01/24/2005 | W5LL/R (W5LL, W5BL) This was my second outting as a rover in the VHF contests. First one was in September and we made significant improvements for the January test. Here's the breakdown of the rover as it was for this contest.


6m - M2 Halo, TE Systems amp 400+ watts

2m - M2 Halo stack, Gulf Alpha 7el yagi, TE Systems amp 400+ watts

222MHz - 222 DEMI transverter, M2 10el yagi, TE Systems amp 200+ watts

432MHz - Gulf Alpha 16el yagi, TE Systems amp 200+ watts


All equipment worked great. I was a little dissapointed with the performance of the 16el 432Mhz antenna but that have been due to the poor conditions as well. We covered 12 grids throuought North Texas and Southern Oklahoma for a total of 181 Q's.

Improvements to be made for the June contest include the addition of 1.2GHz, hard keying the amps(we used RF sensing this time around) also better route planning and coordination is a must. -- W5LL