[UK-CONTEST] GU4CHY/P SSB FD

[Richard Allisette]

GU4CHY/P

SSB Field Day, Restricted section

 

As the embers of the barbecue flicker into dust, the pile of beer caps grow. The Zepp rocks gently in the breeze between its 50ft support poles.

Meanwhile, the off-duty ops soak up the sun as the Run operator works his way through the first 10 metre pile up of Cycle 24; "little-knob" man occasionally croaking "have we worked ZK2 yet?"

This was what I had envisaged when Chris G3SJJ suggested a few members of the GU8D IOTA team get together in Guernsey for an SSB Field Day entry.

The reality was somewhat different. A Force 8 gale, driving horizontal rain, a single 50ft mast that snapped at 40ft five minutes after being erected, and a 10 metre band that was quieter than a very dead church mouse.

Given the forecast, it was decided early on that no tent that we owned would survive 60knot gusts on a clifftop and so we went down the Triple A route of becoming White Van men for the weekend.

The extended double Zepp was erected as an inverted vee at 40ft as the weather conditions meant that putting up one mast was going to test us enough. It worked well (i.e it didn't fall down).

I have often wondered when geekiness turns to full insanity. As we lowered the mast for the fourth time to attend to a runaway halyard and the rain trickled into nooks and crannies I didn't realise I possessed, I felt I had found my answer.

Conditions seemed average on 80/40/20 metres with the peak for us being the early hours of Sunday morning. There were some strange mults missed. Not one HA station was heard over the weekend and never before have I pleaded with a  non-contesting SM station for  a QSO on 40m. On Sunday morning 15 did open for a little while though it sounded more like 6 with stations S9 one minute and S1 30 seconds later. 10 just went walkabout.

Other than the weather, Murphy left us in peace - apart from a few attacks of RF in the CAT control when we switched to 80m. Putting ferrites on everything other than the operator's neck seemed to cure  things, though we did occasionally loose an external keyboard connection for no apparent reason.

At least the sun shone on Sunday and the wind finally dropped below Force 6 ten minutes after taking the mast down.

Despite everything it was great fun. Thanks for the QSOs and roll on next year.

Ops: G3SJJ, G3SVL, G3ZQH, GU4EON, GU4CHY

Gear: FT1000MP MkV, Extended Double Zepp, N1MM networked to two laptops, Renault Trafic Master.

Score:  306,185

Band   QSOs   Points   Countries 

3.5      298       1195     22

7         261       1036     28 

14       256       940       33

21          13         50       11

28            1           2         1

Total    829       3223      95

You'll find some pix of our weekend here: http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/gu4eon/SSBFD2008#

 

73 Dick GU4CHY