Amazing Weather!
The entire weekend was about picture perfect. The sun was out. There was a nice breeze. It was warm but not hot. We did have a little work to do with some plumbing on Saturday, but it got done and that made time for Other Things. And you know that means POTA!
Too. Many. Variables.
I decided that I’d go to my most local park which is the Cooperrider-Kent Bog State Nature Preserve – US-9401. It’s just down the street and seemed like a great idea since I had some Dad Taxi duties floating around with unknown timelines. The truth is that this park is a boardwalk look around a bog. There are no picnic tables and no space to sit, really. Thus I was consigned to the Jeep. I’ve shared many times that this is not my favorite setup. This was the first variable in play.
The second was the Penntek TR-35. I’ve been itching to get this little guy into the field, so I tossed it in my bag. I don’t know this transceiver very well, but the only way I learn is by doing.
The third variable was the one that might have wrecked things but I’m not really sure just yet. I recenly received an ATU-10 automatic antenna tuner as designed by N7DDC and built by a reputable seller to whom I shall not link until I have determined if I have a problematic unit or the dreaded Operator Error. I was planning to use this little guy to give the AX-1 that little bump that it needs to work with the TR-35. I’d measured the SWR on the AX-1 a few times in experiments earlier in the week and it just needed a touch of tuning. So little, in fact, that getting it right on the z-match tuner was a total pain. Why not try the ATU-10?
Lots of new stuff in a new place in an operating position I don’t love. What could go wrong?
This Looks OK…
I got everything set up. The AX-1 was clamped to my Jeep’s cargo bar. The tuner was set up on the dash. The TR-35 was hanging out on my speaker in the phone holder (not at all precariously!). Everything looked good. I hit the tuning cycle on the ATU-10 and things settled in at about 1.1:1. Cool! So I started calling CQ.
And I kept calling.
I spotted myself.
And kept calling.
The RBN heard me! That was good! But it was a very long time before I got a call. It came in at 599 for sure. The signal indicator on the TR-35 was lit up nice and bright. It was a perfect signal from Maine. No fading, no nonsense. It was impressive!
And then nothing. Some static. A few crashes on 20-meters. No other calls.
It was time to pack it in.
I wasn’t too phased by not getting the activation. It was a Saturday at about 3 PM and the weather was amazing. It was nice to sit there in the sun (in the Jeep) and play with my new toys. I had the nagging feeling that I get with a new rig that I did something wrong, but I don’t believe that there was anything to do wrong. Sometimes, the magic simply doesn’t happen. And that’s OK! Besides, as soon as I pulled out of the parking lot, my daughter requested pick up and food for her and her friends. Dad Life!
QSO Map
Here is what my QSO with Maine looked like:
Sunday Will Be Better
It is well known that my wife and I love to bike out to the Cuyahoga Valley National Park – US-0020. We do that most weekends in the summer and I always take my radio along to do a little POTA while we eat lunch. I figured this would be an easy win! Once again, I set up the TR-35 and the ATU-10 with the AX-1 and got to calling CQ. This time, I even used the message memory in the TR-35. Good stuff!
Lots of crashing on 40-meters. I got one contact with Michigan and then moved to 20-meters. More crashing. Maybe our local star was trying to wreck my flow, but it could also be that, again, I was using new stuff. This time, I was prepared. I reached into the bag and pulled out the IC-705.
And I got nothing.
It was almost 20 minutes until I got a contact. It was a Park To Park with an operator in Kansas. The crashing on the bands didn’t let up. There was a lot of fading. After about an hour and a half, I had 7 total contacts and a lot of band noise. I’m not going to give any side-eye to the new gear as I really do believe the bands were hot garbage. I also noticed that the POTA site didn’t pick me up on the RBN though I was getting picked up by the RBN. In fact, all of the activators only had spots from hunters. I wonder if there was a technical difficulty there. Not that it would have helped. You can only work what you can hear and there’s no hearing anything over that kind of noise.
QSO Map
Here’s what the map looked like for Sunday in the park.
Final
What’s does all of this mean?
Nothing. Playing with new toys is learning what they’re good at and where you have to give to take. I plan to take the TR-35 out with a resonant wire antenna in the near future and give it a chance to shine in some backyard portable. I also plan to take this week and mess around with the ATU-10. It seems to want to kick into tuning cycles at odd intervals. Maybe I just need to tune it and turn it off. I was pretty sure that I consumed all available documentation on the device and given that it only has 3 button press commands, it’s hard to imagine that there is a lot of user error here. I will report back with findings.
Also, it’s important to note that there’s no getting skunked in POTA. Sitting outside in the sun with a nice breeze on a Sunday afternoon is fantastic with or without contacts. It’s about playing with a radio outdoors. And that, my friends, is hard to screw up.
P.S.
I didn’t take pictures while I was out on these activations for no really good reason. So you get a picture of Bella the Rottie after a very, very muddy hike where she rolled in everything that she could. You’re welcome!
72!
