I enjoyed the trip to the 2011 Huntsville Hamfest.. It was the second Huntsville reunion with my buddy John K4KQZ from Columbia TN. We met on the air a while back and discovered we had worked together 30 years ago. It was also a pleasure having a new ham Marv KK4DKT along on the trip. He made a new HT purchase at the fest. The highlight of the trip was the Flying High QRP Contest on Monte Sono State park only a few miles from downtown. The contest was hosted by Craig Behren NM4T at a nice cabin in the park. I met a number of QRPers including Randy Moore KS4L from Huntsville. Craig had setup several antennas and Randy provided an Elecraft K3 to operate. We had BBQ and pie for eats. Then two teams formed with a pilot, co-pilot and navigator. The pilots did the operating supported by the co-pilot and navigator. I volunteered to be a pilot encouraged by Marv. The two teams had 45 minutes to operate. There were multipliers for states and DX and a bonus for getting an QRP ACRI numbers. The other team went for DX having the highest multiplier. They snagged three. My team went for anything we could find and worked 5 states. The math revealed that five states was 10 points ahead of three DX contacts. So I was very fortunate to win a Ten Tec R4020 two band QRP rig. This rig is one that fits my portable style of operating as it covers 40 and 20 with batteries inside the small case. The digital display and features are very nice. The receiver is excellent. I plan to try it out this weekend. I also won a drawing for pick of any RadioWavz antenna. I decided to pass this on to Marv and he can use an antenna for his HF rig he just received from a friend. We chose an 80 meter OCF which should cover 80, 40, 20 and 10. The QRP gathering was great and lots of prizes. Craig says there will be more QRP activities at the 2012 Huntsville Hamfest. I definitely plan to attend. Enjoy the photos below.
Greg N4KGL
I enjoy Rapid Deployment Amateur Radio, Field Days, QRP, satellites, and CW. I have many friends in the hobby that make it fun. I will keep you posted on what I learn about amateur radio on this blog.