{"id":7107,"date":"2025-06-29T12:05:00","date_gmt":"2025-06-29T20:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/?p=7107"},"modified":"2025-06-29T12:05:01","modified_gmt":"2025-06-29T20:05:01","slug":"2025-islandhf-field-day-post-mortem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/2025\/06\/29\/2025-islandhf-field-day-post-mortem\/","title":{"rendered":"2025 IslandHF Field Day Post Mortem"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Despite our remarkably modest score, I think that IHF can declare that the FD event was a success for us!&nbsp; What can be better than playing with radios in the sunshine?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The concept of a QRP station running on batteries certainly simplifies the logistics, but we were definitely at a disadvantage to other entries that were running 100 \u2013 1500 watts! Because of our low power signal, sending CQ on CW brought few responses; over 95% of our CW QSO\u2019s were a result of \u201csearch &amp; pounce\u201d operations where our weak signal was less of a handicap.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Alan\u2019s antenna was his version of a design that is commonly known as the \u201cPOTA Performer\u201d, which relies on a resonant vertical whip and resonant elevated radials.&nbsp; When adjusted properly (<em>using Alan\u2019s built-in tape measures<\/em>), this antenna provides a good match to 50 ohms without the use of an antenna tuner.&nbsp; Here is info on the original design: <a href=\"https:\/\/whiteriverradio.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/POTA-PERformer-Antenna-by-KJ6ER-2023-03-1-1.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">https:\/\/whiteriverradio.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/POTA-PERformer-Antenna-by-KJ6ER-2023-03-1-1.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Andy was using a broadband antenna made by Chameleon.&nbsp; The secret is in the \u201cmagic\u201d white module at the bottom (<em>it looks like a loading coil, but isn\u2019t<\/em>) that they call the \u201cHybrid\u201d.&nbsp; The hybrid is actually a uniquely designed step-up transformer that works with the radiating element (<em>either an extendable whip or the end-fed wire<\/em>) to provide an acceptable (<em>but not perfect<\/em>) match on most of the ham bands.&nbsp; It is actually possible to use this antenna without a tuner, but we were using tuners on both radios to ensure a good match.&nbsp;&nbsp; Brian and I both expressed a small degree of skepticism about the inner workings of the Hybrid, as we both believe that it introduces loss as part of it\u2019s broadband matching function.&nbsp;&nbsp; Very little has been published about the Hybrid\u2019s design, but about a year ago I saw an article written by a VK ham who had very carefully taken one apart, traced the schematic, and performed some loss measurements.&nbsp; As I recall, the losses were typically 3 dB or higher.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thinking about next year, we might want to use the same QTH again.&nbsp; It had nearby washrooms and food, was easy to get to (for three of us) and was close to the water.&nbsp; It might be nice to have more power, but battery operation worked well this time!&nbsp; The bandpass filters worked fine, and we had no problems with cross-band interference or front-end overload.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Knocking off at 4 pm or earlier is ideal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>73,&nbsp; Roger<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Despite our remarkably modest score, I think that IHF can declare that the FD event was a success for us!&nbsp; What can be better than playing with radios in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-field-day","category-general-interest"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7107"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7107\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7108,"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7107\/revisions\/7108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/islandhf.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}