Many due to Conrad (N2YCH), who shares the next subject report:
by Conrad (N2YCH)
Silver Sands State Park in Connecticut borders the Northern shoreline of Lengthy Island Sound and is situated in Milford, a city on the Western facet of New Haven County. There’s a subject between the parking zone and the sound that could be a good “parks on the air” activation location. There aren’t any energy strains close by. It’s very flat with no bushes, so there may be nothing to dam the sign. It’s very straightforward to entry and has a spectacular view.
Native hams go to to do POTA often, and we regularly run into one another there. A kind of hams likes to construct and take a look at antennas and dubbed the park the unofficial “antenna testing grounds.” I’ve additionally used the park to check a lot of totally different antennas myself, and at the moment’s submit particulars the maiden voyage of a model new Buddipole Buddistick Professional antenna that I acquired as a vacation reward.
After utilizing a Buddipole vertical as my major antenna for years for POTA activations, I used to be to see if the Buddistick Professional measured up. What makes the Buddistick fascinating is how compact it’s. It breaks down and suits into the zippered case it comes with, however when put collectively, stands tall.
There are a lot of movies and evaluations of this antenna on-line, so I don’t need to re-hash what’s already been reviewed many occasions earlier than. Nonetheless, I did need to share how this labored for me.
Setting this up was a breeze; it took just some minutes. I did carry alongside my RigExpert antenna analyzer to regulate it for resonance. I adopted the directions on the place to faucet the coil and the way a lot counterpoise to let loose. Every thing is clearly marked, and the directions let you know the place to start. Nonetheless, the directions are simply the place to begin. I needed to transfer the coil faucet a number of turns to get the studying the place I wished it. Utilizing the coil does slim up the bandwidth considerably, so it’s vital to check it to see when you have it tuned for minimal mirrored on the frequency you need to function at. Upon getting it tuned, you may go away the faucets in place so that you don’t have to do that every time.
One factor I wasn’t ready for was frozen floor on the park. The temperature right here in Connecticut has been beneath freezing for a number of weeks, and the bottom on the park was frozen strong, stopping me from utilizing my electrical fencepost to assist the counterpoise. I improvised and used my Jeep bumper to carry it up.
As soon as I used to be all arrange, I linked the RF cable to my Elecraft KX2 to function QRP utilizing FT8 on 20 meters. I hit the ATU button on the KX-2, and it shortly discovered a 1.0:1 match.
Subsequent, I linked the pc, synched the clock, and referred to as CQ. I had a pile-up instantly.
I exploit the pskreporter.data map to get an thought of how properly my antenna is performing. Contemplating that I used to be operating QRP, I used to be glad to see I used to be reaching the West Coast.
So, how did I do? In a single hour, I accomplished 32 QSO’s with three of these being park to park contacts. I maintained a gradual stream of callers all through the activation. The protection exceeded my expectations.
Gear Listing
The Buddistick Professional, when packed neatly in its case, slides proper right into a normal-sized backpack with ease, together with the radio, pc, and a spare battery. For me, it will likely be an excellent, mild companion antenna for the KX2 whereas doing POTA or SOTA.
