Keith KG5HOK successfully operated on his first POTA activation on Oct 30, at the San Jacinto Battleground State Historic Park, US-3511. Jeff AB4ME and Dave W5OC accompanied him for his first exposure as an activator. Using Dave’s FT991A 100W transceiver and a 20′ Sotabeam linked dipole, Keith made 20 QSOs across the USA on 20m SSB.
Conditions were fair to good, while operating in the midst of scattered rain and some close by thunderstorms.
Part of Keith’s POTA initiation included registering his callsign into the online POTA app database. This turned out much more difficult than making QSOs on the air since at times the data entry seemed to confuse the app- maybe due to our cellular internet connection.
Once we got started, Keith glibly picked up the protocol and easily exceeded the minimum 10 required QSOs. Interestingly, he had a pipeline to Lousiana, which several of the stations were 10 to 20 dB over S9- just BOOMING IN. Overall, Keith quickly became a smooth POTA operator within minutes. Congrats to Keith!
To avoid RFI, Jeff AB4ME, kindly staggered his setup and activation until after Keith completed his 20 QSOs.
Jeff, using his IC-706mk2g radio and a PAC-12 vertical, started his turn to activate on 20m SSB. With little effort, Jeff got spotted and quickly had a mini-pileup on his station.I have to admit, this PAC-12 vertical also used by AB5SS and KG5LJZ, consistently seems to have great performance. I’m seriously thinking of getting one myself.
As Jeff operated, he used a new smartphone logger called PoLo (Portable Logger) Ham2K. Looking over his shoulder, I could see that it was very well designed for POTA and SOTA use. I was impressed how well Jeff was able to smoothly operate with it (note, I just loaded it on my iphone tonight and plan to try it out). This sweet app precludes the need to bring a heavy laptop or bulky tablet- but assumes you can type and view OK using a smartphone screen and touchpad.
Despite the scattered thunderstorms, we had a blast and this was a perfect POTA during the workday. Yes, retirement is good!
Jeff, using his IC-706mk2g radio and a PAC-12 vertical, started his turn to activate on 20m SSB. With little effort, Jeff got spotted and quickly had a mini-pileup on his station.I have to admit, this PAC-12 vertical also used by AB5SS and KG5LJZ, consistently seems to have great performance. I’m seriously thinking of getting one myself.
As Jeff operated, he used a new smartphone logger called PoLo (Portable Logger) Ham2K. Looking over his shoulder, I could see that it was very well designed for POTA and SOTA use. I was impressed how well Jeff was able to smoothly operate with it (note, I just loaded it on my iphone tonight and plan to try it out). This sweet app precludes the need to bring a heavy laptop or bulky tablet- but assumes you can type and view OK using a smartphone screen and touchpad.
Despite the scattered thunderstorms, we had a blast and this was a perfect POTA during the workday. Yes, retirement is good!
Another great post Dave! Thanks for the PoLo idea, I’m downloading it now.
Congrats Keith