A View of QRPTTF from Ellicott Rock
Special to The Sojourner
Ellicott Rock is located in the Chatooga River at the corner of the borders of Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina. Les had actually scouted the site a few weeks before the contest but on the day of the contest we traveled a different trail to the site. It was supposed to be easier but longer.
The two-mile planned hike-in was actually 3.3 miles. I was packing about 40 pounds of gear and Les and George Allgood, K4PYM, of Walhalla, SC were carrying about half that. It took about 1.5 hours to get to the site and another half hour to set up.
I started off on 20 meters with a ground plane and Index Labs QRP+ transceiver and later switched back and forth between 20- and 40-meters using a ground plane for 20 meters and W3EDP antenna with LDG QRP tuner for 40.
The ground plane was lashed to a post on a small island in the Chatooga River about 20 feet from the operating site. The W3EDP longwire was an inverted L at about 25 feet. Les used a NORCAL-40A and Backpacker II (on 20 meters) with an end fed wire.
George used a Dentron 20-meter transceiver with a zepp antenna and tuner.
We found out quickly that multi-station operation caused too much front-end overload for more than one operator at a time. So we began a little shift work.
Both 40- and 20-meters sounded good considering that we were at the base of two hills that were several thousand feet higher than us. But we did enjoy the great outdoors and the perfect weather.
We heard many more stations than we actually worked. The activity on 40 meters was heavy at times.
Things learned:
- We need much better receiver front-ends to allow multi-station operation.
- Take less gear, especially if you're hiking any distance.
- Two simple antennas are more flexible than just one.
As a team, our QRPTTF score for three hours of operation was 30,320 points.
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Sam Billingsley, AE4GX, is a QRPer living in Atlanta.