20151217 - VHF/UHF Field Day

Post date: Dec 16, 2015 6:04:09 PM

UHF/VHF Field Day

UHF/VHF Field Day - Image: WIA

So what do you reckon that you will be doing on the weekend of the ninth and 10th of January?

The kids are on school holiday, it's hot around the house, someone has noticed that the lawn te needs mowing, and you can't hide in the shed any longer. Well all is not lost, it just so happens that that weekend coincides with the VHF UHF field day and so with a bit of judicious planning you can head out maybe camping over the Saturday night and have some fun on the VHF and UHF bands in the summer contest.

If you go onto the WIA webpage and look under members contests you can find all the rules and information you need to start planning to participate in the contest.

Do you realise that there are places where four Maidenhead grid squares come together. A really smart VHF UHF field day operator might just find where the intersecting point is and then with some careful manoeuvring find that they can then operate from four different Maidenhead locators, and a very resourceful operator might have even checked when within travelling distance there is another intercept point that might give a minimum of two or three extra Maidenhead locators. Remember that with the relatively small number of operators here in the West, if we could use such rules to advantage then why not. As someone once said to young Luke skywalker "use the force Luke, use the force"

All levels of licence holder can participate in this contest and this year in particular there are certificates from the point scorers in each licence category. It really is a fun contest and being VHF and UHF antennas are not difficult to transport and you can learn so much about operating on these bands by participating in such a contest.

And for those of us who cannot for some reason or another get out and about in the field remember that there are always stations needed for the other end of a contact so put aside some time to listen and respond to the field stations on that weekend.

Cheers Wally VK6YS