1st time POTA activation

I went out with DG7PX and DO4HAA for a POTA activation. 

Park reference: DA-0138 nr Hamburg

See the german article here: https://draussenfunker.de/aktivitaeten/

We made a video (which is in german):

Portable St Peter Ording Beach [JO44HG]

Hi guys!

The fibrepole on the Radiojeep :)

One time per year we go to St Peter Ording beach. This time we had the chance to play with a whole bunch of equipment. We had the ICOM 7300 and the FT-817 running. Martin, DL8LBY, did a bunch of Qs with QRP power and the MP-1 Antenna which actually works surprisingly well in beachy environment. 

I had plenty of time to configure N1MM logger and optimize settings for the upcoming contest. We made CW and RTTY contacts to a couple of DXs (even Japan and Indonesia).

The antenna for the ICOM was a 9m piece of wire, tied to the Spiderbeam fibrepole. At the feedpoint there was the SCG 2000 automatic tuner.

Unfortunately the bandconditions were very poor and so we shut down at 23h local time, brought down the antenna in pitch black and muddy environment.

The MP-1 portable antenna

Next year we'll try some QRO instead of QRP to math the band conditions ;)

73 and thanks for all the QSOs!

CQ WW DX Contest RTTY portable

On Sunday I did participate in the CQ WW RTTY Contest for the first time. I usually don't do RTTY at all so it was kind of challenging to set it all up. In the end it was real fun and I had a few nice runs but most of the time I did S&P. 

The setup was: N1MM with MMTTY, a single USB cable to the ICOM IC 7300, RG58 to the HLA300V, 30m RG58 to my triband dipole at 30m between two huge trees.

After the first testruns holy smoke came out of the HLA300. A capacitor broke into two pieces and so I had to compete with 100W from the Icom. If you own a HLA300 be careful on RTTY! (Pro Tip :D )

After 10 hours of RTTY I went QRT, got down the antenna and drove back home. 

That was a nice contest to prepare for the upcoming CQ WW SSB contest. I now have a list with things to prepare, change and to carry with me. (I.e. a head lamp to get down the antenna in the dark) 

CU in contest! 
73 / Andy