Field Day 2K!


We spent Field Day this year at the Owens Creek campground in the Catoctin Mountain Park, Maryland. We operated as 1A (one transmitter, club station) with Ken N3FZX, Patty KB3CTO, Chris N3XRV, and Jon KD3FG. The weather this year was beautiful! Warm days and cool nights with no rain. Even the bugs behaved! A general map of the Catoctin Mountain area (575KB) Uh, what's wrong with this picture?
Ken and Chris get a line over a branch We went with simple wire antennas this year. For Field Day, wire antennas usually do just fine and are much less of a hassle than beams and large loops. We had one 80m dipole (about 135 ft) at 30ft up, an end-fed 40m wire (67 ft), and a vertical diplole (cut for 20m). We used a sling-shot and fishing line to get the wire over some choice branches (as seen in the picture to the left -- the fishing line is invisible...). Set-up took some time but taking the antennas down took less than 15 minutes.
Jon KD3FG and Chris N3XRV Patty KB3CTO and Ken N3FXZ
:-) :-)

This shows our 1A station in action. We used the Kenwood 120s for SSB and the Elecraft K2 for CW.



Chris copied the ARRL Bulletin Chris copied the ARRL Bulletin for another 100 points.
hot in the sun
Solar power with a Sierra QRP radio for 5 contacts! It was plenty hot in the sun! The radio is in the shadow as the heat was causing drift and the operator was in as much shade as possible since the heat was causing much sweating... 		We made a good attempt to get the Satellite contact bonus. Due to some big trees in the path of the bird, we didn't make a contact. Below (l to r) is me with a Palm Pilot running satellite tracking software, Chris pointing the Arrow antenna, and Ken working the radio (Patty took the picture).
teamwork



The score: 
    Field Day 2000          KD3FG 1A MD

Band     CW QSO  CW QSO Pts   SSB QSO  SSB QSO Pts
----     ------  ----------   -------  -----------
  80        50      100          26        26
  40        55      110          30        30
  20        15       30          39        39
  15                  0          25        25
  10                  0           4         4
   6                  0                     0
   2                  0                     0
 222                  0                     0
 432                  0                     0
 1.2                  0                     0
Total:     120      240         124       124

Total CW pts:        240
Total SSB pts:       124
                ------------
Total QSO pts:       364
Multipliers:  x2 (< 100 Watts)

 Bonus Points:
100% Emergency Power for 1A               100
5 Natual Power QSOs (100% solar)          100
Set up in a public area                   100
Copy ARRL Bulletin                        100
                                     --------
Total Bonus Points:                       400
Total Score: (Total QSO Points * Multiplier) + Total Bonus = 1128