goes on the air. At the World Championships, there may be several hundred on the course at the same time.

By comparison, blind ARDF courses have three to five transmitters of about 100 milliwatts, with attendants. Course length is less than a half kilometer. Only one competitor is on the course at a time, attempting to find foxes one at a time in numbered order. As he or she leaves the starting point, #1 is on the air and it stays on until it is found. An official silently runs or walks alongside, speaking only to warn if the participant is about to go out of the competition boundary.

As soon as the runner steps inside the 5-meter circle of chalk or tape surrounding the antenna of fox #1, the official shouts "stop," the attendant at #1 turns it off and the attendant at #2 turns that one on. The competitor immediately takes off after #2 and so on, until timing is stopped when the last fox is found.

Members of the OH-KY-IN Amateur Radio Club are sponsoring this pioneering event. Co-chairs of the organizing committee are Dick Arnett WB4SUV and Bob Frey WA6EZV, who also put on the USA ARDF Championships in 2003. Participants need not be licensed Amateur Radio operators, but they must be blind or sight-impaired. They must also be capable of walking or running without assistance. For fairness, those who are not totally blind will be asked to wear opaque goggles on the course.

This transmitter hunt will be on 80 meters in the CW segment. Participants are encouraged to bring their favorite on-foot RDF equipment for this range. For those who don't have any, there will be a variety of loaner sets to choose from, including a Ukrainian loop-antenna model and a German set with ferrite rod antenna. With either, it's easy to determine bearings by signal loudness in the headphones; no S-meter is needed. There will be a practice session to familiarize participants with the RDF gear before the competition begins.

The fun gets under way at 9 AM on Sunday, May 20, 2007, weather permitting, at Sinclair Park, which is about two miles southwest of the Hamvention headquarters at Hara Arena. After everyone has had a chance to test out the equipment he or she will use, the competition will begin.

More information on this event is at the OH-KY-IN ARDF Web site. The organizers want to get a good head count ahead of time for planning, so please visit this site, then register or contact them. Please pass the word to organizations for the blind in your area.

WB4SUV, WA6EZV and friends are also putting on the annual Hamvention Foxhunt Forum in Room 5 of Hara Arena at 1145 hours on Saturday. This 75-minute session always has a variety of speakers to present the newest equipment, techniques and event information about both on-foot and vehicular transmitter hunting. Take time out from the exhibit hall and flea market to attend.

As the weather warms up, it's time for your club to start planning for the outdoor foxhunting season. A good time for your first event would be the CQ Worldwide Foxhunting Weekend, May 12-13. Details are in my article, "Take the Foxhunting Challenge," in the April 2007 issue of CQ Magazine.

Encourage the best on-foot foxhunters in your club to set aside the weekend of September 14 - 16 for USA's national Championships of ARDF, combined with the biennial ARDF Championships of IARU Region 2 (North and South America). This year's site is in the forests near Lake Tahoe on the California-Nevada border. Watch for details in an ARDF Update when registration opens. Meanwhile, you can read about past and future USA Championships and many other ARDF topics at my "Homing In" Web site.