The First 100 Years Are The Hardest

 I took a rental car on this week's work trip along with my KX3 in hopes of getting a few QRP POTA activations under my belt after work.   The trip did not disappoint, but operating QRP with a compromise antenna (ok, don't call it a compromise) is a really tricky challenge. My first activation on Monday evening was US-0746 Morristown National Historical Park, specifically the Jockey Hollow area of the park.   This site has been on my list for several years, and its less than 10 minutes from the corporate office in Basking Ridge NJ.  Ironically there is no cell service in the park, lots of areas my phone had SOS or barely 1 bar of service which added to the QRP challenge.  I activated the park as second time on Tuesday, for a combined 23 QSOs and about 90 minutes of operating time across both days!  Morristown National Historical Park commemorates the sites of General Washington and the Continental Army’s winter encampment from December 1779 to Jun...

Found some to get back to Richland Creek WMA this morning.  We're well into summer here in north east Texas.   Sunny outside and the temp at 10am was already 88F.   But the breeze made if feel much cooler than that, I hardly broke a sweat!    I had a small panic when I reached into my backpack and realized I'd left my laptop at home, used for most POTAL logging.   I switched to Ham2K Portable Logger on my iPhone and really appreciate how easy it is to use, especially because cell service was fine at the WMA.   Rig was the Yaesu FT-857D, with ATAS-120A mounted to the truck.   16 contacts, all CW with a cootie (straight key), including those I made on the Sideswiper Net on 20M and 17M.  Chris de WX7V

POTA  Activation #68 was a success, with last week's trip to Indiana.   Big Walnut - Tall Timbers Trail State Nature Preserve is about 45 minutes west of Indianapolis, surrounded by large corn fields.   11 states down, and 39 to go but no rush! I only made 1 QSO in the first 30 minutes, before deciding to shut down or try another area in the park.   As I was packing up I realized I had forgotten to attach the counterpoise to the Elecraft AX1 antenna.  That made a huge difference!   30 minutes later and I had 14 contacts, all on CW before my quick hour ran out and I had to leave to visit extended family.  Not a record outing by any means but happy to get Indiana in the books. 73,  Chris de WX7V Rig - Elecraft KX3,  AX1 antenna, 20M, CW.  3d Printed Antenna Window Mount

I'll be QRV in Indiana this weekend, and wanted to freshen up my POTA travel rig, especially after the challenges on my last few trips activating NM and NV.  Finding a place to activate, in a limited amount of time calls for rapid deployment capabilities to maximize time on the air. I'll be taking the Elecraft KX3, a 3AH Bioenno LiFEPO4 battery, and will be using the "compromise" AX1 antenna.  I've also set up my laptop with flrig to enable CAT control for the KX3.   Finally, I've also printed the AX1 antenna window mount from Printables.com .   The mount worked perfectly with my KX3 and AX1 combo.  Made a test run at the local city park just down the street from my house in Dallas.   Called CQ on both 20 and 17M. Got good RBN spots in US and EU.  Spun the dial and heard a lot of strong signals.    Loaded HAMRS Pro, flrig on the laptop and made some very quick POTA hunting contacts with good signal reports from MI, UT...

 For visited US-6596 to set up for this years Support Your Parks annual activators event.   The band conditions were great, and 20M especially active.  Was not hard to get my first 10 just by hunting other activators, without even calling P2P.   32 contacts in all, all on CW, including on DX contact in Spain.  Also worked Junie N1DUC in SC, K7SHR in WY, KA0LDG and AE5X in ND and WA0WWW in MT.  Also nabbed the easier to work states including CO, FL, IA, NE, MA, ME, MI, MO, NC, NY, NJ , OH and UT.    Equipment today was the Yaesu FT-991a, ATAS-120a on the truck.  I used FLrig for USB CAT control from my laptop running the newly rewritten HAMRS Pro logging application.    Temp was mid-80s, but the cross breeze thru the open windows in the truck made the weather fairly pleasant!   73,   Chris de WX7V

ARRL Field Day is in the logs! Temp outside was in the low 90s but felt like 100 here in North Texas . Outside I operated for 4 hours as 2B - 100W, though the first 12 Ah LiFePO4 battery only last about 2 hours. I swapped to my fully charged 15 Ah backup was able to continue without much of a delay. I had 3 portable antennas set up for field day: a Spark Plug EFHW antenna supported by a 19 ft spiderbeam push up mast ; a Chameleon Tactical Delta loop mounted on a ground stake, and the Wolf River Coil mounted on a tripod with telescoping vertical whip and 6 radials. I was able to get good SWR matches for 20 and 15M for all three antennas, but the sparkplug was easily the best field day performer in terms of contacts. The spark plug is rated for 100w but I noticed some of the hot glue was melted off the toroid when I was packing it up. For Sunday morning I switched to 1D -100W, so that I could work 80M and 40M before sunrise and get the 5 call area sections - I go them...