This weekend is ARRL Field Day, and for the first time since picking up the amateur radio hobby, I’m just not feeling it. I don’t think I’ll be charging up any batteries and raising temporary antennas at my home just so I can struggle to get on the air and be heard. Not this year. …
Tag Archives: Field Day
Field Day 2020 Score
Tonight I submitted my Field Day 2020 dupe sheet and multiplier qualifications. My score is 212. It’s meager. I could’ve done better, but I learned things (see the link above for a recount of the difficulties I met during the event). Contacts (31 points) 5 digital, 2x multiplier = 10 21 phone, 1x multiplier = …
Misoperator
My primary radio, a Yaesu FT-857, half-died during Field Day, so I sidelined it for debug later and continued with my other HF rig. Last night, I tore apart the radio and the Signalink attached to it, and dragged my oscilloscope out of storage, in order to probe into why the audio wasn’t modulating any …
Field Day 2020 In Quarantine
This year’s ARRL Field Day was noticeably tinged with difficulty, problems, and loneliness. The goal of Field Day is to set up our radios with makeshift antennas and operate on emergency power while making as many contacts as possible for 24 hours. Adaptation in the face of adverse conditions is the heart of these field …
Natural Log
Today I played Radio and won. Since I have a new laptop for work, I’ve been occasionally moving it from my office desk to the ham bench to mess with digital modes like FT8 and Winlink. But I’ve been waffling on getting logging software and keeping shitty paper logs of my radio contacts to manually …