[Fourlanders] Field Day Summary

[Bob Lear]

W4NH did FD at the W4ZST QTH for a second time last weekend.  Last year 
we were 3A portable on commercial power operating in Great White.  This 
year, we decided that we valued air conditioning higher than the 
portable operating class so we went with class 4E, which is a home 
station with the transceivers operating on emergency power.  This is 
better than 4D (home station on commercial power) as you can make 
contact with all the other classes.  (D's cannot work other D's)  It 
also gives some bonus points for being on emergency power.

We sure had an excellent turnout of operators and visitors.  Full time 
ops and Saturday night sleepovers were:  Bob W4ZST, Tom K4TJD, Scott 
NN4W, Jim K4KXY, Ron WW8RR, Jim WE8W, Dusty NR4N, Kim WG8S and Ivan 
K4VJM.  Other regular Fourlander ops who came part time were Bill KI4US, 
Jeff W0ONR, Brian NX9O with N9KHC Anna and the kids Claire KK4JJT, 
Duncan and Eilis, Chris W4ONT with Mary W4MWP, Lee K4UJL with Seth and 
Tom W4SDR with Audrey.  Visting from the North GA ARC were Dan Bosanko 
KJ4YZP, Diana White KB4SNU and Joe Lello KF4AX.

Band Captains for the four stations were:  Scott NN4W with his Elecraft 
K3 mainly on 15m, Tom K4TJD with his K3 mainly on 40m, Bob W4ZST with a 
K3 borrowed from Tom on 20m, and Jim W4KXY with his FT-2000 on the 6m 
station.  We did have some problems, both with wiring and interference 
and even with AC, most of which we got straightened out.  Probably 
should have done more testing of the stations together and on the air 
than we did on the workday.  Computers seemed to be the most prevalent 
problems during the contest.  The K-3's are excellent radios and lots of 
folks got to check them out when they operated.

For antennas we used the usual FourLanders 6m stacked beams, as we 
decided to set them up now to use for FD and also for the July CQWW VHF 
contest coming up.  Ron brought his tower trailer and set up a Mosely Jr 
tri-band beam which was used pretty much for 20m.  There was a 40/80 
trap dipole inverted Vee hanging off the 6m tower and another dipole 
inverted vee (for 40m) hanging off the tribander tower.  We also used a 
tri-band R-3 vertical on one of the stations.  There were some interactions.

You would think that with this many experienced (?) hams that we 
wouldn't have pulled extension cords without checking polarity, but of 
course we did and had a minor problem with that which we solved.  No 
radios or accessories were seen being relieved of internal smoke.

We wouldn't be the FourLanders if we didn't mention our food situation. 
  About 8 of us met at Rooster's for lunch on Saturday and 3 went to 
Johnny B's after we got the antennas set up.  Then another great treat 
for Saturday evening, Chris brought BBQ Pork from Mike and Ed's in 
Auburn again along with some italian sausages that he smoked.  I made a 
large batch of cole slaw and that made one heck of a good meal.  Anna 
brought a marshmallow cookie pan for dessert.  I also cooked Pancakes 
and Sausage for breakfast Sunday morning and we had enough leftovers and 
such to carry us through lunch on Sunday.  Scott had also made a 
crock-pot of meatballs for late night Saturday and that and the leftover 
pizzas made for our lunch on Sunday.  We ate and drank well as usual in 
the true FourLanders tradition.

Even with all the eating and drinking, some contacts on the radio were 
made, believe it or not!!

Band Summary:
Band	CW Q's	Phone Q's
6m	1	30
15m	120	4	
20m	198	325
40m	171	35
total	2748 + 450 bonus points for a total of 3198

All transceivers were running 100W.  We were pretty disappointed in the 
6m results as we had hoped for an opening like last year.  The band had 
been good the week before FD, but that's what happens.  15m was also 
disappointing in activity and 10m appeared to be dead.  We never even 
tried out 80m which is usually good for a lot of nighttime Q's.  So I 
expect we will be in the middle of class 4E when we get the final 
published results.  We get an additional 400 points for the emergency 
power and 50 points for submitting the results via the web.

We should probably do some better planning next year and also schedule 
operators a little better than we did this time.  Also maybe some stub 
filters will help out the interstation interference problems that we 
have experienced.

Thanks to those who came up for the workday and also for cranking down 
and checking the 6m antennas after the contest was over.  I know it was 
hot outside then for sure.  Also thanks to Tom K4TJD for supplying the 
Honda generator which did the job efficiently and very quietly.  Most 
special thanks to Chris W4ONT for bringing the excellent BBQ from Auburn 
and also for smoking the Italian sausages at home on Saturday morning. 
He brought a Weber grill to warm things up here for supper Saturday 
night.  Thanks again Chris.

And thanks to all who participated and helped set up and operate FD 
again for the FourLanders, W4NH.

73, Bob W4ZST