06/30/2008 | K4ORE The Clarksville Operating Radio Enthusiasts Group has a philosophy of being informal and laid back, taking a minimalist approach to all we do, yet always rising to the occasion and overcoming any challenge. Our approach to Field Day typifies this. Our plan was simple: meet out at one of our groups farm, put up some home made G5RV antennas, talk on the radio, and eat a lot of steak. Our plan was a complete success, and our QSO per steak ratio was the highest ever.
We got off to a bit of a slow start, not really getting all of our stations on the air until about two hours after the starting time. And we had some visitors to show around and explain things to. But once we got started in earnest, we found the bands to be filled with activity and in pretty good shape in all directions. Stopping only to eat some tender and delicious grilled ribeyes, we were settled in and working and found that 20 meters was fairly steady for both SSB and CW for the whole Field Day period, with some slowdown during the early morning hours. 40 meters was hot for both SSB and CW the entire 24 hour period, and yielded the most QSOs of any band. We also had a PSK station that worked 20 and 40, but there seemed to be less activity using that mode than in previous years. 75 meter SSB was slow until late Saturday evening, then got really busy and stayed that way until early Sunday morning. After a big breakfast of steak and eggs and biscuits and gravy, with lots of coffee to keep us going, we went back for the final stretch. 15 meters SSB opened up Sunday morning and yielded quite a lot of activity. 6 meters was totally dead Saturday afternoon and evening, but as befits the name Magic Band, it suddenly opened for us Sunday morning and we filled several log sheets with contacts.
All too soon, it was time to pull the plugs and shut down the generators and put another Field Day in the books. We had a great time, with lots of fun and good food, and thank all the stations that put K4ORE 5A TN in their logs. Hank -- N3ORX