07/04/2004 | KP4ES PUERTO RICO AMATEUR RADIO LEAGUE (PRARL)


This year we returned to the Bacardi Corporation facilities in the city of Cata, and was named Field Day coordinator for this year, not without the help of the Activities Committe of the League.

Think every one had their visit of Mr.Murphy, well when we got to the place at 10:30 am, there was no tent! It was supposed to be there a day before, but thanks to Elizabeth Rubio who works there we got it erected at 12:30pm, so we had to move pretty fast. In the mean time others were taking measurements on how to position the antennas (first photo).

By the time of the start we were almost ready, syncronizing the computers, preparing the power generators and mounting the radio equipment. This years we went for verticals which they say works very well. . .

We went again 2A with the addition of a digital (RTTY) station by KP4JRS standing by, VHF and satellite stations by KP4DR as well a demo on Amateur TV as always by KP4IA with improvements made recently.
Also there were APRS and SSTV demos plus a message to the Section Manager by NP3OD and yours truly.

At the beginning the bands were not so good, only CW was the way to go but later into the night 20 meters was the place to be on SSB. NP3A, WP4F, KP4U and KP4RAT had a good run on CW meanwhile KP4JRS waiting for conditions for RTTY went a while for SSB.

Tried to work SO-50 Saturday afternoon and heard the people working on KP2AA and a station W4 that was calling and not sure if he got my exchange.

As always we had visitors, some friends who also operated and others that were interested in what we were doing. During the night I was contacted to see if I could substitute the controller of a local NET, so I said why not? That's part of what we do so from 8 to 9pm I ran the net and there was good participation. . . 30 stations! Even got ATV signal reports. I explained them what is Field Day for and gave info on the launch of ECHO and it's main use (sure for us amateurs).

Then we had our meal courtesy of WP4F who was in charge of our food and soup brought by NP4CQ. Exquisite!

Took a sleep and at 2am Sunday morning did work 20 meters and did have a pile up, then I was with friends and then slept again til 6:30am. QSO's were rolling in on 20 and 40 meters and by the way participated on a local Sunday morning 40m net, by the way testing a square phase half wave antenna erected by NP4D and WP4BD, I was given a 5-9 and stayed for a while until conditions waned.

And the big thrill came when at 14:30 UTC we heard NA1ISS calling and then grabbed the mic and called twice, and Mike Fincke answering the call wow and the present including our Section Manager KP4PQ heard the QSO. Later on the other pass KP4DR and WP3ME worked ISS with their callsigns. Am happy that Joel-WP3ME did the contact: this was his second Field Day and was expecting something like this; even heard Mike say "Viva Puerto Rico" to him. It was his first "satellite" contact.

Later at noon there was an opening on 15 meters and my friend KP4JRS had a blast racking up on SSB and think we won over CW (sorry NP3A)this time; this was also his first Field Day. It was that good that we finished at exactly 2pm as his father KP4JFR was timing him.

Operators were NP3A, WP4F, KP4JRS, KP4JFR, NP4CQ, KP4DR, WP3ME, KP4U, NP3OD, KP4NNC, KP4SQ, NP3TY, KP4RAT and KP4IA.

Oh! And the verticals did work well. And as you saw the only one with the official Field Day 2004 T-shirt. Again thanks to the Bacardi Corp for lending their grounds and having a good time. Til next year!


For more visit http://www.prarl.org/FD2004.html -- WP3GW