Trip Report: Lockhart State Park US-3033
SO2R QRP Digital Activation - 2 September 2024.
Backstory
I’ve spent the summer putting together a QRP kit that will let me do SO2R digital activations using low-cost QDX radios (4-5 watts). My last experiment had me burning out the finals of my original QDX low-band kit for the second time! I made an attempt to rewire it for 9 volts, but I think it has succumbed to it’s injuries and my successive attempts to repair it.
So I ordered another. This time a v6 board (old radio had a v2 board).
At the same time I’ve been putting together a trapped vertical built for 12-17-30 meters (my WARC special!) that matches my existing 10-15-20 meter trapped vert.
Putting It All Together
Today was my latest attempt at bringing them all together. I drove out to Lockhart State Park (US-3033) to give things a try. Honestly, the activation got off to a rough start. First, it took me about 20 minutes to realize I forgot to plug the coax into the low-band QDX. I figured I had broken something in transit. However, the hi-band QDX was getting things done at a good clip on 20 meters.
Eventually I recognized the problem with the low-band QDX, plugged in the coax and began making QSOs on 30 meters. Interestingly, I noticed that the 20 meter QSOs began to dry up as the 30 meter QSOs began to roll in. I’ve conducted enough tests that I knew that I’d be able to carry on QSOs on multiple bands. I noticed that RBN was POTA-spotting me on both bands and began to suspect a problem there. If people are relying on the spotting page as their sole source of POTA hunting, that probably did me in.
This was my first activation using a 12/17/30 trapped vertical I’ve been working on. I had it connected to the low band rig. It’s OK, but I think I’ll continue to use my QRP guys 20/30/40 tri-bander that switches in loads since it gives me more bands.
The high-band setup with a tri-band vertical trap continues to work very well. After getting a mess of QSOs on 20 meters and went ahead and worked a few stations on 10 and 15 meters.
This was also the first time using my homebrew 12v regulator. I spent some time thinking about using a 3D printed case, but realized that heavy-duty heat shrink would be a lot easier and more compact.
The good news, though, is that the finals on my low band QDX are still intact. Whew!
I ended up with about 30 contacts. The only things I’ll change next time is to a) ensure my coax is plugged in, and b) use an antenna on the low bands that is matched to the rig.
Todays Equipment
Lo-band QDX (80-40-20-20 meters)
Hi-band QDX (20-17-15-12-10 meters)
Homebrew tri-band trapped vertical (30-17-12 meters)
Homebrew tri-band trapped vertical (20-15-10 meters)
Homebrew common mode chokes (7x 1.125” toroids on RG58)
Sotabeams Carbon-6 portable telescoping mast.=
Homebrew-ish 12v regulator (built from one of these)
2022 Macbook Air (M2)
