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hello all,heres the full story of how feilday 2006 went down with regards with the Avalon Radio Amateur Club.
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well here is were it all happened,right here at the shack of vo1crc,you may have heard vo1crc in the past few years,this
is were the guiys hang out,and the contest are controlled.
this shack is used sometimes during the evenings,when the guys get the time too operate,keep listening,you may hear this
call sign soon.
| unrolling the brandnew icom folded dipole |
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Heres how an icom folded dipole,looks after being damaged by being installed the incorrect way.(RIGHT)
| the dipole gets tangled |
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so on the day went,after the guys finally got there antenna up and running,i finally,got my setup up and running,(LEFT),naturally,i
decided too use bpsk31,or in lamins terms,PSK.
the setup was complete with a PAKET station setup,PSK,and even 2.4ghz WIFI.along with SSB and of course CW.
| Don - VO1XH un-rolling coax |
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Heres a prime example,of how not too operate your station during a emergency activation,notice the stippir-yagi,2m yaqi,and
two folded dipoles all supported on the same support tower.(RIGHT)
rf bleed-over was a TRUE mess,we had too take turns operating in order too make contacts,or niether one us would have
any contacts.
before the new icom-folded dipole was set into posistion,Uncle Phil had too climb the 60ft tower too replace the old support
rope.(RIGHT).
the wind that day must have been around 60kph for sure,that tower was rocking and rolling too be sure.
Along with replaceing the old rope with a new rope,or hall-yard,or whatever you guys call it,Tom-VO1TV gets ready too haul
up an antenna.(RIGHT)
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| VO1CRC |
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unrolling the icom-folded dipole,(LEFT),the installation of the folded dipole never got in the air without it's own problems,the
antenna was supported only by the terminated resistor,this proved too be a expensive bad desision.
| notice the tape,used as a quick fix. |
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before the antenna came too it's resting space,(LEFT)the antenna got tangled,rapped around itself,on more than one accasion.
We also had a few other amateur radio operators drop by,one of which was VO1HP-Paul Webster. the guys eye-balled the antenna
systems,mine was only a puny 20meter horizontal dipole,at about 10feet,at this height,i was hearing stations from all around.
The guys,including me,used every possaible means of sucuring our antenna systems,here we see Tom-VO1TV and Phil-VO1ALF securing
the icom folded dipole too little 8foot evergreen tree.(LEFT).
| Phil - VO1ALF battles the wind. |
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We even mangaged too use VO1ERV,thats the big white rig behind Don-VO1XH,a real nice radio setup is located inside this rig,loaded
with the fanciest equipment you ever saw,way too go guys.(LEFT)
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Well after a long day setting up the antennas,lugging and slugging radio equipment,we finaly got on the air,not too many
contacts were made,but hey,feilday is just that,just too prove what amateur radio is capable of during a emergency.
we found out that the VO1ERV's generator dont charge the it,s own battery when in use,which you guessed it,it died,it
took the guys about 30mins or so too finally get VO1ERV running again.
we also found out that VO1CRC's indoor generator,has too be watched,and checked up on,at least every hour on the hour,or
better.
we had also found out,that the folded dipole has too be supported by both the top and bottem sections of the antenna,or
problems such as was witnessed,well surely happen again.
all in all,about 40+ contacts were made during the little time that we had feilday running,the few members that were
too stay during the night had decided at around 2am that we would call off feilday.
and at last,never but never,place all your antennas,on the the same support tower or mast,and run two radio's with HIGH
RF POWER,if you ever expect to make any contacts with multiple transmitters. give lots more distance between antennas if you
are planning on multiple high power transmitters,or your outing well end up a mess,as was witnessed during feilday 2006 at
vo1crc.
This years feilday was agreed that only QRP rf power levels were to used,so as too have as many transmitters operating
as possiable,but the qrp feilday setups did not materialize as was agreed on before any station equipment was setup because
the members that had come along,decided that the only way contacts were to be made,in may amount would have to be with highpower
rf energy,was that ever a BIG mistake,out of the three transmitters that were operating,only 2 were really makeing any contacts,even
than,the two were qrm'ing each other with 100watt rigs being used to there full capabilties.
nerves were running really thin,at one point during feilday,one operator decided to complain about being qrm'ed by another
operator at the site. go figure !!
thats why at 2am feilday for avrac / vo1crc was offically abondoned. and no logs were sent too ARRL,and none well be
sent,because this feilday event was doomed before it even started.
well thats about it folks,it was fun,many problems,and failurs was found and fixed.
after all,this is what feilday is all about.
And thats all i got thats fit 2 print. hi
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