2008 ARRL Field Day
07/31/2008 |
KA2FHN
The ARRLs theme for Field Day 2008 was "Ride The Waves" and I sure did long before the event even started.Was FD-08 even going to happen this year? All day Friday and up to 11 AM on Saturday I was trying to get my vertical Hustler somewhere near resonance, with my new MFJ-259. I had installed a large number of radials which threw off the calibration of the antenna.About 11Am I had it in the ballpark.
With that done I went to the shack to make a few test QSOs and MURPHY STRIKES!!!! What more can go wrong...FD is now 3hours away! It seems I don't have any audio from the speaker or the rear panel speaker jack..all that antenna work for this!!!..A quick trip to Radio Shack solved that with an 1/4 in to 1/8 in headphone adapter.This FD I'll be on headphones..But at least I'll be able to operate.. And I'll be able to use this jack for PSK by plugging in my sound card input...In all it worked fine!!
With that all squared away I started to work on my goals I set after last years FD..1)Double my QSO points..
2)Operate more PSK-31..
3)Operate the majority of both days..
I operated in my usual class 1D.
Saturday was amazing as the amount of stations this year was full throttle all night. I did the search and pounce method for the entire show..One goal for next year will be to call CQ much more than I do.I finally had to hit the sack about 2:30Am local as I could not stay awake.Sunday I was on the air about 5:30AM and I continued till the end.A bright spot was during the entire event the neighborhood QRM was absent.
Overall the weekend turned out very well indeed, the antenna was hearing stations quiet as a whisper and the PSK was amazing in stations operating, sometimes 2-3 on top of on another!!.Also I was logging stations much weaker than I normaly could so those extra radials were doing the job. My QSO points were tripled this year and all my other goals were met as well.This was,in short,my best FD EVER!
This FDs lessons learned were to :work through your problems and don't quit...Get on the air as you are able to. The sense of gratification on July 1 in completing this event was amazing.. Thanks to all who are in the log..and see you next June.
73 -- KA2FHN
With that done I went to the shack to make a few test QSOs and MURPHY STRIKES!!!! What more can go wrong...FD is now 3hours away! It seems I don't have any audio from the speaker or the rear panel speaker jack..all that antenna work for this!!!..A quick trip to Radio Shack solved that with an 1/4 in to 1/8 in headphone adapter.This FD I'll be on headphones..But at least I'll be able to operate.. And I'll be able to use this jack for PSK by plugging in my sound card input...In all it worked fine!!
With that all squared away I started to work on my goals I set after last years FD..1)Double my QSO points..
2)Operate more PSK-31..
3)Operate the majority of both days..
I operated in my usual class 1D.
Saturday was amazing as the amount of stations this year was full throttle all night. I did the search and pounce method for the entire show..One goal for next year will be to call CQ much more than I do.I finally had to hit the sack about 2:30Am local as I could not stay awake.Sunday I was on the air about 5:30AM and I continued till the end.A bright spot was during the entire event the neighborhood QRM was absent.
Overall the weekend turned out very well indeed, the antenna was hearing stations quiet as a whisper and the PSK was amazing in stations operating, sometimes 2-3 on top of on another!!.Also I was logging stations much weaker than I normaly could so those extra radials were doing the job. My QSO points were tripled this year and all my other goals were met as well.This was,in short,my best FD EVER!
This FDs lessons learned were to :work through your problems and don't quit...Get on the air as you are able to. The sense of gratification on July 1 in completing this event was amazing.. Thanks to all who are in the log..and see you next June.
73 -- KA2FHN
Photo Gallery
-
This was my locat...
-
The object of my ...
Back
