Jekyll2024-04-14T21:24:25+00:00https://ac5m.github.io/feed.xmlAC5M’s Adventures in CW, POTA, and BeyondJoin me in exploring various aspects of amateur radio, focusing on portable operations including CW (Morse Code), participation in Parks on the Air (POTA) and Summits on the Air (SOTA) activities, and the techniques of QRP for efficient low-power communication.My First Activation at Honey Creek State Park2024-03-21T21:14:00+00:002024-03-21T21:14:00+00:00https://ac5m.github.io/pota/2024/03/21/pota-cw-honey-creek-state-parkI had a quick opportunity to activate Honey Creek State Park (US-2768) for my first time earlier this week. My wife and I had some day plans to visit Missouri without our kids and I planned short activation along the way. We stopped at Honey Creek State Park in Grove, Oklahoma at around 10:30 in the morning. It cost me $8.00 for the parking permit (I should probably buy the annual pass again!) and there were some somewhat clean bathrooms available. The park seemed relatively full, but there weren’t many people out and about on a Tuesday morning.

I deployed my 7.2 meter fishing pole with my homemade linked dipole near the pavilion. It was fairly windy and my pole blew over while I was getting it setup. I realized I needed to anchor my support poles (electric fence posts) a little better in the rocky ground. Once it was up, I pulled the coax over to the picnic area. I tried to get a spot in the sun because it was a little cool. Unfortunately almost the entire area was shaded.

AC5M with KX2

I started on 40-meters first to try to get some local contacts. Since I had the activation scheduled, I was spotted by RBN and my spot automatically posted to the POTA spots page. 40-meters was very slow! It took several minutes to get my first contact. I ended up with three QSOs (and one busted callsign – sorry!) on 40-meters.

AC5M with KX2

I switched to 20-meters after about 30 minutes. 20-meters was working a lot better. I ended up with 10 more QSOs in the log before I had to call QRT. I was really happy to get my fellow CWA Academy classmate Norm (WA1NLG) in the log! In total I had 13 good QSOs with almost everyone to the east of my location.

My POTA QSO Map

I created a Python script to generate the QSO map. Caller locations were pulled from an online API and may not be 100% accurate. I need to clean up the script before I can share it. My next planned activation will probably be at Pine Creek WMA where we will be camping to view the solar eclipse.

]]>Early Spring CW at Heyburn Wildlife Management Area2024-03-14T18:22:00+00:002024-03-14T18:22:00+00:00https://ac5m.github.io/pota/2024/03/14/pota-cw-heyburn-wmaYesterday, I completed my second activation of Heyburn Wildlife Management Area (US-8124). The warm, early spring weather prompted me to take some PTO and get on the air. The weather was near 80°F with gusty winds from the east and warm sunshine. I put in a last minute scheduled activation and hit the road.

Heyburn Wildlife Management Area (US-8124) Map

Heyburn WMA is an area surrounding Heyburn Lake west of Tulsa, Oklahoma. I decided to setup at the northeast most parking lot just off of OK-33. I arrived to an empty parking lot, and there were no other visitors during my entire activation.

I brought along my Elecraft KX-2 and my homebrew 40- to 10-meter EFHW. I easily deployed the antenna in a convenient tree with my arborist throw line. I had the feedpoint come down near my truck and decided to operate from the truckbed. I barely had any signal on my phone and could not load the POTA website to spot myself so I relied on the Reverse Beacon Network to spot me. I noticed my SWR was bouncing around a lot, and I think that was due to the wind.

On a whim, I choose to start on 10-meters and found an empty frequency. My first spot came through at 20:10 UTC. I had three hunters (one was DX!) answer my CQ in about 20 minutes, before I decided to switch to 15-meters. 15-meters was a lot busier; 20 minutes later I had nine more hunters in the log. Next I decided to go down to 17-meters where I got five more hunters. At this point, I had a little time left before I needed to head home for dinner. I debated going down again to 20-meters, but I have activated 20-meters at Heyburn before. Instead I choose to go back up to 12-meters. I got six more hunters in the log before I had to call QRT. In total I had 23 QSOs and another succesful activation.

My recent completion of the CWA Fundamentals course helped to improve my instant character recognition. I did have to ask for several repeats. It is always hard to tell if I had any busted calls, but this time all of them checked out on QRZ. There were a few hunters that did not have POTA profiles though so I am not sure how we came into contact. Overall, it was a great time and I plan to return to Heyburn for more activations in the future.

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