This page describes WW7D's excellent adventure during the ARRL September VHF QSO party.

This was my fourth attempt at VHF/UHF roving--all done this summer, and split between flying and driving among grids. This was also my most ambitious attempt: I was shooting for activating 12 grids each on 6, 2, 1.25 and 0.7 meters. I ended up with 10 grids total, and a very good run.

For day 1, I arrived at Harvey Field bright and early Saturday for a 2 hour flight to Independence, OR (CN84). The weather was perfect almost everywhere, except Harvey field was in a heavy fog at the bottom of a river valley. That delayed departure by 45 minutes.

I was set up and ready to go by 11:30am on Saturday, and began calling CQ. Nothing. Actually, I did hear some stations that were quite loud on 6m, but they absolutely refused to respond to my pleas. I double checked the coax and antennas to make sure I had everything connected correctly. Nothing.

Twelve minutes later I contacted W7EME on the coast in CN84. "Here we go", I thought. Nuh-uh. After ten more minutes of calling CQ and trying to answer others', I gave up, packed up and left my first grid with a score of 2 (1 point times two multipliers [1 grid activated, 1 grid contacted]).

Curiously, while I was setting up in CN84, several groups of folks, including two who were hams, stopped by to figure out what I was doing. So, in my first grid, I had more "eyeball QSOs" with licensed amateur radio operators than on-air QSOs.

Next stop was Scappoose, Oregon (CN85), where I had much more success, two 6m, two 2m, two 223.5 MHz and three 432 MHz QSOs. I didn't stay long, because I was now an hour behind schedule.

From Scappoose, I headed to Hoquiam, WA in CN86, but all I did was re-fuel. In previous contests, Hoquiam has always been a minimally productive grid, but a necessary refueling stop.

Within a few minutes of refueling, I was landing at the nearby Ocean Shores airport.

The interesting thing about this spot is that the southern part of the airport ramp is in CN76 and the northern corner of the ramp is in CN77. And the ramp is about 125 meters north to south, so one can legally activate two grids out of the ramp.

I started out in CN76, which is the high side of the ramp, that way I could literally pull my airplane to CN77 and avoid taking down the antennas (as I would need to do if using the engine). CN76 was very productive on 2 meters with seven QSOs. But 6 meters was unproductive, with only one QSO. 223.5 MHz yielded one QSO and 423 MHz gave me two QSOs (KD7TS/R in CN96 and KD7UO in CN97). After 35 minutes of operating I dragged the plane across the ramp while wondering if something was wrong with my 6m beam.

Things picked up in CN77. After 25 minutes I had completed five QSOs on 6m, eight on 2m, three on 223.5 MHz, and four on 432 MHz. I was really tempted to go back to CN77 and work all those stations again, but that would have prevented me from activating CN78.

Next stop was Sekiu, WA (CN78), about an hour away on the northern margin of the Olympic Penninsula. Here I am ready to call CQ from Sekiu (sorry...I just can't resist...):

I was really pushed for time in Sekiu. The first QSOs happened at 6:30pm local time and I had to depart by 7:00pm to get back to Harvey with some light. The runway lighting at Harvey is lousy, and I haven't done night landings since the late 1990s. (Sunset was at 7:30pm, twilight was at 8:03pm.) So after making four 6m, two 2m, two 223.5 MHz and two 432 MHz QSOs, I moved out.

The next photo shows the antenna set-up. Near the top of the 20 foot telescoping fiberglass mast is a cross support. On the right is a stacked pair of 11-element 432 MHz quagis. They were awesome! On the left is a 7-element 223 MHz quagi. The antenna in the center of the mast is a five element 2m quagi. The lower antenna is a 4-element 6m yagi. (Detail photos of the antenna set-up can be seen here.)

The following picture shows the "shack." A car battery, sitting on the passenger-side floor powers the rigs. It gets recharged via a cigarette-lighter plug battery charger during flight. The rig on top is a Jetstream JT220M that puts out 50 watts FM on the 1.25m band. For a little more than $200, it is hard to imagine, even using FM, more db per $ of equipment (for a given antenna) on 1.25m. I wish there was more activity on 223.5 MHz during these contests.

The workhorse is the Yaesu FT-857d that puts out 100 watts on 6m, 50 watts on 2m and 25 watts on 432 MHz. It can be seen underneath the Jetstream, and the remote head near the top of the photo.

I arrived back at Harvey Field a few minutes after civil twilight (8:07pm), but the landing was just fine. The one non-trivial problem I was having was that my aviation GPS was dying. Some of the critical buttons on the unit refused to work for anywhere from five minutes to nearly an hour after being turned on. It's probably a heat-related intermittent problem. It didn't cause much difficulty because I was very familiar with the route for Saturday. But on Sunday I intended to fly to Eastern Washington and activate several grids. I am unfamilar with the area, and I really wanted a GPS flying through the Cascades.

At Harvey, I transferred equipment and supplies into my car in the dark. By this time, it was too late to go to my next stop, a residential street in CN97. I decided to go to Lake Stevens High School (CN88), where my activities would be less likely to get me shot.

When I arrived, I started setting up, only to realize that I had left part of the mast support jig at home! "Okay...stuff happens." I hooked up the mobile antennas to the rigs to work some QSOs on the hour trip back home.

As it happens, Highway 9 was briefly closed down for a construction project and then down to one lane with a flagger. This delaying my departure from CN88 by about 15 minutes, but I ended up working five QSOs on 6m and six on 2m while still in CN88. I almost got a VE7DXG on 223.5 MHz, but I left the grid before completing the QSO, and decided against trying to change out my log sheets in the dark while traveling at highway speeds.

I rushed home, grabbed the jig, and headed to the nearby Horace Mann Elementary School that sits atop a 400' hill. Got set up at 11:20pm and managed a few QSOs. Eventually my friend and near neighbor Doug, AC7T, who isn't into VHF contesting, heard me on 6m. After working me there, he pulled out his hand-held dual-band rig and worked me on 2m and 70cm FM over about one mile.

A little after midnight, I headed home, with a new plan for Sunday. I would not go to Eastern Washington. Instead, I'd maximize QSOs by working CN87, CN88, CN97 and CN98, and then heading south to activate CN86 and CN96. And I very nearly executed the entire plan.

Here is the set-up out of my car in CN87 the next morning. The mast is held at the bottom by the weight of a car battery (that isn't being used for anything else). A PVP pipe jig holds the upper support at the window.

In this picture you can see the 6m halo antenna I built several days before the contest started. There is also a 2m/7cm mag-mount whip on top of the roof, and whip antenna off the front passenger side of the hood for 223 MHz.

Next I headed to a residental neighborhood in CN97 that is at about 720'. In the August UHF contest, I had great success in making QSOs from here, and the residents were curious and friendly. This time, another neighbor confronted me with some hostility. He pointing out that I freaked out his wife when she pulled out of the driveway. I apologized and agreed that I could see how this might spook people on the 10th anniversary of the September 11th attacks, and explained the contest and the value of the activity to emergency preparediness, etc. He was okay in the end.

Ten minutes later a guy who lives on another street nearby drove up and exclaimed, "I finally cornered one of you guys." He had seen rovers in the past and wanted to know more about the activity. Very friendly guy.

I headed off to this wonderful 600' hill-top spot in CN98. I've had good success in the past. This time, I ran into a big sign saying that this was a private road and was "monitored 24 hours a day." It wasn't an inviting sign, and I couldn't help but wonder if my August roving inspired the sign. Or maybe I just missed the sign in the past?

Either way, I needed another suitable CN98 location, and spent about 45 minutes hunting without success. Finally, I pulled out my cell phone and Googled "schools in Granite Falls." The name "Mountain Way Elementary School" sounded promising. The location was okay at 400'.

Next was a quick trip back to the Lake Stevens High School location, where I filled out the CN88 contacts. Here the view to the north:

The view east shows some nearby overhead wires that likely contributed some noise.

At 5:45pm, I made a beeline to the south. That morning, I had identified this spot for CN86 and, a mile up the road, this spot for CN96.

I figured I might get 20 minutes in CN86 and 10 minutes in CN96. It took me longer to get there. Part of the problem was my car GPS that tried sending me down a fenced-off private road at one point. Google Navigator on my cell phone saved the day, but with some loss of time. The second problem is that the road, highway 165, was rough--like a giant wash board. I had to proceed slowly.

I got on the air in CN86 at 7:29pm. The set-up in CN86 was super. I had stations in the southern part of CN87 booming in. I was happy! Well...until the mast decided to fall over. This was the first time I had set-up on gravel, and a gust of wind turned the gravel into crude ball bearings, causing the battery box to shift....

I had to dissemble the entire set-up to disentangle everything. The damage was astonishingly light. The boom on the 223 MHz quagi snapped, converting it into a 4-element antenna. But it didn't matter, the burette clamp that supports the 432 MHz and 223 MHz antennas broke. Here is the extent of the damage:

I quickly got the 2m and 6m antennas set-up with 10 minutes left in the contest. Just as I was tightening the final clamp, two cars in a row stopped. The driver in each was a ham and wanted to know all about it. I explained quickly, expressing some urgency, and invited them to watch me make some QSO. (That worked.) I was able to eek out seven more QSOs before 8:00 pm.

I never made it to CN96--too bad I lost that hour looking for an alternative spot in CN98.

Results: I activated ten grids (CN76, CN77, CN78, CN84, CN85, CN86, CN87, CN88, CN97, CN98), and worked a total of 10 grids (CN77, CN84, CN85, CN86, CN87 CN88, CN89, CN96, CN97 and CN98).

On 6m, I made 54 QSOs (+4 dups) and worked nine grids (all but CN96). On 2m, I made 61 QSOs and worked eight grids (all but CN86 & CN97). On 1.25m, I made 25 QSOs and worked eight grids (all but CN86 & CN97). And on 70cm, I made 35 QSOs and worked ten grids.

In total, I worked 35 grid-band pairs for a multiplier of 45, and 235 points for a score of 10,575.

The contest was a blast, even with all of the problems. It was also grueling, as the sun was on full display, and it was uncharacteristically hot out everywhere I went during the day. (I suspect it got into the 90s both days but I didn't want to know.) Eventually, I decided I was pretty pleased with the antennas. But, of course, I have some new antenna ideas cooking.

73

Darryl, WW7D