The GRAND
PRIZE, ADI AT-201 VHF Handheld transceiver was donated by PRYME Radio
Products (www.pryme.com). This
transceiver was not claimed and will be the grand prize for
another day.Computermail.net (Paul Shinn)
paid for every body's Pizza's and drinks. Thanks Paul.
Six teams started from the Pleasanton start point.
Four teams found the first fox in the allotted time (4-hours) and no one
found the second fox (8-hours).
I really like these long distance hunts. A great deal
of learning can occur on these type of hunts.
For example, taking beam bearing every few miles is
not so bad. It will save you time in the long run and give you
confidence to continue.
I also learned how to center my beam on the radio
signal. By setting the attenuation and radio squelch level so I get two
distinct edges, I read my boom mounted compass at these two points and
mathematically figure the center. I am also switching to a digital
compass because I forgot to add the 16* declination to my readings
several times and a digital compass will do this for me. One more thing,
my magnetic compass was too slow in settling down after a vigorous
rotation, a digital compass points almost instantaneously.
I also learned a high altitude radio signal can be
heard almost everywhere, except when you get close-in and under it
(especially if you are on the same hill as the transmitter).
Another thing (which I can't seem to get imbedded into
my brain), when you are chasing a high altitude transmitter in the
mountains and you are close. The radio signal will be shadowed and you will
have reflections. You need to continue traveling on the road you think
is correct, even when the signal disappears or points behind you. In
order to believe you are on the right road, you have to take beam bearing
from high elevations on a regular bases, plot them on a map and then
trust your triangulation. Keep driving until you eliminate this road,
get another beam bearing when you get some elevation. On three
mountainous transmitter hunts, I have been stumped and turned around to
early. The Fox was only a few miles up the road I was on.
Equipment I used.
1) 4-element beam: To obtain
all my bearings.
2) AHHA
MicroFinder Doppler. Very little help.
3)
Garmin StreetPilot-III: Street level GPS map and auto routing to
find the correct roads to drive on to a specific area.
4) Laptop Computer: TOPO GPS mapping and draw bearings. Extremely
useful, considering all the bearings I took and the large area this hunt
covered.
5) Icom IC-R3, U-R-Here
radio. Full scale on attenuation-4 when I was near both FOXES and needed
to change my hunt tactics.
6) Mobile radio, Standard
C5900DA. Listen to the fox frequency and talk-in communications
channel. I think a mobile radio with a good roof mounted antenna is very
necessary when transmitter hunting (if only for safety, cell phone's
don't work in the mountains).
CONCLUSION:
A good BEAM (made by Arrow Antenna), the StreetPilot-III for auto
routing a good road that would get me to my destination, a laptop
computer running some sort of map program like TOPO to plot all my
bearing and never running out of maps and my U-R-Here radio (Icom IC-R3)
to tell me I'm close so I can change my hunting tactics were a good
combination for this hunt. Mount a digital compass on the Arrow-Beam so
bearings can be taken fast, easily and frequently.
Jim Sakane (KD6DX)
