Sunday, July 2, 2017

2017 Amateur Radio Field Day

For this year - I am the Field Day chairperson and so had the job of organizing and mobilizing the many club members of the Greer Amateur Radio Club. Just to recap last year's result - we were in the 2A class (2 transmitter club stations).  Rusty Kirkpatrick WU2T was the chairperson last year.  We ended up 16th nationally in 2A class and 2nd in the Roanoke Division of the ARRL.  We took first place in SC.  Our points total was 7670 last year and this is the score we had to beat this year.

For 2017 - what we did that is the same as last year.
We used the same K3s we used last year - thanks to Dave K4SV
We used the same tribander on the trailer mounted tower - thanks to Dave K4SV
We used the same home brewed hex beam I constructed
We had two transmitters - one dedicated to CW and one dedicated to SSB
We had a Get On The Air or GOTA station.
We had round the clock coverage

What we did differently for 2017
We had dedicated antennas for both transmitters.   The SSB station had 40m and 80m dipoles I constructed in addition to the tower mounted tribander 3 element yagi.  The CW station had the hex beam for 20-15-10 and the CrankIR for 40m and 80m.  Originally I had planned to have Bob ND7Js 80m vertical but unfortunately this did not happen.  This meant reeling the crank on the CrankIR in the middle of the night to convert it to 80m operation and then back to 40m in the morning.
We had a VHF station for 6 meters.

Here is a video put together by Dave Anderson K4SV



Results for 2017
QSOs overall 2300 plus (since it has not been submitted - subject to adjustment
1073 QSOs on SSB, 1185 QSOS on CW
Band CW Phone Dig Total %
---- -- ----- --- ----- ---
   80 143 159 0 302 13
   40 483 51 0 534 24
   20 428 650 0 1,078 48
   15 121 128 0 249 11
    6 10 84 0 94 4
    2 0 1 0 1 0
            -- ----- --- ----- ---
Main Stations Total 1,185 1,073 0 2,258 100

GOTA CW 47 PHONE 85

Grand Total = 1232 CW and 1158 Phone

QSO Points =  2464 CQ and 1158 Phone = 3622 Points x 2 Power Multiplier =7244 Points

Total Contacts by Operator:

Operator Total
-------- ----- ---
K4SV 433 WG4MC 255 AG3R 214  W4RCW 179  WN4AFP 209  NY4G 156 W4FC 155 KE4EA 131  K1IT 101  WU2T 101  KD4S 98  W4EEY 86  ND7J 69  WB4OQL 78  KZ4M 38 K4VOI 7  W4VX 6  KN4EUM 11  KJ4TID 2 K1SBI 37 KM4VJC 24
Total = 21

Total Contacts by Antenna

CrankIR 626 28%
Hexbeam 549 24%
80m Dipole 159 7%
40m Dipole 51 2.2%
Force12 778 34.4%
6m beam 94 4.1%

BONUS POINTS 1030

Emergency Power  200 POINTS
Media Publicity 100 POINTS
Set Up in Public Place  100 POINTS
Information Booth 100 Points
Message to SM 100 POINTS
Educational Activity 100 POINTS
W1AW Field Day Message 100 POINTS
GOTA Bonus 80 POINTS
Electronic Submittal 50 POINTS
Social Media 100 POINTS

OVERALL POINTS - 8274 points

Here are some photos from the operation.



The GOTA screenhouse - I believe that is Ron WB4OQL



A view of Lake Robinson




Inside the GOTA tent - A TS480 set up for digital modes and an ICOM 706 fgor 6 meters

 

Operation now in full swing - Pete AG3R under the watchful eye of Dave K4SV



Last year's captain Rusty WU2T



Carl W4RCW on SSB



Dave K4SV taking a video



Howard K1SBI making QSO's



That is a CrankIR in the foreground near the lake which served as the antenna for the CW ops on 40m and 80m



Matt Case KG4MC standing in front of y home brew hexbeam



There is Dave K4SV/s Force 12 Tribander on a trailer mounted tower



Husband and wife team Vicki KS4VJ and Dave KE4EA



Howard and family.  That is his son Sammy