09/15/2008 | K1DS/R One of the most enjoyable roves I have had as I limited myself to 4 grids due to previous weekend commitments. The regional area was buzzing with rovers, and it seems like all of us had successful outings, as I had plenty rover calls in my log.
Harmonic N1XKT is now on his own as a rover, and I managed to work him on the bottom 4 that he has in his little Honda Civic with vertical antennas.
After several roving contests, the 6m Moxon didn't appear to be doing its job, and the center pin connector seemed to be having some intermittent contact problems. Got this fixed after cutting the connector box open to make sure there was no internal problem, but never did get much satisfaction on that band. As 6m didn't appear to be very exciting, there was plenty of action on 2m and up. Unfortunately, Murphy did make a visit, as my 5G and 10G gear wasn't performing beyond 1 QSO. On the other hand, my 100+ watts on 903 and 1296 made for quick and easy QSOs throughout the region. Several extra microwave QSOs were generated when we used the x.100 calling frequencies, as others had parked their receivers there and jumped in to tail-end other QSOs. Interesting to see that the 10W I have on 2.3 and 3.4G seem to make the paths as well when all are lined up. I also didn't miss the usual jumping in-and-out of the van to makes sure the dish was pointed correctly, as it was steamy hot and humid. Had the air-conditioning cranked up in the van for all of Sunday.
Surprise of Sunday evening were several 2m QSOs into VE3 and EN9x territory from the corner of an FM29ax cornfield.
Nice to see the stations spreading out across the lower 4 bands to keep the QRM limited. Photos to follow...73, Rick -- K1DS