Overview: 

Nick Farlow, KB0YHT - Harvey Jones, W0HGJ - and myself Randy Wing, N0LD planned a route to include 15 grids in 4 states; we actually made it thru 13 grids in 4 states.  We had 5 or more contacts in all but 1 of these grids.  This was perhaps a little too ambitious as we stayed on the road later in the evenings than planned but we did get good results.  

Lessons Learned: 

A couple of lessons from previous contests we applied:

   1) bring a keyer/key on the road

   2) use a software package to broadcast our track/route real-time

   3) We ensured we had water and snacks

A couple of lesons learned for future contests:

   1) Need more power on 432 mhz!

   2) We could stand some morse code practice!  (thanks for those of you who endured our rustry morse code!

   3) Perhaps a cubical quad on 6m is in store for us!

   4) Have something to give to people who approach us.

Highlights:

Several of the random places we stopped had people approaching us and admiring the antennas and internal setup and asking questions.  Most had little or no knowledge of ham radio. We seemed to always be making contact when they showed up but always took time to share. Sometimes CW was needed to complete the contest, so CW skills were improved on this trip.

Due to the large number of grids attempted, we had to make a couple of tough choices and alter our route.  Our next rover will likely be shorter but we should be more accurate on our timing. Perhaps the highlight was driving a dirt road in Kansas and pointing towards Illinois to get a great long distance contact of 432 miles!   We made our first VHF contest contacts on digital (FT8)!   Thanks to the super stations:  K2DRH (distance), WQ0P (worked us in all grids), K5SW, K0TPP, W0LGQ for making this exciting!  

Score:  

Band CW Phone Dig Total  %

---- -- ----- --- ----- ---

6    0    20   3    23   17

2    0    47   1    48   35

1.25 1    25   0    26   19

70   3    23   0    26   19

23   2    12   0    14   10

---- -- ----- --- ----- ---

Total 6   127 4    137  100