Prepping

WOW!! Where did September go???

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

It has been a busy month, I guess. I have really been into the whole POTA thing and between that and work and keeping my life from falling into the usual chaos, it has been one amazing fun filled blur. I mentioned in my last post that I had activated 2 parks on 3 September. Well, just the other day, 1 October, I went out to the same place, Big Spring State Park, located in Tuscarora State Forest and activated again. I made a total of 49 contacts in an hour including several park-to-park contacts and was able to withstand the constant bombardment of acorns falling from the trees. It was a beautiful early autumn day and I was very happy to be out and about. I will include a picture or 2 below. I prefer to go out on nice days as I do not want my radio rained on. There are pavilions I could use, I guess but I do prefer the open air and sunshine. It doesn’t take me long to set up and I can be on the air within 15 minutes of pulling into the park. I prefer to use a G5RV Junior antenna as it is a good multi-band antenna and works well as an inverted vee. Right now the only limiting factor in my setup is my power situation. The battery pack I use just isn’t up to the job which is why I am going the pick up a LiFePo 12V 20ah battery tomorrow which will allow me to run my rig for a much longer period of time. You can expect a more contacts listed from my next activation report. well kidlets, enough for now. Namaste, you’all.

As for Summer, I don’t hear no singing!

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

It was a beautiful day today and I decided to go activate a park. I went to Big Spring State Park which is located in Tuscarora State Forest, making it a two-fer! All went well. I put my antenna up over a convenient branch with my arborist bag and quickly got on the air. I self spotted on the POTA app and soon was making contacts. I had no real issues until an operator started using AM on a nearby freq. I just moved down the band and started over. I ran for a while more before the heat got to me. Overall a very successful activation. I made 44 contacts including 3 park to parks. I will be back there in the near future as it is a nice park and is nearby. I enjoy working portable and POTA gives me a chance to get outdoors. Yesterday I was out on my lawn and, with the help of my long-suffering wyfe, got my Buddistick tuned up using a 4″ by 20′ length of copper screen as a ground radial. It worked great and I will have to try it at a park next. Now I think I will sit here and stream some shows.

Namaste, y’all

Events Special and Otherwise

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Yesterday we, the club I belong to, held a special event to mark the anniversary of the birth of Marie Doro, a local who was a very well known actress in the early 1900s. She was very famous on stage and in silent films and was the first American actor invited to appear before the British royalty!. She was born here in Duncannon PA and is buried here, though she lived the majority of her life elsewhere. In a perfect world, running a Special Event would be simple. Since when has this world been perfect? There is quite a process involved starting with getting the club interested in hosting the event to announcing the event and getting the announcement published in QST magazine and on QRZ.com to painstaking work designing the certificate to securing a venue to hold the event to procuring equipment to enticing people to operate the radios and bring food, chairs, tables and other odds and ends. anyway, we did it. I even made a batch of chili which was a big hit. I even brought one of my mascot owls, Tootsie to supervise. He approved of the radio activity.

Summertime is getting closer and the living will be easy

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Soon it will be time to start thinking about getting outside more and enjoying the warmer weather …. until it is 95 degrees Fahrenheit ( for those who still use that system, I prefer 35 degrees Celsius) with a relative humidity of about 85% then you will want to lay about in the AC and bitch. Actually I was out yesterday with my new radio and a G5RV Junior playing around. First off I was learning the foibles of tuning this set up as an inverted vee. I didn’t want to have it set up in too permanent looking a configuration as I was in a public location. Second, I was learning the menu system of the radio as so far I have not had a lot of time to use it. Third, I was fine tuning my grab and go style. Back some years ago I could have a portable QRP station up and on the air within 15 minutes of pulling into a location. Yesterday it took me over 40 minutes to get on the air not including having to return home to get my power supply (turning red with embarrassment). I am not as readiness able as I used to be, I reckon. Guess I just need to practice. My plans for the future include bringing alternate antennas to try out. One nice thing is that my wyfe is willing to assist. She enjoys coming along for the ride and likes to laugh at my mistakes. 🙂 In any event, I will keep plodding away and keep posting here. For now, namaste, y’all.

Ahhhh …. Autumn

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Well it is Autumn again. I just got done beating Satan’s Putting Green back into submission and I am looking forward to the seasonal die-back. In any event, running a lawn mower reminds me of safety. Thinking of safety reminds me of the annual Simulated Emergency Test. What is that, you might ask? Well :

The annual Simulated Emergency Test (SET) is a training exercise involving the Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES) and the National Traffic System (NTS), a message-handling service of amateur radio. The American Radio Relay League is a prime mover in this event, which is organized somewhat like a contest. Its primary purposes are to evaluate strengths and weaknesses in emergency preparedness and communications, and to demonstrate amateur radio to the public.

During the first full weekend of October of every year in the United States, a nationwide radio communications network is set up that links every major city and most of the geography of the country. This technological infrastructure is set up from scratch within a few hours at locations that vary from state and local government Emergency Operations Centers to isolated areas without utilities of any kind. Every mode of radio communications is utilized including analog, digital, voice, data, simplex, duplex, satellites and even automated relay stations launched on aircraft and with weather balloons. For no more than 48 continuous hours, this nationwide radio communications network is exercised with the primary objective of proving the system’s readiness and capabilities. Then as quickly as it was set up, the system is dismantled and stored in preparation for when it is needed. The system has demonstrated its value time after time during earthquakes, hurricanes, forest fires, terrorist attacks and other disasters. All of this capability is provided by volunteers who continuously hone their technical skills and acquire, build, and maintain their own equipment. These radio engineers and operators, along with their equipment, combine into an important resource for emergency communications.

There you have it. The SET will be held this weekend, OCT 1 and 2. The SET is held this time of year because it is near the end of hurricane season and is a good way of evaluating performance under stressful conditions. Right now, Florida and other areas in the South are being pummeled by Hurricane Ian. There are traffic nets set up on the HF bands to pass health and welfare messages into and out of the affected areas. Ham radio has been a major part of emergency communications and will remain so.

The Power Is Yours

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

I had the opportunity to do some troubleshooting the other day. I was operating my HF radio on 10.111 MHz and suddenly it turned off. It came right back on and I continued. A short while later it turned off and stayed off. Hmmm … A small table light stayed on (plugged into the same power bar as my power supply) so I knew the issue had to be either the power supply or my radio. I turned on my VHF radio and it came on. I did observe one of my cats in the general vicinity of the back of my desk where my wiring is. I turned the power supply off and looked around the back where the radios attach. Sure enough, the positive wire from my HF rig was disconnected. It turned out that the spade connector had come off after being interacted with by one of my catz (bad crimping on my part). I crimped on a new connector and attached it to the power supply. When I turned everything on, the HF radio powered up and has had no further issues. Problem solved. Why am I sharing this? Maybe to illustrate the point that it is always best to check the simple solutions before you dig yourself in to much deeper territory. If I had started with the radio as the issue, I would have spent several hours testing and finding nothing. Instead I looked at the simple things first and fixed the problem in just a few minutes.

Namaste, Y’all

One More Lap in the Rat Race

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

There is currently a thunderstorm going on. It has rained 18.29 MM in the past hour. Gotta love it. I had left my windows in my car cracked open and had to venture out into a waterfall to close them. One good thing, the storm has lowered the outside temperature from 32 C to 21 C. It makes it a lot more comfortable. Unfortunately, I can’t use my radio right now as I have no desire to have my equipment fried by lightening. It might be an exciting afternoon. Here is a copy of the NWS bulletin:

Special Weather Statement issued May 22 at 2:​47​PM EDT by NWS State College

…STRONG THUNDERSTORMS WILL IMPACT SOUTHWESTERN SCHUYLKILL…
NORTHUMBERLAND…DAUPHIN…EAST CENTRAL FRANKLIN…EASTERN SNYDER…
SOUTHEASTERN MONTOUR…SOUTHEASTERN COLUMBIA…CUMBERLAND…EASTERN PERRY AND NORTHWESTERN LEBANON COUNTIES THROUGH 330 PM EDT…
At 246 PM EDT, Doppler radar was tracking strong thunderstorms along a line extending from Northumberland to 14 miles south of Selinsgrove to near Carlisle to near Chambersburg. Movement was east at 25 mph.
HAZARD…Winds up to 45 mph and pea size hail.
SOURCE…Radar indicated.
IMPACT…Gusty winds could knock down tree limbs and blow around unsecured objects. Minor hail damage to vegetation possible.
Locations impacted include…
Harrisburg, Chambersburg, Carlisle, Lower Allen, Colonial Park, Sunbury, Progress, Mechanicsburg, Camp Hill, Shamokin, New Cumberland, Linglestown, Enola, Steelton, Mount Carmel, Selinsgrove, Shippensburg, Danville, Lemoyne and Northumberland.
MAX HAIL SIZE…0.25 IN MAX WIND GUST…40 MPH

The other day, while out shopping, I was able to save a wood turtle that was crossing the road. I picked her up and carried her across while lecturing her on traffic safety. I try to save turtles as often as I can. I have a soft spot for them, and they are not good at outrunning cars.

Speaking of radio, propagation has been rising. There are more and more dx openings and the shorter wave-length bands are opening up on a daily basis. I am seeing more and more spots on 17M and 12M. It might just be a great sunspot cycle!

enuff for now. Namaste!

Some Thoughts

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Here are some thoughts: It pays to be prepared. You might laugh at people who prep but what if they are right and you are wrong? Would it hurt for you to have some basic skills and supplies? Skills to include knowing how to sharpen a knife, how to fire a gun, how to forage for food, how to identify which local plants are edible, how to preserve and can food, how to live without electricity. This is by far an incomplete list. There are a lot of good books and resources online to help. Never be afraid to learn. Another useful skill is map reading to include land navigation. Some good things to have: a high-quality knife or 2, canning supplies, battery and solar powered radios, “survival” food, gardening supplies, a rifle and a hand gun, bow and arrows, fishing supplies, water filters, a good quality backpack, good quality walking/hiking shoes. Again, not a comprehensive list, just some things to get your brain engaged. It would also be useful to have some ham radio gear and a license so that you would know how to operate this gear. You could even go as far as to learn basic radio repair. I am sure you could come up with some method of producing electricity to supply modest needs such as solar panels, wind turbines and or water turbines. An additional skill that could be valuable is producing alcohol. Learn to make beer and wine as these would make great trading commodities.

Adventures in Snowblowing

/ KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Anyone who lives/has lived in a northern climate knows the joys of having to clean up after a snow storm. Today I after I woke up, I had to do that. First we had to make a trip down to my mum-in-laws place ( a senior community) and clean out her car. The folks who run the place contract for someone to plow the main part of the lots and the sidewalks but they end up burying the residents’ cars, for the most part. Most of the residents don’t have the physical ability to clean their cars off and un bury them. We and other relatives of the residents go down there and clean up.

Once that was done we came back home. I had to purchase some shear pins the other day as 2 of them had snapped in my blower. I went to replace them and found a large rock wedged under the auger on one side. I was able to hammer the rock out of there and then I had to drive the broken pins out of the shaft. Once this was done, I got the blower started and did the clean up in my driveway and the walk up to the house. Gotta love winter!!