Kanaskat Palmer State Park (US-3209) Dec 10, 2024 amateur radio & POTA Looking at my stats on the POTA website, I saw that I need three new activations to hit the next level of activator award. I am fairly resolved to Lake Sammamish SP (US-3216) 12/3/24 Dec 7, 2024 amateur radio & POTA As the weather turns less pleasant, my willingness to activate new parks diminishes, because I often have very little idea if I will be able to find Yet another Lake Sammamish Activation (11/25/24) Dec 6, 2024 amateur radio & POTA After our Big Windstorm, I had tried to do an activation of Lake Sammamish State Park and arrived at the park to find, to my horror, all the gates Redemption at Marckworth State Forest Dec 2, 2024 amateur radio & POTA Having narrowly avoided a ‘invalid’ activation attempt at Lake Sammamish SP when I inadvertently had a QSO fall into a new UTC day, I was feeling a One activation, two days Dec 1, 2024 amateur radio & POTA A week of looking around for another set of parks that would give me an opportunity to do two parks in one day left me at the end of the week having One Year of Parks on the Air Nov 13, 2024 amateur radio & POTA I made my very first POTA QSO on October 4, 2023. I did my first POTA park activation on October 30, 2023. Prompted by a desire to hunt (and then Two Activations in One Day Nov 10, 2024 amateur radio & POTA With the itch to get out and do an activation growing, and a Friday with no commitments scheduled, I started eyeing the POTA map looking for Activating two parks, one day (US-3168 & US-3169) Oct 30, 2024 amateur radio & POTA One of my goals is to activate more different parks. I’ve been eyeing the cluster of parks on Whidbey Island for some time, contemplating a two day Optimizing POTA Oct 29, 2024 amateur radio & POTA & musings I’m an inveterate optimizer. I’m not suggesting that I optimize for what other people expect - in fact, often the opposite. But it’s a peculiar Thoughts on Fun and US-3216 (Lake Sammamish SP) Activation Oct 19, 2024 amateur radio & POTA As we head deeper into autumn here in the PNW the weather can only get colder and rainier until spring. If I want to keep doing activations, I need Yet Another Activation of Lake Sammamish State Park (US-3216) Oct 16, 2024 amateur radio & POTA On Oct 14, I was champing at the bit to do an activation, despite a sort of wet weather forecast. Figuring I’d start figuring out how to work in Another fun activation of US-3216 (Lake Sammamish State Park) Oct 12, 2024 amateur radio & POTA Despite the dour outlook of various propagation prediction tools and reports of cruddy band conditions I was eager to get back to doing activations More Relaxed Activation of Lake Sammamish State Park (US-3216) Jul 12, 2024 POTA & amateur radio Presented with the possibility of a clear schedule in the afternoon I cleverly packed the day’s vital tasks into the AM with a goal of sloping off Thinking about QRP POTA activations Jul 5, 2024 amateur radio & POTA My recent struggles during POTA activations have had me thinking hard about QRP, activations, and antennas, specifically antennas for POTA park POTA activation of Olallie State Park (US-3239) Jul 3, 2024 POTA & amateur radio The weather has been wonderful and with pleasant temps and a day free I resolved to head out for a POTA activation or two. Propagation forecasts CW first activation of Lake Easton State Park (US-3214) Jun 27, 2024 amateur radio & POTA Propagation conditions continue to be crummy but I am resolved to continue to do activations anyway. I am not using the ‘number of QSOs’ metric, I Bad Condx at Lake Sammamish State Park (US-3216) Jun 20, 2024 amateur radio & POTA Notwithstanding crappy band condx, today was POTA day. Off I trundled to Lake Sammamish State Park, US-3216. I had a cunning plan: do enough (ten) An Exciting activation of Lake Sammamish State Park (US-3216) Jun 14, 2024 amateur radio & POTA Today I did a very exciting (well, exciting to me) POTA activation at Lake Sammamish State Park (US-3216). This activation was exciting for several Important New Ham Radio Equipment Jun 10, 2024 amateur radio & POTA I’ve just added a new, critically important piece of equipment to my field operating kit for POTA: Introducing the fun-o-meter, which is used to Thin Radio Jun 9, 2024 amateur radio & POTA My participation in Parks on the Air, both hunting and activating, has increasingly been pushing me toward operating in ways where more and more of A challenging activation at US-3216 Lake Sammamish State Park Jun 8, 2024 amateur radio & POTA Good weather and a day of rest from training were calling me into doing a POTA activation, but when I checked propagation, it was in the dumps, Resonant versus Non-resonant Antennas May 27, 2024 amateur radio One of the things I hear is that, especially for QRP operating, resonant antennas are greatly preferred. Some of this seems to stem from some Two Activations - Bridle Trails SP (US-3166) & St. Edward SP (US-3261) May 24, 2024 amateur radio & POTA We had to go pick up Paula’s car at the shop yesterday, mid-morning, and so I loaded up my car with the radios/antennas, &c, and planned on Xiegu G90 More Thoughts May 24, 2024 amateur radio With a little more time operating with the G90 I have some further thoughts/observations. I think the supplied power cable is awful. I think the Kanaskat-Palmer State Park (US-32090, US-3236 (Nolte State Park) Activation, Flaming Geyser State Park (US-3187) May 21, 2024 amateur radio & POTA With an appointment at 3:30pm, I was hoping to squeeze in three POTA activations: Kanaskat-Palmer State Park, Noltle State Park, and Flaming Geyser US-5744 (Tiger Mountain State Forest) Activation May 14, 2024 amateur radio & POTA This morning I was hopeful that I’d be able to slope off and do a four park POTA activation at a cluster of four parks not far from my home: Tiger Xiegu G90 First Thoughts May 11, 2024 amateur radio & POTA I’ve been wanting to do more POTA park activations but the overhead of pulling either the IC-7300 or the KX3 out of the station setup, and then Random Wire Antennas Apr 27, 2024 amateur radio The conceit that goes with random wire antennas is that they amount to taking a random chunk of wire, stringing it up in the air, and using it as an POTA rove lessons Mar 28, 2024 amateur radio & POTA One of the problems I encountered about halfway through the multi-day expedition was an intermittent problem with the coax connection to the three The N3JCJ(sk) Memorial POTA rove Mar 18, 2024 amateur radio & musings & POTA My dad died on Jan 30, 2024. I spent half of January whammied while I recovered from Across the Years, and the other half on the East Coast helping K-1732 Brandywine Creek State Park Activation Mar 4, 2024 amateur radio & POTA While my Dad was in the hospital I went back east to help my Mom. I took along a field kit of radio gear (described below) vaguely thinking that I’d Learning CW Dec 24, 2023 amateur radio & POTA I’ve been working on learning CW/Morse Code for some time, now - essentially for as long as I’ve had an amateur radio license. That works out to, POTA Activation #1 K-3216 Oct 30, 2023 amateur radio & POTA I’ve been making a lot of QSO’s hunting POTA activations, which is hella good fun. One of my goals was to do an activation before the end of Parks on the air Oct 23, 2023 amateur radio & POTA I made a bunch of FT8 and FT4 QSOs recently, and they highlighted a problem I have with modes like FT8 - they’re utterly impersonal. A good example: Antenna Lessons Part Three - Antenna Rigging Aug 10, 2023 amateur radio My home is smack in the middle of a forest, a mix of conifer (Douglas Fir, Western Red Cedar, Western Hemlock) and deciduous (Red Alder, Cottonwood, Lessons from Antenna Hanging Part Two - Hardware Aug 5, 2023 amateur radio I live in a forest, and I’ve hung a fair number of antennas from the trees that surround my home. I’ve learned a thing or two along the way. In this Lessons from Antenna Hanging Part One Aug 4, 2023 amateur radio One of the lessons I learned from my recent maintenance effort on my main HF antenna (an 80m-6m OCFD) was that rope differences matter a great deal, Antenna Suspension Maintenance Aug 1, 2023 amateur radio My main HF antenna is a Buckmaster 80-6m OCFD. Two of my friends put it up for me just after my leg was broken in 2015. At the time none of the 3 of Improving NMO antenna magmount Jul 31, 2023 amateur radio I use a mag mount for the antenna on my car. I’ve run through a number of mounts, though, because I just route the coax through the rear hatch and Get Home Bag/EDC Bag May 15, 2023 musings & amateur radio I got a good start on an EDC backpack/bag. This has prompted some thinking about what belongs in an EDC bag, and how much such a bag can weigh. So Batteries and Preparedness Jan 25, 2023 amateur radio Long ago I settled on non-rechargeable AA cells as the battery standard for various packs/kits for both preparedness purposes and also recreational SpaceX Starlink Jan 20, 2023 life in the forest & amateur radio (While not strictly Life in the Forest nor Amateur Radio I’ve tagged this with those tags for want of some better classification.) For something Statistics and Preparedness Jan 6, 2023 amateur radio & musings Being part of the amateur radio world, and being predisposed to preparedness on my own anyway, I rub shoulders with a lot of people for whom Minimal Winlink VHF RMS Station Nov 3, 2022 amateur radio Since sometime in 2019 I’ve run a VHF Winlink RMS that serves the Seattle Eastside/Snoqualmie Valley area. Originally I had a VHF station and a UHF Skills are better than stuff Oct 2, 2022 musings & amateur radio (I’m giving this an amateur radio tag although it is only tangentially related to radio. So many hams are into emergency preparedness, it makes Compactenna 2m/440+ Sep 5, 2022 amateur radio Date 9/5/2022 YouTube decided I needed to watch a video about the COMPACTenna line of antennas. The inventor, Jack Nilsson N8NDL, states that the Diversity and Inclusion Jul 19, 2022 musings & amateur radio I’m still thinking about Dan Romanchik KB6NU’s post about inclusion and amateur radio regarding one club having a chaplain and starting meetings My Bridgecom BCR-220 story Jul 19, 2022 amateur radio In November, 2019 I bought a Bridgecom BCR-220 repeater and duplexer to set up at my home. I wanted to learn about repeaters, and owning one and More NVIS Thinking Jul 19, 2022 amateur radio & NVIS I think the idea of different NVIS antenna designs for different situations is pretty solid, so I have been thinking about parameter ranges for Inclusion Jul 11, 2022 amateur radio & musings Dan KB6NU opines on this reddit post about an amateur radio club that starts meetings with the group chaplain offering an invocation: Hello, newbie An Excellent NVIS presentation video Jun 23, 2022 amateur radio I’m a big believer in learning from mistakes. My preference is to learn from other people’s mistakes. This saves me the time, effort, and NVIS antenna thinking Jun 22, 2022 amateur radio After giving my newly revised presentation on NVIS propagation and NVIS antennas last night I was left unsatisfied with the last part of the Marathon Support Jun 13, 2022 amateur radio Yesterday I spent about half my day doing communications support for the Tunnel Marathon. Race support seems like a fine alignment between my NVIS presentation Jun 8, 2022 amateur radio & NVIS I’ve been asked to do a presentation on NVIS and NVIS antennas for the Microhams club. Since I’ve had further thoughts on how to improve my Mobile VHF/UHF Installation May 27, 2022 amateur radio My goals for a mobile radio installation are: 100% reversible - no holes, nothing permanently mounted. Easily removable, so that it’s simple to Portable Repeater Project - Shelf Weights May 17, 2022 portable repeater & amateur radio I’m in the process of putting all the bits into the SKB roto-molded 4U rack case I’ve got. Mostly that has consisted of arranging things on the two Portable Repeater Project - Receiver & Transmitter May 14, 2022 amateur radio & portable repeater A lot of hams have picked Motorola Maxtrac radios for VHF or UHF repeater projects. But programming the radios is a pain, because Motorola are rigid Portable Repeater Project - Duplexers May 11, 2022 portable repeater & amateur radio A repeater is basically just a receiver with the audio output routed to the input of a transmitter. Whatever it receives (modulo things like CTCSS The Portable Repeater Project - Controller Choices May 11, 2022 Amateur Radio & Portable Repeater Repeater controllers have gone through a significant evolution. The club I’m a member of (SNOVARC) uses ARCOM RC210 controllers. They’re very Portable Repeater Project - Power May 10, 2022 amateur radio & portable repeater In the past I’ve built go box style setups which included internal batteries. The goal, in my view, was to have a setup where you bring it to the The Portable Repeater Project - Case May 10, 2022 amateur radio & portable repeater Since the Portable Repeater will be, well, portable, it will need to be in a case of some sort that will protect it from the heartache and thousand Ultramarathon Go Bags for Hams May 8, 2022 amateur radio & ultrarunning Some little while ago I was discussing supporting ultramarathon races with some of my ham radio friends. The specific scenario discussed was Towards A Modern Mobile VHF/UHF (part 1) Apr 8, 2022 amateur radio The current crop of mobile vhf/uhf radios is, er, disappointing. It’s like they were designed in the 1980’s and have been preserved in amber all The Portable Repeater Project Apr 5, 2022 amateur radio & portable repeater One of my amateur radio projects I’ve got underway in a low intensity background sort of way is building a repeater that is portable - not intended