Field Day
June 26th & 27th, 2010

This years Field Day event was held at our usual location at the
Fall River / Freetown State Forest ranger station.  The HAMCOW
was our main air conditioned operating center, plus a couple
of tents along the edges of the field.


HAMCOW is set up for HF, 6 Meters, Satellite, & APRS.


Two Tri-band HF Yagi's and a full sized 40 Meter
1/4-wave vertical kept our signals loud.  We also
had an 80 Meter dipole high in the trees.


And we proudly displayed our new ARRL banner.


W2DAN's 30 ft. aluminum tower sports this gorgeous
fold over base plate that was manufactured for us
by N1OCY.

Here is the tower base once the tower is placed vertical.



The tower has a built in support leg to hold the tower in the proper
position for assembly and disassembly.



When the tower is vertical the support leg simply
lays flat against the tower.



Here is N1PMB taking a breather from the GOTA station while giving
N1VDK a demo.  How many diet Pepsi's does one man need anyway?
Cold caffeine.


I'm sure W2DAN was telling N1VDK a great story, but this picture begs to
be entered in a funny caption contest.


Of course we had our pile of pamphlets and club packets.  Not too many
takers came this year, but a few is better than none.


All of this radio stuff makes the gang hungry.  Capt. Jeff, K1JGK cooks up
a batch of N1JOY's secret recipe chicken wings.


And Sunday morning W2DAN cooked up egg omelets with some ham
and bacon for breakfast.


This year we shared the field with the Humane Society, who was holding their
"Walk Your Paws Off" dog walk fund raiser.  It was fun having all those dog
lovers and their pets. 


There were several dogs there that are up for adoption.  One just cannot
take them all home!


And you can find a nice dog like this older beagle who was very
friendly and you know was a great pet before circumstance
found him in the shelter.


All of the participants took their dogs for the 3 mile walk
through the trails of the Freetown forest.


Before the clouds rolled in, we were able to knock out several solar
powered contacts with this 30 Watt panel and gell cell battery.


This has nothing to do with Field Day except the HAMCOW is in the
background.  KB1JBC has this Buzzards Bay Brewing tap handle
ornament as a trunk decoration for his car.


But all good things must come to an end.  N1RHS is pulling guy stakes
while N1JOY dismantles the APRS antenna on the push up flagpole.


N1JOY is breaking down the HAMCOW main tower antennas to stow
on the roof for the ride home.  Everything has a certain spot on the
roof, and the tie downs use ratcheting rope tie downs for quicker
lashing and un-lashing when setting back up.


Even W2DAN's tower stores in one piece, and is easily handled by
one person on the roof.


Then the banners come down and get carefully
rolled up for next time.


And the last thing to get put away is the generator, especially on a hot day.
The air conditioning was left running in the HAMCOW so we could have
a cool place to duck into in between breaking down antennas.



Back to HAMCOW Events