Yesterday was a high speed low drag run

I went to a town east of Comombus, Ohio to meet up with one of the guys that is going to do the Camp Perry radio thing with me. He's the guy that is the secretary of the club we formed so as to be able to get this thing up and running.

I felt the need to do this for a couple of reasons. FIrst I wanted to see if he was a human being or at least reasonable facsimile thereof, and I know he was likely thinking the same thing as we have only met prior to this over a damned keyboard. As anyone with half a brain knows, you can be anyone you want to over the web.

What was interesting is that I thought he was going to be a much younger man, and a guy that might of worked in an office and was surprised to find he was a rugged looking, shaggy faced guy almost my age.

Because I didn't wwant to shoot a whole day to hell, I left early clad in a khaki short and baggy khaki shorts and was greeted at his door by an easygoing guy in jeans and a T-shirt.

He's a nice guy.

We discussed the upcoming radio project that will take place next month and ironed out a few details. Seeing this is the first year and I have had a lot of input on it the object is simply to get things going and keep them up and simple.

Keeping anything simple when there are other people involved is hard as everyone and their cousin wants to drag their specialty into it. While maybe next year we might be able to do a little more with technology, this year we are simply going to try and get things running in a simple manner.

You have to remember that there are going to be the military people watching us and we want to be as transparent and leave as much of a small footprint as possible. The last thing we want ot do is invade the place and string up all sorts of wierd antennas and have people tripping over wires and things.

I'll bet you that both the communications officer and the Special Ops people are at least going to drop by and check us out because the SpecOps people are always looking for ways to communicate in difficult situations. They will be curious.

I suppose that if we get s few DX stations they will start asking us how we did it and will be amazed but the truth is that HF operatons are not really a reliable 'On demand' way of communicationg. What will likely happen is that we will answer a few questions and they will be both amazed that a little radio like the PRC 320 can jump the pond and then be disappointed when I explain that it is all a product of sunspots and propogation.

Another reason I went across Ohio is because the guy I went to see has a 43 foot vertical antenna which is supposed to be the ticket for DXing and I wanted to see how much hassle it would be to set up. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it required little and can be easily be raised and lowered by one old man.

The initial setup looks like an hour's work and I very well might bite and snag one after I run it by Mrs Pic.

For under $200 it looks like a pretty good deal.

Anyway, that's whay no big post was made yesterday.


my other blog is: http://officerpiccolo.blogspot.com/ http://piccolosbutler.blogspot.com/