FIELD DAY 2026 @ KA2BEO

For another Field Day, the only antenna was my 18.5-foot long 20m Slinky Junior dipole, which measured 2.6:1 SWR. See the TinyTenna link for details. The tiny radio was a QRP Labs QCX-mini 20m CW transceiver. The portable iambic keyer paddle was a GHD GM702. The battery was an Anker PowerCore Select 20000 (A1363H11-1) power bank rated for 20Ah, 18W that I purchased at Walmart. Its output was converted from 5Vdc to 12Vdc by a Baofeng USB 12Vdc 1A power adapter (a DC-DC boost converter). The overall results were excellent considering that I operated only a quarter of the event time (6 of 24 hours), the low output power (2.5W), single band and operating mode (20m CW, using Morse code), antenna size (18.5'), and antenna height (10' at center). I made 54 contacts this year, including five in Ontario, Canada (4x ONE and the Golden Horseshoe section) and one on the west coast. Considering the high SWR, I was effectively running only about a watt into an electrically-small, linear-loaded dipole antenna on the 20m CW band. I operated for six hours total, averaging a contact every 6.7 minutes. The weather was very hot, extremely humid, and it rained during nearly the entire event on Saturday, but at least Sunday was dry. I started the event much later than usual, trying to wait for the rain to end, but ended up erecting the antenna in the rain anyway. Overall, it was a very successful weekend. 73 fer now de Rob, KA2BEO.