QRP adventures with kite launched antennas
Mike Pittaro, KJ6VCPMay 18th 2020
Portable Operating – My Constraints
● Portable
– Carryable, not ‘Luggable’
– One or two bags or backpacks
– Airline friendly, Hiking friendly
● Simple
– Quick setup, quick tear down
– Nothing complicated
– Be on the air, operating, not messing around
Portable Operating – The Setup
● Yaesu FT-818
– All Band, All Mode
– 6 Watts RF output
– No Tuner
● Extras
– Battery – Li-Ion, 5.6 AH
– Headset – Koss SB-45
– Custom USB audio and rig control cable
– Laptop
– Antenna
– Kite
End-Fed Half Wave Antenna
½ ƛ Dipole
Feedpoint ~ 70 Ω
½ ƛ Wire.1 ƛ Counterpoise
Feedpoint ~ 3500 Ω
End-Fed Half Wave – Kite setup
Shock Cord - 5M
Stake
Kite
MatchRadioStake
Antenna
Ground
Kite Line
1 M Ω resistor(static bleed)
Matching Unit – 70:1 Impedance Transformer
●
Matching Unit – Connections and Adjustments
Shack on the Beach
●
On The Air !
● 20 M vertical ½ wave
– 18 AWG
● Ultrafoil 30 kite
– 30 FT2 / 3 M2
● The results
– P4/KJ6VCP
– 12 FT-8 contacts
– 0 SSB contacts
– Reached Grid EN82 (Ontario)
Observations and Surprises
● It worked !
● It was all back-packable
● Aruba is kind of a desert
● The ground is coral, under a few inches of sand
● Sun wiped out the Laptop
●
Top Related