Subject: QST QST Foxhunt Foxhunt Rochester NY
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 14:33:19 -0400
To: xarc

XARC will hold it's first foxhunt of 1999 Next Sunday, April 25th. Everyone
is invited and an amateur radio license is not required to participate. My
teammates and I have come up with all kinds of creative ways to hide the fox
this year, but because we're lazy procrastinators we've decided to keep it
to the basics. If the fox is found quickly, we'll hide it again! I'll email
you next week with more details like time and place (around noon). Below are
the rules we've used for past hunts.

Fox Hunt Rules:

1.Fox frequency is 146.565 MHz.
1.Mode will be FM phone; polarization vertical; transmissions intermittent.
1.Transmitting on the fox frequency is prohibited.
1.All participants will convene at the designated place and time for the start of the hunt.
1.The fox will be located within a 10 mile radius of the starting location.
1.Unlawful trespass is prohibited. The fox will be located in an area open to the public.
1.Hunts will be conducted from the vehicle of your choice.
1.One hunt vehicle will be allowed per hunt team.
1.You may form a team of any size including a team of one.
1.You may communicate with other teams, but this is a competition, be wary of advice!
1.Fox signal must be copyable at the start of the hunt by the consensus of all present.
1.Traffic misdemeanors during the hunt disqualify you. (No traffic felonies either!)
1.Upon finding the fox, contact the huntmaster via the Xerox repeater (145.29 -).
1.In your victory transmission, relay only the info requested. (others are still looking!)
1.Defacing, altering, moving, hiding, obscuring (etc!) the fox is prohibited.
1.An award will be presented to the first three teams to find the fox.
1.To ensure good humor and fair play, huntmasters may make additional rules.
1.All decisions of the huntmasters are final.

Hunting hints from N2JAC:

Finding this fox should not require any fancy equipment. Any 2 meter
receiver should be sufficient, and most of the past winners have used
directional antennas. I found it a couple years ago with a homemade small
antenna made from TV twinlead, coax and wooden sticks. When you get so close
that you detect the signal from all directions, use your rubber duck
antenna. Hold your receiver close to your body and turn around slowly until
you hear a null (weakening) in the signal. At that point the fox is directly
behind you. Even closer in you may want to tune off frequency and/or remove
your antenna completely, still using the 'body fade' technique. The more
adventurous of us will use quads, yagis, GPS, doppler, etc. systems.

I hope we can do a few more of these, once a year is not enough.

here are some web sites with fox hunting info

http://www.webring.org/cgi-bin/webring?ring=foxhunt;list foxhunt webring
http://www.homingin.com Joe Moell K0OV
http://www.ggw.org/xarc XARC's page with past hunt tips