It’s time!
Russ, Jim and I put the antenna to the test in New Zealand ZL ham radio / amateur radio field day (the Jock White contest).
A 250m long wire over a gully, what could go wrong?!
Enjoy! 🙂
Category: Radio Runner
Radio Runner Chris from NZ
We get it done!
It’s not properly tuned, but it works and we do a very quick field test!
Enjoy!
ZL4RA – Radio Runner
Ham Radio, QRP, SOTA, Portable Radio, ZL, VK, Antennas, Amateur Radio, Long wire, CW, SSB, Bananas, Random Words
I asked Russ if he had any large capacity batteries I could pinch for Jock White Field Day in ZL this year – the next thing you know we’re a team of three building an antenna the size of the moon.
Absolutely magnificent, we really broke the back of the job today – we just need to tension the wire to see where our feed point needs to be, drop it back down and then wire in a feeder and a couple of 1/4 wave legs for the bands we want to use and we’ve got ourselves an antenna.
Should be an absolute monster with no trouble busting through local QRM on 80 meters!
Hopefully Omicron doesn’t make a mess of our plans for next weekend!
Enjoy!
ZL4RA – Radio Runner
Ham Radio, QRP, SOTA, Portable Radio, ZL, VK, Antennas, Amateur Radio, Long wire, CW, SSB, Bananas, Random Words
Stoked to finally be back in the hills with my radio!
Thanks for coming along with me and the pup for a little adventure up Brow Peak in Queenstown New Zealand to net some solid low power international radio contacts!
Summits on the Air
Ham Radio
Random Words
Banana Hammock
This week we take an old friend into classic New Zealand gold mining country in part of the Remarkables Conservation Area near Queenstown in the South Island of New Zealand.
We set up a small portable radio station on a summit and work 24 stations in New Zealand, Australia and Japan using very low power QRP ham radio.
With the South Island of New Zealand finally free of lockdown, I head back into the mountains for a little hiking trip up into my own back yard!
We walk up the Arrow river, rich with old gold mining history as it winds its way up the valley towards the derelict town of Macetown.
We throw a right off the Macetown "road" and head up the New Chum Ridge Track, head left onto the sparse Miners Route and then shoot up off trail to the 1108m spot height. There are expansive views throughout the Wakatipu basin of Arrowtown and Queenstown, and many of the basins feature peaks such as The Remarkables, Coronet Peak, Cecil Peak, Walter Peak, Mt Sale, Crown Peak, Brow Peak, Ben Lomond, Bowen Peak, Mt Soho and Cardrona.
On the summit we have a crack at a little bit of ham radio (summits on the air) and make contact with stations as far away as Japan using voice (SSB) and also morse code! (CW).
There was also some "exceptionally good" wildlife, nature and particularly bird photography/videography done. I apologise in advance for this, it was terrible.
Please enjoy, and get outside and explore if you can! 🙂
Join Chris (ZL4RA), Roly (ZL1BQD), Geoff (ZL3GA) and Mark (ZL3AB) as they guide me through a typical QRP portable ham radio expedition to a SOTA summit.
I take no responsibility for the actions of others, or myself.
I have not been into the wilderness for over a month, this is old footage, please send help.
Injuries suck, but who better to learn more about the topic from than from Adam, an amateur radio operator and also long time, highly experienced SAR (Search & Rescue) team member.
https://www.youtube.com/c/K6ARKPortableRadio
With the world turned upside down it was only a matter of time before the "Big D" AKA delta variant of COVID-19 showed up – so we’re taking it slow!
Adam K6ARK from the San Diego Mountain Rescue Team tells us the basics in terms of clothing for operating radio in the great outdoors!