Sunday, April 15, 2012

Take a Soldier Fishing Tournament Radio Station


Had a great time yesterday as members of our amateur radio club set up a radio station at Lake Mayer in conjunction with the "Take a Soldier Fishing Tournament".  Combining two things I love.....military and radio!  There were members of all branches of the service competing in the event with some local pro fishermen.  Sure was a beautiful day and lots of military/veteran related groups in attendance.  It's great to see groups like the Bass Angler, Plus doing things like this for our troops.

It was a very good day to set up our radio stations in the outdoors.  Kevin-KW4B and Peter-KJ4FAW set up stations using a ground plane antenna on a 12 foot mast for VHF/UHF, a BuddiPole clone for HF, and a Cushcraft vertical for HF.  Power was delivered by Kevin's 1KW Honda generator and Peter's 12V deep cycle battery.  So we had a nice "off the grid" operation.

We were only on the air for a few hours but Kevin was able to make contacts as far away as New Mexico and points in between.  I love any opportunity to set up and operate outdoors like this.  What great fun.  Mac-KF4LMT, Lester-KF4JBQ, and Bill-AK4PI showed up toward the end and helped with the tear down of the stations.

Antenna Farm

Peter-KJ4FAW setting up his "go kit"

Another view of the setup

Kevin-KW4B operating one of the Candler Hospital "go kits"

Kevin and Peter
Yours truly-K4GTM, Peter-KJ4FAW, and Kevin-KW4B

Kevin-KW4B on the air


Trophies for the soldiers

One of the soldier fishermen with his tournament shirt

Part of the crowd at the awards ceremony