Tag: park

Black Rock Mtn State Park – Aug 2025

Last weekend I finished up a 3-day, 1,800 mile, 7-state POTA Rove that included a radio trade. Out with the FTX1 and in with a TS-590sg. After setting up the 590, I brought it with me to Black Rock Mountain State Park to try some FT8 and if the band conditions permit, a little CW.

I arrived at the Park Friday afternoon. I have done this enough times that I am setup and ready to go within 30 minutes.  This campsite had some challenges.It was the smallest campsite I ever used.  I had space for the trailer and I had to park my truck in the picnic area.  I also had overhead power lines so I had to use a shorter antenna. The weather was cool for a change and I didn’t have to run my A/C.

Setup was a Chameleon Micro Hybrid transformer with a 12’ whip and about a 20’ counterpoise.  The radio was my new-to-me Kenwood TS-590sg.  This was the radio’s maiden voyage and I really liked it. It performed well.  One of the main reasons I like running big radios at low power is more of the controls are readily available. Most everything in the TS-590sg is either a push button or a twist of a knob away.  Having a high performance receiver isn’t any good if you can’t get to the controls.

Band conditions were poor. The first night I only made 88 FT-8 contacts and they were a struggle.  At times the band would “white-out”, high noise and only white snow on the waterfall. At the better times QSB or fading was a constant up and down.  I would watch S7-9 signals drop to nothing during a QSO.  Saturday afternoon brought a power failure at the park. Yep, right during mid QSO.  The power was still out at 1800 hrs, so I had a decision to make – should I stay, or should I go.  As you get older one of the things that goes, is your night vision.  If I was going to leave it had to be soon, so I could still do most of my driving during daylight/evening hours.  I decided to go.  Since I have a lot of practice setting up and tearing down.  I was packed up in less than 30 minutes. As I was pulling out of the park, the power returned.  Better safe than sorry.

I ended up with 233 contacts, 88 short of my kilo for that park.  I will plan another trip in the fall to finish.  I am real happy with the TS-590sg.  I opened it up and found the MARS mod already done and the TXCO installed.  The radio performed well and I ran it mostly at 20 watts.  As you can see in the QSO map, Most of my contacts were CONUS. Kenwoods and Icoms have the best ergonomics. I feel the layouts were designed by people who use their radios; that ergonomics were a primary concern and not an afterthought. 

Screenshot

I also decided to trade off the FT-710 and ended up with a pristine IC-7200.  I always wanted one but the stars never aligned — until now.  I no longer have any Yaesu radios in the stable and probably won’t have any more.  Why? A couple of reasons. I prefer the ergonomics of the Icoms and the Kenwoods.  Everything I need is right there on the front panel. Easy, to see — Easy to use. I have owned a FTDX10, FT-710, and a FTX1, along with an Icom IC-7610, IC-7300, and a Kenwood TS-890s. I can tell you that whatever I hear on one radio, I can hear on the other.  There’s two reasons for this.  One is knowing where the controls are and two is knowing how to use them. There is a third factor the CSP unit, that’s Cerebral Signal Processing Unit. Half of the battle is using the CSP to process faint signals.  After 30 years, mine is pretty good.

The Yaesu radios, are not bad radios, they are not my cup of tea. I can squeeze more horsepower out of the Icoms and the Kenwoods.  I am sure there are those who can say the same about Yaesus.  I at least crossed the fence and tried them but in the end my preference is not Yaesu. YMMV.

Other happenings. I rearranged my Go Box.  My TS-590sg will not fit in it like my other radios so I got an Apache case for it from Harbor Freight and moved some antenna stuff into the Go Box. So now all my radios travel in a separate case and my Go Box has become universal.  Everything I need to run any of my field radios is in the Go Box.  These days I do more FunComm than EmComm, but I am always prepared to do either. I load the same stuff and off I go. I’ve had a busy summer and the honey-do list is growing, there is lots to do around the ranch so this may be one of the last trips for a while. I do most of my outdoor work from Fall to Spring to avoid working in the southeast hot, humid summers and the accompanying chiggers and ticks. That’s all for now,  take care and 73 de Scott

US-2167 Black Rock Mountain State Park and the End of an Era

This month I ended up at Black Rock Mountain State Park. It is one of my favorite parks. I like it because it is located on the top of Black Rock Mountain. The views are fantastic and you couldn’t find a better park to operate a radio. This was a weekday trip. For the past couple of months I tried operating during the week instead of in the weekend. It was okay, I think I like the weekends better.

The weather was beautiful mostly cool with a spot of rain on the first night. I was surprised to see Slate Colored Juncos on the mountain. My mother called them snowbirds because they often proceeded a cold front and sometimes snow. I was near a comfort station and right next tot he camp host. No issues when I put up my 28.5′ random wire vertical.

Radio du jour was my FT-710. I also brought with me my IC-705 thinking I would switch over to QRP and CW on the second day. More about that later. I started out on FT8 and 25 watts. I went QRV on 20 meters around 1900 Z. The band was wide open! I stayed on 20 until about 0200 Z. The first day, I made over 200 QSO’s. Wednesday morning things started out well and then fizzled. In the end I made 453 QSO’s covering 46 states and 16 DX entities. The states I missed were AL, HI, ND, and WV. For DX I got as far north and west as Alaska, as far south as Uruguay, as far east as European Russia. I was hoping the band would stretch far enough west to pick up Hawaii, but it didn’t quite make it. A hop too far.

By Wednesday afternoon the bands were dead and I decided to head back to the house. It was a good run while it lasted and a lot of fun. The only issue I had were people asking for dupes. I only need to work you once and the way band conditions were many stations I needed were a one shot deal. Heard them once and then they were gone. I lost some of those because of people asking for dupes. That means two of us lost. Most logging software will show you if you worked a station before. It’s what I use. As an activator, I try to get as many stations as I can in the log.

Once the bands died and I realized that QRP and CW were not viable, I decided to pack it up and head home. I left the park early Wednesday evening and was home before dark. All in all a nice trip. Here is a QSO map of the activation.

End of an Era. This will be my last year on WordPress. It cost me between $100-$200 a year to maintain and being retired I need to cut a few corners. What will happen, is I will move back to Blogger which is free. I own the domain name and I will bring that with me. My WordPress subscription, ends March of next year and in the mean time, I will move some of my posts over to Blogger. Mainly the technical stuff. I will also be taking fewer overnight trips and combining some trips with the wife doing more than amateur radio.

Retirement is grand, I wouldn’t trade it anything. With it comes a little more responsibility. If I think I want something on the pricey side, I ask myself if I am willing to go back to work for it. So far the answer is no. Stay safe and 73 de Scott