[bars] Is Cape Cod the HF Heaven?

[Christopher Lennon]

Christopher,

It is a lovely place.  My family has a long history vacationing in
Eastham.  The Marconi area is special to me because we used to go there
when it was just a dirt road and the debris from the station was still
there.  Long time ago.

As to my antenna.  While the G90 has the reputation of having a great
tuner, my preference is for resonant antennas.  I use a Wolf River Coils
extensible whip.  The long one that can be tuned in length down to the 20 m
band.  I have the Wolf River Coils Sporty Forty Coil that will allow that
whip to be used on 40 m.  I mostly just use the whip.  The whip is mounted
on the WRC tripod, the one with 24 inch legs.  I have 100 ft of silicone
coated wire cut into 6 equal lengths.  Two wires attached per alligator
clip and clipped to the tripod legs for ground radials.

It stores compactly, and is easy to set up.  Also it requires no staking or
ground spikes that might annoy rangers.  I tune the length using a VNA.  I
used to use a nanoVNA, but that is kind of fiddly, so I bought one of the
RigExpert Stick VNAs to make the measurements.

Over moist ground I can get impressively low SWR numbers.  In dry sandy
Wellfleet I was at 1.3; good enough.

It was not very expensive and the mix and match ability of the products in
the Wolf River line means I can mess with other options in the future.

Chris
W2BPL

Sent from my phone.

On Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 1:36 PM Christopher Wood <
christopher.wood at firelinkllc.com> wrote:

> Chris,
>
> Congratulations on your work down on the Cape. I have a house in Wellfleet
> and know from where you were transmitting. Unfortunately, I'm getting down
> there very rarely recently due to work.
>
> Yes, that's my experience that it's very quiet down there and generally
> easy to make contacts. Sadly, I just don't seem to have an ear for CW or
> any skill for transmitting. However, I've worked both phone and FT8 with
> much success. I really do love that area having been going there for nearly
> 50 years.
>
> I'd be curious to know more about your antenna.
>
> My usual setup is IC705 with an antenna tuner and Super Antenna with a
> long aerial on 20 m. With an external battery, a small LiFePO4, it puts out
> 10W. I've made lots of contacts across the pond and the Americas.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Christopher
>
> KC1GHR
>
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* bars <bars-bounces at w1hh.org> on behalf of Christopher Lennon via
> bars <bars at w1hh.org>
> *Sent:* Tuesday, July 22, 2025 1:23 PM
> *To:* BARS <bars at w1hh.org>
> *Subject:* [bars] Is Cape Cod the HF Heaven?
>
> Just back from a weekend at the Cape.  I did a PoTA activation at the
> National Seashore Marconi area.  If you know it, I was set up by the park
> headquarters on the road up to the Marconi site.  There is a nice flat
> grassy area with trees so I could set up my equipment in the shade and the
> quarter wave whip for 20m out in the field.
>
> I was operating CW at 20W with my (nothing to write home about sensitivity
> wise) Xiegu G90. My usual equipment set up.  About 4:00 in the afternoon.
> Band conditions good.
>
>
>
>
>
> I usually do fine with this set up.  At home noise is S2-S3.  In the field
> S1 is typical.  On that afternoon the noise was almost dead silent.  No
> indication on the S meter when not sending or receiving a signal.  Dead
> Silent.
>
> I spotted myself and boom Italy. Boom Great Britain.  Boom France.  I gave
> out a lot of 5 readability reports at low 2, 3 signal strength levels.
> Somewhere in there Puerto Rico.  Then a location code I didn't understand,
> A2X.  I had the call sign so I would look it up later.
>
> A2X: Botswana!!  Amazing.
>
> Contact map:
>
>
>
>
> Is this the usual for Cape Cod?
>
> I wondered if it being a Cape the local noise would be very quiet. I mean
> they put that first Marconi station there for a reason.
>
> Was I just lucky and having a good afternoon or is Wellfleet the HF
> capital of the world?
>
> Chris
> W2BPL
>
> Sent from my phone.
>
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