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"Since 1957 Giving 50 Years of Service to the Community" |
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DBARA Field Day Roundup DBARA has not been involved in Field Day for several years. Clearly most members don’t want to work hard in the summer heat. Yet a few members wanted to experience Field Day (FD). So the first goal was to devise a FD plan that would give folks a good sense of what FD is about without requiring a monumental effort since there would only be a limited number of club participants. The DBARA Board decided to offer a “Keep It Simple” FD with these basic elements: 1) 1 HF station using an existing portable HF setup that is readily available with emergency power; 2) Reserve and use a relatively comfortable location with necessary facilities; 3) Operate only as long as there were operators willing to operate. Input was solicited from the membership but little was received. With this implied consent we proceeded as planned. Return to Top Club Secretary John LoCicero K4TUG (ex KD5IBY) worked with the News-Journal to get a story published about our FD effort. The paper hasn’t published a story…yet but we applaud John’s effort. Keep an eye out for the story in this week’s paper. I need a copy for our FD logs. I believe the most successful publicity for our FD occurred on Citizens Band Channels 27 & 32! I believe that Roger Whedbee KF4JGT of South Daytona (not a DBARA member…yet) is responsible for promoting FD in this manner. I’ll explain more later. Cliff Fraser KE4HIY had the DBARA Coffee Station percolating early. He was setup at Sunrise Park North in Holly Hill early Saturday morning. At 1000 Frank Haas KB4T planted big signs at the entrance to the park and along the route to the pavilion where the station would be located. Return to Top Dave Lammers AE4DL (ex-AE4DL (ex-AE4DL (ex-KF4UFA))), Bob Ledford WA4IDI, Paul Milward AB4PM and John Tamm W4TAM all helped get two HF stations setup and configured. By 1130 one station was setup for CW and another for SSB. Only one of these would be used at a time but switching between the two would only take moments. By Noon we had more visitors. Greg Petit KF4JGU of Holly Hill and John Bisanti KG4ZFU of South Daytona had arrived. Greg brought a big cooler with drinks and water. Greg also brought a complete HF and VHF station that operated completely off battery power. John put the station on 40 meters using an MFJ portable HF Antenna system. This changed our classification from 1A to 2A but it was great to have the additional capability. (Greg and John are not members of DBARA…yet.) The BYOL (Bring your own lunch) didn’t go quite as planned. With all the radios working and being tested on the air, along with adjustments to antennas and the usual ham camaraderie everyone ate more or less as the opportunity presented. At 1400 FD began. AB4PM lead the charge on 20m SSB with help from different logging assistants. Paul made most of the 20m SSB contacts. At various times during the afternoon, several operators took their turns at the 20m SSB station. John KG4ZFU, assisted by various operators, made most of the contacts on 40m SSB. I believe all of the VHF contacts were made by Greg KF4JGU. Interesting funny occurred while Frank and Paul were operating together. Paul was doing the talking and Frank was doing the logging and asking questions at the time. Picture this now, the two of them with headphones on that fit rather tightly, trying to out shout each other while querying each other “which one, that one, who, him!” It was so funny but one of those naturally occurring incidents that we all have done at one time or another in our operating careers. (Wa4idi) Return to Top During the day we were visited by 3 members of the local Citizens Band community. I asked everyone who visited how they found out about our activity. Three visitors told me that they had heard about it on CB Channel 27 or 32. They all said there was considerable on-air discussion about the ham activity at the park in Holly Hill. They were curious enough to make the trip and see for themselves what was going on. One of the CB visitors actually took a turn on the 20m SSB station and made a few contacts. Club members that visited during the day were: Club Prez Tom Davies AA3AS Ed Mitchell AA1ED Harold Mitchell N1XBG and his wife Shirley Bob Brannigan W2EJG who also copied the special W1AW FD Bulletin that netted us a 100 point bonus Art Byrnes KA4WDK who rode in on his Segway and gave a great demo even allowing some folks to take a test drive. Dave Calder N4ZKF brought more antenna weatherproofing gifts Jeff Mathews KG4DHZ who took a turn operating the 20M station with AB4PM Steve Szabo WB4OMM, K4BV Club License Trustee, who visited to make sure we were adhering to all FCC rules and regulations. No rules were broken in the making of this FD! However, some may been bruised. Other visitors included: Darrell Brock, N4GOA, Ormond Beach Bill Beyer N2WB, Ormond Beach (Peter 1/3Y0X Operator) David Weiss N1DOU, Holly Hill Police Officer (not active at the moment) Bob Elger KI4FPL (Former DBARA Member) Greg Petti, KF4JGU, brought his Icom 706 and a VHF/UHF antenna John Bisanti, KF4ZFU, brought his new MFJ Active Antenna to try out. The general public strolled by and took a look. In all perhaps a dozen or so different people inquired about what we were up to. Jackie Shutack, a reporter for Channel 13 (Brighthouse Networks News channel) stumbled into our operation as she was searching for another story on shoreline restoration. She spent a little time with us to get a sense of what we were doing and promised to return later once she finished the story on which she was working. Several hours later, Jackie returned but told us that Brighthouse was doing a FD story on a group in Orlando so she couldn’t. She asked us to contact her next time we do something outdoorsy and interesting so she could cover it. We got her card! Rain visited us 3 times during the day. Thanks to Cliff Fraser KE4HIY and Bob Ledford WA4IDI, two tarps were tied into position to protect the gear. Around 1815 most everyone had left. When the last two operators stood up from the rig around 1830, we began the tear down. By 1915 the location was cleaner than when we arrived and we headed to the house. Thank you to EVERYONE who helped put gear together and take it down. Thank you to EVERYONE who visited and provided support for the activity. The log doesn’t show all that many contacts but we did earn lots of bonus points. More importantly, we: 1) Demonstrated ham radio to the public; 2) showed a number of non-members that DBARA knows how to have a fun day; 3) Gave a bunch of new hams a chance to get a taste of what FD is like; 4) Showed that it’s possible to mount a workable FD effort without going to extremes both in terms of rigs used and discomfort. We learned some interesting lessons. 1) We need better antennas to compete against the QRM and pileups created by FD activity. 2) We need a little more separation between the kibitzers and the operating stations! 3) It’s possible to make contacts with even the most limited of antenna systems as long as you are patient and skillful. 4) It’s possible to put together a successful FD effort with a limited station. 5) Club members can contribute to FD in a meaningful way without committing to a long time investment or suffering through hot weather. From what this reporter could tell, everyone had a great time. The core group of about a dozen that hung in the whole day seemed to really enjoy the company of their peers and the activity underway. Everyone seemed to get along well. Everyone helped where they could. The camaraderie was inspiring. All during the day I kept thinking to myself, “This is what FD should be.”
Field Day - 2006 The DBARA group decided to take an entirely new approach to the annual ARRL Field Day contest. This year we were going to participate in FD but the goal was to have fun, not kill ourselves and still prove to ourselves that we could provide emergency communications if need be. The following digital photos are a very brief representation of the groups efforts. The location was the City of Holly Hill, FL park on Riverside Drive at LPGA Blvd. If I have anyone's name, call sign or other errors please tell me so it can be fixed in a hurry. Thanks!
Updated: Tuesday, January 30, 2007 |
"Motto for 2008 "Let the good times roll!" |
