It is likely that - almost no matter where you were - you were aware that a solar eclipse occurred in the Western U.S. in the middle of October, 2023.  Wanting to go somewhere away from the crowds - but along the middle of the eclipse path - we went to an area in remote west-central Utah in the little-known Conger Mountains.

Clint, KA7OEI operating CW in K-6085 with Conger mountain and the JPC-7 loaded dipole in the background. Click on the image for a larger version.

Having lived in Utah most of my life, I hadn't even heard of this mountain range even through I knew of the several (nearly as obscure) ranges surrounding it.  This range - which is pretty low altitude compared to many nearby - peaks out at only about 8069 feet (2460 Meters) ASL and is roughly 20 miles (32km) long.  With no incorporated communities or paved roads anywhere nearby we were, in fact, alone during the eclipse, never seeing any other sign of civilization:  Even at night it was difficult to spot the glow of cities on the horizon.

For the eclipse we set up on BLM (Bureau of Land Management) land which is public:  As long as we didn't make a mess, we were free to be there - in the same place - for up to 14 days, far more than the three days that we planned.  Our location turned out to be very nice for both camping and our other intended purposes:  It was a flat area which lent itself to setting up several antennas for an (Amateur) radio propagation experiment, it was located south and west of the main part of the weather front that threatened clouds, and its excellent dark skies and seeing conditions were amenable to setting up and using my old 8" Celestron "Orange tube" C-8 reflector telescope.

(Discussion of the amateur radio operations during the eclipse are a part of another series of blog entries - the first of which is here:  Multi-band transmitter and monitoring system for Eclipse monitoring (Part 1) - LINK)

Activating K-6085

Just a few miles away, however, was Conger Mountain itself - invisible to us at our camp site owing to a local ridge - surrounded by the Conger Mountain BLM Wilderness Area, which happens to be POTA (Parks On The Air) entity K-6085 - and it had never been activated before.  Owing to the obscurity and relative remoteness of this location, this is not surprising.

Even though the border of the wilderness area was less than a mile away from camp as a crow files, the maze of roads - which generally follow drainages - meant that it was several miles driving distance, down one canyon and up another:  I'd spotted the sign for this area on the first day as we our group had split apart, looking for good camping spots, keeping in touch via radio.

Just a few weeks prior to this event I spent a week in the Needles District of Canyonlands National Park where I could grab a few hours of POTA operation on most days, racking up hundreds of SSB and CW contacts - the majority of being the latter mode (you can read about that activation HERE).  Since I had already "figured it out" I was itching to spend some time activating this "new" entity and operating CW.  Among those others in our group - all of which but one are also amateur radio operators - was Bret, KG7RDR - who was also game for this and his plan was to operate SSB at the same time, on a different band.  As we had satellite Internet at camp (via Starlink) we were able to schedule our operation on the POTA web site an hour or so before we were to begin operation.

In the late afternoon of the day of the eclipse both Bret and I wandered over, placing our stations just beyond the signs designating the wilderness study area (we read the signs - and previously, the BLM web site - to make sure that there weren't restrictions against what we were about to do:  There weren't.) and several hundred feet apart to minimize the probability of QRM.  While Bret set up a vertical, non-resonant end-fed wire fed with a 9:1 balun suspended from a pole anchored to a Juniper, I was content using my JPC-7 loaded dipole antenna on a 10' tall studio light stand/tripod.

Bret, KG7RDR, operating 17 Meter SSB - the mast and vertical wire antenna visible in the distance. Click on the image for a larger version.

Meanwhile, Bret cast his lot on 17 meters and was having a bit more difficulty getting stations - likely due in part to the less-energetic nature of 17 meter propagation at that instant, but also due to the fact that unlike CW POTA operation where you can be automatically detected and "spotted" on the POTA web site, SSB requires that someone spot your signal for you if you can't do it yourself:  Since we had no phone or Internet coverage at this site, he had to rely on someone else to do this for him.  Despite these challenges, he was able to make several dozen contacts.

Back at my station I was kept pretty busy most of the time, rarely needing to call CQ - except, perhaps, to refresh the spotting on the RBN and to do a legal ID every 10 minutes - all the while making good use of the narrow CW filter on my radio.

As it turned out, our choice to wait until the late afternoon to operate meant that our activity spanned two UTC days:  We started operating at the end of October 14 and finished after the beginning of October 15th meaning that with a single sitting, each of us accomplished two activations over the course of about 2.5 hours.  All in all I made 85 CW contacts (66 of which were made on the 14th) while Bret made a total of 33 phone contacts.

We finally called it quits at about the time the sun set behind a local ridge:  It had been very cool during the day and the disappearance of the sun caused it to get cold very quickly.  Anyway, by that time we were getting hungry so we returned to our base camp.

Back at camp - my brother and Bret sitting around the fake fire in the cold, autumn evening after dinner. Click on the image for a larger version.

My station

My gear was the same as that used a few weeks prior when I operated from Canyonlands National Park (K-0010):  An old Yaesu FT-100 equipped with a Collins mechanical CW filter feeding a JPC-7 loaded dipole, powered from a 100 amp-hour Lithium-Iron-Phosphate battery.  This power source allowed me to run a fair bit of power (I set it to 70 watts) to give others the best-possible chance of hearing me.

As you would expect, there was absolutely no man-made noise detectable from this location as any noise that we would have heard would have been generated by gear that we brought, ourselves.  I placed the antenna about 25' (8 meters) away from my operating position, using a length of RG-8X as the feedline, placing it far enough away to eliminate any possibility of RFI - not that I've ever had a problem with this antenna/radio combination.

I did have one mishap during this operation.  Soon after setting up the antenna, I needed to re-route the cable which was laying on the ground, among the dirt and rocks, and I instinctively gave it a "flip" to try to get it to move rather than trying to drag it.  The first couple of "flips" worked OK, but every time I did so the cable at the far end was dragged toward me:  Initially, the coax was dropping parallel with the mast, but after a couple flips it was at an angle, pulling with a horizontal vector on the antenna and the final flip caused the tripod and antenna to topple, the entire assembly crashing to the ground before I could run over and catch it.

The result of this was minor carnage in that only the (fragile!) telescoping rods were mangled.  At first I thought that this would put an end to my operation, but I remembered that I also had my JPC-12 vertical with me which uses the same telescoping rods - and I had a spare rod with that antenna as well.  Upon a bit of inspection I realized, however, that I could push an inch or so of the bent telescoping rod back in and make it work OK for the time-being and I did so, knowing that this would be the last time that I could use them.

The rest of the operating was without incident, but this experience caused me to resolve to do several things:

• Order more telescoping rods.  These cost about $8 each, so I later got plenty of spares to keep with the antenna.
  

• Do a better job of ballasting the tripod.  I actually had a "ballast bag" with me for this very purpose, but since our location was completely windless, I wasn't worried about it blowing over.
  

• If I need to re-orient the coax cable, I need to walk over to the antenna and carefully do so rather than trying to "flip" it get it to comply with my wishes.

* * *

Epilogue:  I later checked the Reverse Beacon Network to see if I was actually getting out during my initial attempt to operate on 30 meters:  I was, having been copied over much of the Continental U.S. with reasonably good signals.  I guess that everyone there was more interested in the DX!

P.S.  I really need to take more pictures during these operations!

This page stolen from ka7oei.blogspot.com

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As I am wont to do, I recently spent a week camping in the "Needles" district of Canyonlands National Park.  To be sure, this was a bit closer to "glamping" in the sense that we had a tent, a flush-toilet a few hundred feet away, plenty of food, solar panels for power and didn't need to haul our gear in on our backs - at least not any farther than between the vehicle(s) and the campsite.

While I did hike 10s of miles during the week, I didn't hike every day - and that left a bit of "down time" to relax and enjoy the local scenery.

As a first for me - even though I have camped there many times and have even made dozens of contacts over the years on HF - I decided to do a real POTA (Parks On The Air) activation.  In the days before departure I finally got around to signing up on the pota.app web site and just before I left the area of cell phone coverage (there is none at all anywhere near where we were camping) I scheduled an activation to encompass the coming week as I had no idea exactly when I would be operating - or on what bands.

Figure 1: The JPC-7 loaded dipole at 10', backgrounded by red rock. Click on the image for a larger version.

* * *

It wasn't until the day after I arrived that I finally had time to operate.  As it was easiest and most convenient to do so, I deployed my "modified" JPC-7 loaded dipole antenna (an antenna I'll describe in greater detail in a future post) affixing it atop a tripod light stand that could be telescoped to about 10 feet (3 meters) in height - attaching one of its legs to the swing-out grill of the fire pit to prevent it from falling over.  Being only about 10 feet from the picnic table, it offered a relatively short cable run and when it came time to tune the antenna, I simply disconnected it from the input of the tuner, connected it to my NanoVNA and adjusted the coils:  In so-doing, I could change bands in about two minutes.

The radio that I usually used was my old FT-100 - typically running at 50 watts on CW, 100 watts on SSB, but I would occasionally fire up my FT-817  and run a few contacts on that as well.  As you would expect, the gear was entirely battery-powered as there is not a commercial power line within 10s of miles of this place:  Often, one of my batteries would be off being charged from a solar panel, requiring that I constantly rotate through them.

* * *

For reasons of practicality - namely the fact that I would be operating in (mostly) daylight - and for reasons related to antenna efficiency, I mostly operated on 30 meters and higher.  Because we were outside, this made a computer screen very difficult to see so I logged on a piece of paper - also convenient because this method required no computer or batteries!  The very first contact - a Park-to-Park - occurred on 15 meter SSB, but I quickly QSY'ed down to 17 meters and worked a few dozen stations on CW - breaking in my "CW Morse" paddle for the first time on the air:  It would seem that my scheduling the activation and my Morse CW being spotted by the Reverse Beacon Network caused the notice to go out automatically where I was quickly pounced on.

In using this paddle - made by CW Morse - for the first time I quickly discovered several things:

• I've seen others using this paddle by holding it in their hand - but I was completely unable to do that:  I would get into the "zone" while sending and inevitably put my fingers on the "dit" and "dah" paddle's tension adjustment screws, causing me to send random elements:  At first I thought that something was amiss - perhaps RF getting into the radio - but one of the other folks I was with (who are also hams) pointed out what I was doing.
  

• Since my CW Morse paddle has magnets in the base - and since the picnic table's top was aluminum - I stuck it to the bottom of a cast-iron skillet which solved the first problem, but I quickly discovered that the bottom of a well-used skillet is really quite smooth and lubricated with a fine layer of carbon.  What this meant was that not only did I have to use my other hand to keep the key from sliding around, I started looking like the carbon-covered operators of high-power Poulsen Arc transmitters of a century ago:  My arm and hand quickly got covered with a slight residue of soot!  I then made it a practice to at least wipe down the bottom of the pan before operating.
  

• During contacts, I would randomly lose the "Dah" contact.  I was presuming that this was from dust getting into the contacts (I'm sitting outside!) as it usually seemed to "fix" itself when I would lean over and blow into the paddle, but in once instance when this didn't work at all I wiggled/rotated the 3.5mm TRS jack on the back and it started working again.  I'm thinking that the issue was just a flaky contact on the jack.

At some point I'll need to figure out a better means of holding this paddle down to keep it from sliding about - perhaps a small sheet of steel with bumpers and rubber feet - or simply learn to use the paddle with a much lighter touch!

Figure 2: Operating CW from the picnic table, the paddle on a skillet! Click on the image for a larger version.

With a few dozen CW contact under my belt I readjusted the antenna and QSYed down to 20 meter SSB where I worked several pages of stations, my voice getting a bit hoarse before handing the microphone over to Tim, KK7EF who continued working the pileup under my callsign.

* * *

After a while, we had to shut down as we needed the picnic table to prepare dinner - but this wasn't the last bit of activation:  Over the next few days - when time was available - I would often venture out on 40, 30, 20 and 17 meter CW - occasionally braving 17 meter SSB:  I generally avoided 20 meter SSB as the band generally seemed to be a bit busy - particularly during the weekend when some sort of activity caused the non-WARC bands to be particularly full.

* * *

By the end of the trip I had logged about 387 total contacts - roughly 2/3 of them being CW.  When I got home I had to transcribe the paper logs onto the computer and learned something doing this:  If you do such a transcription, try to avoid doing so late at night when you are tired - and always wait until the next day - whether you were tired or not - and go back and re-check your entries BEFORE uploading the logs to LOTW, eQSL and/or the POTA web site!  Being tired, I hadn't thought the above through very well and later had to go back and make corrections and re-upload.

This page stolen from ka7oei.blogspot.com

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