Monday, July 30, 2018

Oscar Zero QSO One and Two

Shortly after I announced my plans for the June VHF contest, I got a random email I was not expecting:

Hi Dave,

if you are qrv on 432 for the ARRL contest we can try on sunday (June 10th) some EME. Have here new installed 128x11el. so it needs not much on your side. >20w and >10el. will do in JT65b. Will be qrv from your moonrise till 14:00UTC mostly calling CQ on 063 first.

73 Bernd DL7APV

I was of course intrigued, but just didn't find a way to fit EME into my contest plans this year. I did however, make a note of the request, and decided to followup later...

In my spare time (which admittedly hasn't been much) I've been playing around the K7MEM Yagi Calculator seeing what's possible. I've also been ordering a few antenna building materials here and there from McMaster-Carr - primarily dealing with custom Arrow designs that W8LID has been cranking out. Even though Bernd assured me that 10 elements and 20w would be sufficient, I wanted build something a bit bigger on 432mhz anyway for terrestrial work. Like most of my projects, the early stages occurred before I realized what I was doing, and it just spiraled from there.


For my new 70cm beam, I decided to mimic the design of the classic Arrow. I'd order 2 pieces of 6' long 3/4" square aluminum tubing, join them together with some 5/8" round tube, then use Easton 1816 Jazz Arrow Shafts (or 9/32" diameter aluminum round tubes) as my elements. I'd then use a stock Arrow Gamma Match element as my driven and my existing satellite gear to feed it. While the Arrow Driven is tuned at 435, and would be a little short, the adjustable match would make the SWR close enough. I got all my parts ordered, and when it arrived I got busy on the drill press.


18 holes is A LOT to drill by hand, but after measuring about 3 times the actual drilling went pretty fast. Cutting all the elements took even longer, but once I got a rhythm down, it wasn't too bad. The idea was simple, measure everything out about a 1/16th of an inch too long, use a pipe cutter to trim - glue in a point insert (to thread the elements together) hand file off the excess length and smooth the cut side, slap on a plastic cap and attach to the boom. A couple hours in the shop spread out over a couple weeks, and the 'Lunar Arrow' was christened. 


Finding a way to mount the thing to a tripod did prove to be a bit tricky. I didn't want to put a saddle clamp and the associate bolts on the same plane as the element, so I cut a small piece of excess 3/4" square tube, and then bolted below the boom vertically, and attached the saddle clamp there. 


The split boom design with the tube in the middle worked great to line things up, and the under boom square piece had the added bonus of providing some support in the boom break, and made everything tighten up and look nice and straight. 


I put the monstrosity up on a short mast, and tested it in the back yard. After some dinking with the gamma I had a good 1.1:1 match on the SWR at 432.100mhz, and the field strength meter I borrowed from a local showed a respectable pattern with no weird random lobes walking around 50' so in front the beam. Yes I was using 2w and announced myself before spewing out the RF - to avoid the inevitable emails telling me I did something wrong.... 

It wasn't a precision engineered, computer modeled beam, but I had less than 50 bucks in the whole thing, and it seemed to work pretty well. The only thing left to do was try a contact. I dusted off my trusty G-5500 (Cause ain't no way I was going to hold this 12' beam for the time it took to make an EME Q) and put it up on my 10' mast. I set a sked with Bernd for the 13th of July - when conditions were good - and waited. 


The setup was as follows - My homemade Lunar Arrow, mounted on my G5500 Rotor System, 8ft' of Times LMR240 Coax into an Icom 821 running 30w on 70cm. Signalink USB hooked into that, going to a Laptop running WSJTX. I was running everything off of my 30A power supply with a extension cord back into my shop, but I easily could have done battery here too. Trees at my house block the horizon until about 20° - so I waited until the computer said the moon would be above them. The moon phase was new, and it was only about 10° off the sun, so I just kinda had to guess at where it would be. I was chatting with Bernd on the HB9Q chat page, so he told me when he began his transmission and I went to 432.063 and began listening. Amazingly, I decoded him on the very first sequence. I quickly replied, he decoded me, and we finished the QSO before I even really knew what happened. I've always heard EME QSOs were often a long drawn out affair, but this was just like any other JT65 contact I've ever made. I was obviously massively psyched. 


I had a bunch of stuff going on the rest of the day, so I had to go QRT shortly after the contact. Just to prove it wasn't a fluke though I left everything setup and came back on the morning of the 14th to try again. This time I managed to decode NC1I, called him, and got a quick answer - marking my 2nd EME QSO ever. 


This time I actually had my settings in WSJTX correct, and used the 'short' versions of the messages, which forgoes a message report and just exchanges callsigns and a 'over over over' message. Either way, it was awesome. 


Life has been really busy lately, but I'm still finding time here and there to do some fun Ham stuff. This was project was cheap, used mostly stuff I already on hand, and was loads of fun. I have no plans to develop a huge EME station, but it was super cool to tinker a bit and make a couple of contacts using the 'ultimate dx' method. If you've even got a modest UHF setup, I'd highly recommend you give Bernd, Frank, or any of the big gun EME stations an email and setup a sked. You might surprise yourself with the results, I sure did. 

Wednesday, June 6, 2018

June VHF/UHF Contest 2018 Plan

I know I haven't blogged in a while... sorry bout day - I'll try and jump back on that horse soon. For now though, here is my official 2018 June VHF/UHF Contest Plan!

KG5CCI - Pilot Rock Mountain - EM35io

This year I've decided to head to one of my favorite SOTA locaitons in the state of Arkansas, Pilot Rock Mountain, deep in the Ozark Highlands, northwest of Dover, AR. At 2201' MSL it's among the highest points in the state, and because it's deep in the Ozark St. Francis National Forest, it is among the quietest RF locations I've operated from. It also is ringed by sheer drop-offs instead of trees - which is rare in this part of the country. 


I'll be operating in the Single Op 3 Band category again this year - with 100W on 6M, 50W on 2m, and 30W on 70cm. I have made some upgrades to the beams though, going from a 6m Moxon last year, to a full 3 Element Yagi, and upgrading from a wideband 3 Element 2m Yagi, to a optimized 144mhz 5 Element Yagi on 2m. Coax is upgraded all around, as is the mast support. Even though I'll be low powered compared to some of ya'll out there, elevation and remoteness should allow me to punch above my weight quite a bit. I'll also be taking full advantage of the digital modes, and will have WSJT-X capability on all bands. If you're marginal distance on 2 or 70 and wanna try JT65, QRA, or MSK - by all means reach out. 


Like all things though, there's a catch - I was only able to secure about 24 hours worth of time to operate. I need to be back down the mountain into Civilization by noon on Sunday. That means I'll probably be operating from contest start (1PM local on Saturday) until about 10AM Sunday Morning. That should allow me the main afternoon, evening, and the meteor skip morning though to work as many people as I can. 



I had internet up there last time I was there, but you never know what you'll find. I plan to be on pingjockey, ON4KST chat, Twitter @KG5CCI, and APRS as KG5CCI-5. Feel free to hit me up for a sked if you wanna try something awesome. 

Good Luck to all, hope to hear you on the high bands!



Monday, February 5, 2018

Precision Time While Off the Grid


Since I've started playing with 6 meters, I've gotten hooked on the WSJT modes like MSK144 and FT8. I won't go into deep detail about how these modes work (That's for someone elses blog) but just understand that they are digital, and they require your computer to be synced with a precise clock in order to function properly. At home this is not a problem, the NTP or Network Time Protocol, is a well established network protocol any modern computer can run, and serves to do nothing else beside keeping a computer's clock in sync with a central server on the internet. Cool right? This works just fine as long as your computer is ON the Internet, but what about when it's not.. what about when you're out in the middle of nowhere, and you don't have your Cable, DSL, or a 4G hotspot you can connect too.. what then?


Enter the Global Position System, or GPS. I hope I don't have to explain what GPS is, because any user of technology the past 25 years should be familiar with it. A series of US launched satellites constantly orbit the earth, and provide location data thru time based triangulation in 3 dimensions to  anyone on the ground who has at least 4 of the satellites in view. Nifty huh? Also notice a very key word I used in my description: Time Based. Yup, you got it. In order for GPS to function, the Satellites must have very precise clocks on board, and must get updated from a central server often. If you have a receiver that can pick up a GPS signal, then you can determine what time it is. You don't even need 4 satellites - just one signal is enough to calculate the current time accurate enough for WSJT modes to work. Now of course, how to integrate that with a computer that is running WSJT software.


I looked around, and found an inexpensive option that looked like it would do everything I needed. The GlobalSat BU-353-S4 is $25 bucks with free Shipping on Amazon Prime, and has fantastic reviews. I decided to give it a shot. After receiving the BU353 I then paired it up with the NMEATime2 software by VisualGPS LLC (for another $20) and I was in business. NMEATime2 uses the NMEA string (GPGGA) protocol to receive 'ticks' from the GlobalSat as a timing reference, keeping the computer's clock perfectly in sync with the signal from the Satellites. Everything looked good, but I wanted a local test - so I put the laptop on Battery power, made sure the Wi-Fi was off, and went to the driveway with nothing but the BU-353. I set the clock a few minutes off, fired up NMEATime2 and watched: 


The program showed the Satellite signal coming up, then showed it locked in place, and the time slowly started catching up. Within about a minute, the clock on the computer was perfectly synced, and the CPU second ticks were in perfect match with the ticks from the GPS Constellation. I was impressed. A bit more testing and tweaking and I figured I was good to go, but still, a field test was going to be required. 


On December 10th I got up early and headed Northeast to EM46. It's a rare grid on 6m, and the meteor scatter action had been picking up - so what better place and time to test the BU-353 out.


I made sure the Wifi was off, and just ran PingJockey on my phone - making sure my computer would ONLY use the GPS signal for clocking.. and what'da know, it worked beautifully. 


I would almost venture guess to say my clock precision was *better* than most other WSJT users that morning, even though I was 200 miles from home on the side of a road out in the fields of the Arkansas Delta. If you need a solution to run the WSJT modes while out in the field - I don't think you can go wrong with this solution. 

Monday, January 22, 2018

YADR (Yet another distance record) on FO-29

Back in November my good buddy Jerome, F4DXV, sent me a message asking if I wanted to try breaking the FO-29 distance record with him again. We already held the record, but never one to shy from a challenge I said sure. He had already figured out the perfect pass, had a new spot on his end, and just asked me to get to one of my spot in the wee hours of the morning No big thing :)


We actually had 2 days we could work with, December 10th or December 12th. Both days had a window, neither really favored either operator, and both had a 0.6° Maximum elevation window for with FO-29 at true apogee during the pass. We agreed to try for both - cause you never know what will happen. Good thing we did too, because some of the fiercest weather of the year struck France on the 10th, with driving rain and wind, making it impossible for Jerome to get to his spot. We crossed our fingers though, and set a sked for 2 days later. 


The morning of the 12th I drug myself out of bed at 2:45AM (local) and stumbled to the car. Quickly downing some caffeine and Cliff bars, I turned on some Metallica and navigated 90 miles Northwest to Mt. Nebo State Park near Dardenelle, AR in EM35. This was the location I used during our last FO-29 record, although I did park just shy of the summit this time, to take advantage of a slightly better angle for the pass, and to shelter myself from a strong westerly wind that was blowing. 


Jerome was already setup on his side, at his spot in JN04 up on a small hill. The weather still wasn't great, but it was a lot better than it had been the previous window. Via Twitter we both confirmed we were setup, picked a frequency and got ready to set another record. 


We both had video going - though like normal Jerome's turned out way better than mine did. Having daylight helped :)


Here's my 'Video' that I took of our contact. All you can really see is my red headlamp, but the audio is there. I had my headphones plugged in by themselves at first (just in case the audio splitter was lowering my volume) but after I dialed Jerome in I popped it back in so you could hear both sides of the QSO.


And that's all she wrote. 7635km on FO-29 in the books. As you can tell from the videos, we had PLENTY of time to make the QSO. Enough time to rag chew and play with power settings even. What does this mean? It means that further is most definitely possible. Probably better bookmark this blog for 6-12 months from now, to see what we've done next :). 

Monday, January 15, 2018

Four Eighty Eight

With the completion of the K0D expedition, I was 487/488 on the CONUS grid chase via Satellite. EM41 was the only remainder.  I briefly considered making the drive myself and using a club/1x1 call to wrap it up, but at the same time I kind of wanted to be at the controls of KG5CCI personally for the last one. I decide to be patient, and lo and behold another fellow operator came to the rescue.

Brian, KG5GJT, had a trip planned to Natchez, MS with his wife for their anniversary. Somehow using sweet talking mysticism that I have yet to perfect on my better half, he convinced her to let him do a few satellite passes while they were there. After a few missed attempts on AO-85, on 11/19/2017 at 0356z we made contact on SO-50. EM41 was in the logbook. And then there were none.


All 488 grids in the lower 48 United States were in the log. My first Satellite contact was on July 13th, of 2014, and after making slightly over 4800 QSOs on the birds, 3 years and 4 months later I had em all. Mission Accomplished. 



My global Map Looks pretty good too now - with a big pile of red over the US, much of Mexico, and a portion of Canada, South America, and Europe. 



Even with the chasing, I'm even more proud of my Satellite rover map. In the same time frame I had activated 107 different grids on Satellites. I plan for this map to become more and more populated over the coming years, as it truly is better to give than to receive, and I know I've helped many other chasers on the way to their goal as well. 

Statistics:

As best as I can tell, 164 unique operators were responsible for the 488 grids. That means there was some serious rover action that took place. In some cases (like the W1AW/x calls) I'm really not sure who the operator was, so I left those alone, in other cases were a 1x1 was used by a group of activators, I gave both ops credit. With that in mind, my top 10 looks like this:

AL6D (Also as KM4RTS, NJ7H & K5T) 107 Grids
W5PFG (Also as K5L & K5T) 36 Grids
AC0RA (Also as K0D, K6R, and K5T ) 33 Grids
WD9EWK (Also as W7O) 27 Grids
N6UA 18 Grids
AK4WQ 16 Grids
N4UFO 13 Grids
KX9X (as various KX9X/x) 9 Grids
N9IP 9 Grids
AA5PK 7 Grids

Full Stats in a spreadsheet HERE if you are really that interested.


THANK YOU!

To all the operators along the way, especially the crazy rovers who spend much time and fuel going to places way off the beaten path, to help color in blank squares on a map. Now that this obsession has been put to bed, I can focus on what comes next. 

73!

Monday, January 8, 2018

The K0D Story

Editors Note: This blog was originally published in parts, but for the sake of continuity, I have centralized it all here in this post and removed the other pieces. I hope you enjoy this format more.



The Idea

So back at the end of October 2017, I was staring at my AMSAT grid map, and it looked a little something like this:


I had made a lot of great strides in the world of grid chasing, thanks to a bunch of really great rovers. Alex (N7AGF) Doug (N6UA) Clayton (W5PFG) and Paul (N1PEB) had managed to knock out several of the stragglers in random places around the map that were proving difficult earlier in the fall, then Patrick (WD9EWK) got a couple for me on his way to Reno for the AMSAT symposium, and Gabe (NJ7H, now AL6D) finished out a few of my far western grid pairs on his way to Alaska for a new job. That left me with just a big hole along the DN/EN field line thru the Dakotas, and EM41 to finish out my CONUS map on Satellite. EM41 would come in due time, but figuring out how to deal with that void in the Dakotas was going to be tricky. I could wait for someone else go rove thru the area - which might take years - Or I could take matters into my own hands. I've spent months building a properly functioning remote station here in EM34 that works well enough in most directions. I'm also a fairly accomplished rover in my own right, so activating all the grids and 'working myself' was definitely going to be possible. That said, I was going to need help.


I took the idea to Wyatt, AC0RA, one of the most accomplished rovers in the AMSAT and VHF/UHF community today, and also a good friend. I discussed the possibility of roving to each of the grids I needed over the course of a couple of days, using my parent's QTH in EN21 as kind of a 'home base' due to it's relative closeness to the grids needed. He thought the idea was solid, and agreed to help - I made a map of how to navigate the highways and byways to hit all the grids needed, in the shortest amount of time possible and we had our plan. Then of course, we started adding extras.


Anyone who's been following this blog has been watching my slowly growing fascination with 6m Meteor Scatter. Since these grids were so rare on Satellites, it figured that some might be rare on 6m too. Well, they are. Quite a few actually are in the '3rd rarest' category (yellow) on the FFMA chaser board. Since this rove was going to occur in November, chances of e-skip were basically slim to none, but meteor scatter could work. Also a few of the local big guns in the /0 region (K0SIX especially) needed some of these grids in their final 50 for 6m FFMA. Wyatt knew this too, and suggested the possibility of taking his Rover truck with a modest 6m beam on it so we could do both Satellites and 6. As icing on the cake, since there would be 2 licensed hams in the truck we could theoretically operate in motion with 1 driver and 1 operator. This was something that Wyatt had told me he was interested in trying at some point anyway - as for contests he normally goes out solo. With that it was settled and on the morning of November 9th, 2017 we would head north from EN21 and begin a nearly 2000 mile trip to activate 13 of my 14 remaining AMSAT grids needed to complete the KG5CCI 488 map. We would also operate 6 Meter MSK144 Meteor Scatter in motion, and from certain fixed locations on the rarest grid lines. I applied for the K0D 1x1 special event callsign. Since there were 2 hams, and I would be keeping my personal callsign for my Arkansas station, it would make everything easier from a logging perspective, and keep the operation on the up and up.  I acquired LOTW certs, and setup a simple QRZ page with details for what we were up to. We were set for the rove.


The final piece of the puzzle was how to work 'myself' since I would physically be in North Dakota with Wyatt, using the K0D callsign, and in all likelihood out in the middle of nowhere lacking cell phone reception to remote into KG5CCI myself. I was going to need more help. Luckily another ham friend, Clayton, W5PFG, answered the call, and agreed to operate my station remote during the passes required. We tested the station multiple times to make sure remote operation was functioning correctly, and felt like it was ready.

The idea was simple enough, and the plan was set. The K0D expedition was on.

Day 1: 

November 9th at 4:00AM CDT we were on the road. Wyatt had met me at my Parent's QTH in EN21 near Crescent, IA the night before, and we got everything in the truck ready. Rolling out of bed at an ungodly hour we scarfed some breakfast Mom has prepared and jumped in the truck heading north. We had a long day ahead of us, and had to get moving early. It was ~720 miles to DN98 where we planned to spend the night. The idea was to go north to Sioux Falls as fast as we could, go west thru EN04, and then get on US83 which would parallel the DN9x/EN0x line thru the 5, 6 and 7 grid pairs, then finally pick up DN98 at the end of the night when we crashed in Minot. 8 of the 13 needed KG5CCI grids would be activated in this first day, and the times were going to be tight. The first goal of the day however was EN04 by 8:00AM local, to catch an XW-2A pass. We chatted for a bit once on the road, and at 5:00AM after entering EN12 we got on 50.260 and fired off a CQ:


It didn't take us long to get our first contact. KA8TBW was in the log at 5:08AM from EN12 while driving 75mph down I-29 south of Sioux City, IA. 8 Minutes for the contact with a 3 element beam,  only 3' above the cab of the truck, and 100W from the IC-7300. The 6m in motion idea was really just secondary to the AMSAT grid activation, but already we were making contacts. We knew this was going to be a lot of fun. 


We kept trudging along North on I-29 until Sioux falls, where we headed west on I-90 until Mitchell, SD. We grabbed gas and a Wyatt found a baked breakfast item which he raved about being damn delicious for the rest of the trip. We busted north out of Mitchell and got to the EN03/04 line. I already had EN03 in my Satellite log from Arkansas, but we were at the line so we did both anyway. I remoted into the home station on my phone, and Wyatt ran the IC-910 - 1 quick contact later we were back in the truck. Popular demand on Ping Jockey for some new ones required that we go operate from the EN13/14 line as well, plus our buddy Greg, W0LGQ needed both of them on sideband. I fired up a bit of periscope to capture our shenanigans. 

After screwing around at the corner for close to an hour (but making a ton of contacts on both Satellite and 6m) we headed back northwest again. We had plenty of time at this point, cause the next needed grids weren't until DN95 & EN05, and the next passes that looked favorable were going to be UKUBE-1 and CAS-4B, so we had time. We continued until reaching the town of Gettysburg, SD - just inside EN05 and stopped for gas and lunch at a local diner. It took a little bit to get our food, but the wait was rewarded with a darn good open face hot beef sandwich, which was the special of the day. Loaded up with beefy gravy goodness we headed north until getting out of town a ways, and found a dirt road to operate a CAS-4B pass from, right on the DN95/EN05 line. Wyatt hoisted the 6m beam and I grabbed at the Arrow. 


This particular section of the trip was probably the most delicate time wise - we were still 350 miles from our Motel room for the night, and if something went wrong on these passes there were no other satellite windows with EM34 for several hours. Luckily though everything worked out. W5PFG was running the KG5CCI remote like a boss and picked me up operating as K0D right away. I worked a pile on CAS-4B, and Wyatt worked a bunch on 6M from the line. After about 20 minutes we jumped back in the truck and continued north. A quick hour on the road and we crossed into North Dakota, shortly there after we crossed into DN96 and immediately turned east off the highway onto dirt roads looking for the line. We found it just south of Hague, ND and got setup just in time for another CAS-4B pass (this one a little higher) but still in perfect position to work the entire US West to East.


Once again, I jumped on the IC-910 and Wyatt ran the IC-7300 from the truck. Once again I found W5PFG running the KG5CCI remote, and knocked out 2 more in the 488 chase. North Dakota is a rover's dream land. Flat treeless expanses for miles, clear view of the horizon everywhere. We couldn't have asked for better terrain. 

Back in the truck again, we continued north. One more line op for the night and the hardest batch of satellite grids would be knocked out. Luckily we had many more options now for birds as the early evening brings on the 'XW Train' of Chinese Transponder Satellites, 1 by 1 for almost 3 straight hours. We wound north for almost 2 hours this time, crossing over I-94 just east of Bismark, turning east near the town of Tuttle, ND. The sun was getting lower in the sky, more snow was on the ground, and the thermometer was dropping fast... it was obvious we were getting pretty far north. We found a spot on a reasonably clear road (the initial road we had mapped was covered, and I mean *covered* in ice) and setup operations. This time W5PFG had a family commitment and couldn't run remote, so Wyatt braved the cold and ran the IC-910 on an XW-2C pass as K0D while I remoted into the KG5CCI EM34 station on my laptop from the truck. 


Side Note: I just want to comment on the hilarity that is technology. I was sitting in a pickup in North Dakota, speaking into into a wireless bluetooth headset, connected to my computer, which was connected to a wifi hotspot, via my cell phone, which had established a VoIP link, over the internet, to my computer in Arkansas, that was piped into a radio, which was then transmitted at a Satellite and repeated back down to a receiver, being held by a guy roughly 10ft away from me. I often struggle to explain what I do to non-hams, but on this day, I was struggling to explain what I was doing to myself. 

Anyway, contact was made quickly and I switched spots with Wyatt to let him warm up in the truck and work some 6m. I jumped on AO-85 to give the FM only folks a chance at some rare grids - and then we packed it up and continued heading north. KG5CCI was now 7 for 13 on grids - and the most time sensitive part of the trip was over. Things were looking good. 

The goal for the night was Minot, but on the way we took a small break to meet up with Bill, ND0B, who lives near Harvey, ND. We hooked up with him at the local Pizza Ranch, where we stuffed ourselves silly on buffet pizza and fried chicken. This was my first experience at a Pizza Ranch, and while I'm not sure it'd be my first choice - when it was the only choice, I wasn't disappointed. It was hot, fresh, and plentiful. Considering where we were, I couldn't have asked for much more. After saying our farewells to Bill, we got back on the road, with the final 80 miles or so to go. The stretch of road between Harvey and Minot was amazingly desolate, and we also hit our low temperature of the trip here: 


It was flipping cold. We continued to work 6M MSK144 while in motion, right into the outskirts of Minot. We found our motel for the night, and quickly unpacked. It actually had warmed up a bit - but not much. I believe it was 8°F in the parking lot of the Microtel as we were unloading our gear. I did need DN98 as well, so once again I jumped on the remote and Wyatt fired up the IC-910. This time though, things didn't go quite so well. The pass was a nice high descending FO-29 but for some reason my LinPhone Audio wouldn't connect. The bitter cold had been giving us grief on our devices, but this was something different. I ran inside to my laptop, already on the hotel wifi, but no luck there either. Something had happened to shut down the LinPhone voip proxy servers, and I couldn't connect my audio. This was the only technical failure of the trip, and it happened from a station location with good internet and warm facilities. Murphy had finally got us. I troubleshot for a while that night, but decided it was useless without the proxy server functioning. Exhausted after the drive, and having more options in the morning we made sure all the different battery powered devices were charging and called it a night. 

Day 2:

After 6 (more or less) hours of sleep, we were refreshed and ready for day 2. Over the night the LinPhone proxy server had begun working again, and my VoIP connection to my home re-established. A nice high AO-7 pass (and Wyatt standing in the cold again) and we had KG5CCI in the logs from DN98. 8 down, 5 to go. We got everything packed back up and got on the road shortly after 5AM local. The plan was to head west to DN88/78 Line, and be on site for FO-29 at 7:49AM local time. It was just over a hundred miles, and while snowing - it was cold and windy, so the roads were in fine shape. As soon as we got out of town, we fired up 6m again, and immediately started making Meteor Scatter contacts while in motion. Right about day break we got to our spot on the DN88/78 line and setup. This was the furthest point from home of our Trip, and also the rarest of the grids we planned to hit - both on 6m and on Satellites. Within seconds Wyatt had a pileup, and I setup the IC-910 for a 60° FO-29 pass. W5PFG was running KG5CCI again, and since the reception was good, and we had a bit of time to spare, I fired up some periscope:
After an amazingly successful activation (I worked 21 stations on a single FO-29 pass and Wyatt worked 15 6m stations in about 30 minutes) we packed back up and begun - for the first time - going south. Originally we had thought about meandering over into Montana, but decided instead to shoot down to the DN77/87 line, since we were so close - and there was an SO-50 pass about 30 minutes later that we should easily be able to get too. We kind of aimlessly drove around til we got to a good spot - on what appeared to be a levee next to the Missouri River, direct south of the town of Buford, ND, and setup once again. Unfortunately the reception wasn't the best - so no periscope, but I did snap a selfie after working another ginormous pile on SO-50.


With DN88, DN78, and DN77 in the bag for KG5CCI, 3 more of the 488 had gotten knocked out in a 1 hour time span. Only DN85 and DN73 remained, and those were slated for K0D activation later in the day. We packed up from the line, and continued on the levee we were on, because turning around on the ice might have proven to be a bit tricky. At the end of the levee we surprisingly (and awesomely) found ourselves at the Missouri-Yellowstone River Confluence - which was a cool treat. 


Wyatt did some logging and checked some email while I jumped out and snapped another selfie in front of the sign. I walked down to the river, to pay my respects to Lewis and Clark, and back on the road we went. We meandered just a bit, not knowing exactly where we were going, and ended up in the town of Fairview, MT. We needed gas, and needed food - so we found a Subway, fueled up, and decided the best bet was to go back east a ways to US85 and then south. For the next few hours we traveled south, without really a whole lot to do. And by 'not a whole lot to do' I mean we were kept busy logging, and working 6m in motion, as well as chatting on PingJockey and seeing when the passes would line up from DN85 and DN73. This was the point of the trip that it donned on me, that we'd driven over 1000 miles in the past 24 hours, and time had absolutely flown by. I've always found long trips kind of enjoyable with good company, or a good audio book - but was astonished just how far we'd gone in what seemed like the blink of an eye. A few miles after this epiphany, we did pass thru a small portion of Teddy Roosevelt National Park - and got to see a small piece of the famed 'Badlands' of North Dakota. 


We kept south on US85 until just north of the South Dakota line. We drove west of the highway and found a dirt road on the DN85/86 line. I didn't need DN86 for the KG5CCI 488, but we were there, and figured why not. With W5PFG manning the remote, we quickly hooked up for a contact on AO-7 and were down to 1 to go. Wyatt hoisted the 6m mast and made some good contacts there as well - including some stations far west out in Idaho - which is usually too far for both of us on Meteor Scatter. It had also warmed up significantly, and was near 50° - so we shed some of our polar gear and and repacked for 'warmer' temperatures.

We got back on US85 and kept going south, finally stopping for fuel and snacks in Belle Fourche, SD. Up until this point, we hadn't quite figured out our plan for DN73. It was on the far western side of the Black Hills, and and hotel for the night was in Wall, SD about an hour East of the Black Hills. A wildcard had also been thrown at me, in the form of Nick, UA0ZGX who I had asked for a sked while I was 2000km northwest of where I normally am. The perfect AO-7 pass for him was about 2350z - while the CAS-4B that was going to be the last grid was coming over at 2352z. Working Nick wouldn't get me a new grid, but it would get me another all important DXCC entity, and it would actually complete my WAC requirements. So, we decided to aim for a spot in the Thunder Basin Grassland, northwest of Osage, WY - just inside the line of DN73. I was chancing it to find a spot with a good location, but I figured out there I'd have a much better horizon that I would back closer to the Black Hills. We navigated to the area, found a rise on a pull off on the side of the highway, and setup shop. I fired up periscope, and well, you can see for yourself (Fair warning, some not so nice language was getting used, apologies for that after the fact).
We had pulled it off. Despite from difficulties with noise, frequency coordination, and a language barrier, I had hooked up with UA0GZX as KG5CCI on AO-7, then switched over to CAS-4B, and operating as K0D worked W5PFG operating as KG5CCI from EM34, getting CONUS grid #487 in the logs from Arkansas. In retrospect, watching that live video I have to laugh at myself, but I was pretty overwhelmed at the time. In the course of about 5 minutes I had worked a new DX, completed the WAC Satellite requirements, and had gotten all but one CONUS grid in the logs. I was exhausted from driving and lack of sleep, but I was pumped full of adrenaline from the experience. The hour or so we spent in DN73 on the side of the road was some of the funnest ham radio operating I've ever done.

At the same time all this was going on, Wyatt had been working piles on 6m. We hung out for a while after the passes, since the spot was good and we were working quite a few stations. After about 30 minutes though the pings became less frequent and we decided to pack it in for the night. We had met every satellite goal for the trip - and only experienced one technical failure, which we were able to remedy without too much trouble. The 6m operating (while originally just a side thought) had turned out to be almost as important as the satellite fun, and there were requests for 2 more grids the next morning.

We got back on the road just after dusk, and headed to Wall, SD to crash for the night. We flipped a coin to decide whether to go back to I-90 and around the north side of the Black Hills, or right thru the middle. We opted for the 'thru the middle' path - and were rewarded with a bunch of altitude ear popping and nervous deer alongside the road. It was fun to drive thru the Black Hills again, as I hadn't been there since I was a kid, but I'm not sure I'd make the same choice again after dark trying to make good time. A few hours later we rolled into Wall, found our motel and nearly collapsed. Convinced of the need for a beer after such an epic accomplishment though, we drove a short ways to a local bar, for sandwiches and cold beverages. Hardly able to keep our eyes open we finished our chow and fell down quick like upon return to the room.


Day 3: 

Part of the reason for choosing Wall as our stopping place for the night, was that it put us in perfect position to the DN83/DN93 line - which was another set of extremely rare 6m grids. With meteors being the best in the early AM, we got up at 5AM and drove the 15 minutes or so out to the line just north of the Badlands National Park.


The weather was cool - but nowhere near what it had been up around Minot the previous day - so even though KG5CCI didn't need the grids on Satellites, I setup the IC-910 and Wyatt went to work on the IC-7300. As it was Saturday morning - the typical Ping Jockey weekly gathering time - the pile ups were big. We handed out both grids to 18 chasers in just over an hour of operating. Once again I have to admit that I was amazed what we were getting done with a 3 element yagi at 30' or so, and 100W. For anyone reading this that likes 6m operating, but gives up when E-Skip isn't happening, you're seriously missing out. Meteor Scatter is the bomb diggity. If you're still not convinced just look at Wyatt's face:


That is the picture of a happy, happy ham. Anyhoo.... about 8AM we packed up the station and started heading east again on I-90. We continued to operate in motion on the interstate, picking up a new contact about every 15-20 minutes on average. It doesn't sound like much, but when you consider we were handing out grids AND traveling 75mph down the interstate, it's really pretty amazing. Wyatt decided he needed to make 1 final stop in Mitchell, SD (not hunting the breakfast pocket from 2 days before) but instead to grab some fishing poles at Cabelas. While he was inside I hoisted the mast and hung out in the parking lot making contacts, knocking out a few more 6m QSOs from EN03 that we had missed the 2 days ago on the outbound leg. 


We also, by popular demand from the AMSAT crew, did an SO-50 pass to the west, working a few people that had missed the FO-29 pass a few days ago. After this, we stowed all the gear and decided to shut the RF down and take a nice mellow cruise back to EN21 and talk about the epic adventure we had just completed. 

K0D Statistics & Data

On the AMSAT Side of the House:

14 Passes Worked
19 Grids Activated 
66 Unique calls logged 
184 QSOs Made 
Single Best Pass - 26 Contacts made on SO-50 at 1528z Nov 10th from DN87/77 line.

On the 6M Side:

24 Grids Activated
37 Unique calls logged
108 QSOs Made
2581 MSK144 Transmissions sent
2188 MSK144 Pings decoded
Best Contact Distance - W8BYA in EN61 from DN78/88 Line at 1691.7km

General Stats:

1852 Miles Driven
2591 APRS Messages Sent from K0D-5


Here's a link to all the 6m Logs

And Here's a link to All the 6m contacts we made plotted on Google Maps.


Acknowledgments

It's hard to understate how many moving parts had to come together to make this adventure work. I want to make sure to thank my folks, for letting me and Wyatt use their house to serve as our launching pad before the trip, and our crash pad after the trip, as well as watching my kiddo for a few days while I went 'off to play with radios and space stuff'. I want to thank Bill, ND0B for meeting us for the Pizza in the frozen wastelands of Harvey, ND. I want to send a big thanks Clayton, W5PFG, for running the KG5CCI remote - and for all the advice and mentoring he's given me in the AMSAT world these past few years. And of course I want to thank Wyatt, AC0RA, who was crazy enough to agree to a trip to North Dakota with me, in November, just to fill in a few black squares on a map. Also the use of his pickup and equipment made something possible that I just wouldn't have been able to do solo. Thanks buddy. 

What's Next?

Well, you tell me. I've got some ideas, but they're all a ways out. For now, I'm going to keep writing and keep planning. But the rover bug will never die. We'll see where the grids take me. 

Monday, January 1, 2018

Happy 2018 from KG5CCI

Happy 2018 Ham Radio Readers!


There isn't much substance to this post besides that. I have promised to get better at writing blog entries but thus far I have failed pretty hard. My goal for 2017 was to get a new entry out every 2 weeks - I did not meet that goal, with only 21 entries published during the year. In 2018, I will try harder. Now that I've got the 488 AMSAT chase completed, I SHOULD have more time. I'm also done with school, so I SHOULD have more time. All of these SHOULDs though can quickly get confounded by a gorgeous little blonde girl running around asking Daddy to help her out with things, and let's be serious - You all (and me) would probably be better served with me building and experimenting in the shop and then posting pictures to Twitter rather than writing about it in this blog.. Right? Well OK maybe not.. 

THE POINT of this is I've got a lot more things to write about than I do have time and gumption to actually do the writing. With that in mind, for 2018 I'm going to set my goal the same. One entry, every 2 weeks. I will try my best to hit this goal. I'm going to use the scheduling function of Blogger to make them all come out on Monday morning too - that way every other Monday, you should have something to look forward too... or jeer at me for. Either way, it's entertainment. 

For a little 2018 teaser - here are some of the things I've already started on: 


The K0D Story - Part II
YADR (Yet another Distance Record) on FO-29
Finishing the AMSAT 488 Chase
More Meteor Scatter adventure
Cheap Yagis
Cheap Duplexers
Precision Time Issues
STFU about Millennials in Ham Radio (Written by a Millennial in Ham Radio)


See anything there you like? Good. I hope to make 2018 an enjoyable year. And if not, well that's cool too. 73's Ya'll. 

-Dave, KG5CCI