FIELD DAY 2013 @ KA2BEO

This year is my 20th consecutive Field Day participation. I decided to 
return to using 100 watts this time around. The station was kept simple 
by using only a single Icom IC-706Mkiig transceiver. I started the event 
by working seven stations using natural power at 5 watts output on the 
20-meter band operating CW (Morse code) with a homebrew partially-loaded 
rotatable dipole. Surprisingly, the other stations returned my call on 
the first try for each one of the QRP (low-power) contacts that reached 
to Colorado (from New Jersey). The alternative energy battery pack 
consisted of an 8Ah gel cell that was charged by a 20-watt monocrystalline 
solar module. It was equally amazing that a single 110Ah deep-cycle 
lead-acid battery provided enough power for the remainder of the event 
running at 100 watts. My other homebrew antenna, a 40m four-foot square, 
3-turn loop hanging on a fence post, exhibited high VSWRs, even at its 
designed center operating frequency, which indicated a problem that will 
need to be debugged at some point in the near future. I suspect an open 
connection at one of the antenna's three 5kV transmitting capacitors. I 
operated CW and SSB (phone/voice) on the 40m, 20m, and 15m Amateur Radio 
bands using the 20m dipole with an antenna tuner on the other bands, and 
worked only one DX (distant) station that was in Venezuela. This year I 
operated for about 12 hours, or half of the event's duration. Thanks go 
out to my friend Walter (soon to be a Ham) and my harmonic (daughter). 
Both helped with the logging. And, a special thanks again to the Field 
Day Widow (my wife) for supplying the food and beverages. The weather was 
perfect with no summer storms in the area, and we ended up working 40 of 
the 50 states and 2 provinces in Canada. The pool provided us with some 
relief from the heat, and overall, it was another fun weekend. 
73 for now! Rob, KA2BEO.