AmateurRadio.com

Fleets Cove Beach

Yesterday, on a day off from work, I had to head up to the Huntington Village post office to pick up a kit I ordered from China. Why my post office is a 15 minute drive (in traffic) from my home when there’s a beautiful, brand new post office, with a large self-service lobby half a mile from me is a story for another day. As-is the reason why my postal carrier is too lazy to actually leave me notices that I have a package, or ring the bell and ask for a signature. I retrieved the kit, and decided that since I was a few minutes from the North Shore, I would try for some 10 Meter mobile contacts from the beach. I headed to Fleets Cove Beach.

I plunked the mag mount to the old Buick, and plugged in my HTX-10. The band was busy, as it has been lately, but to the point where my 25 watts wasn’t getting through a lot of the pileups. One operator heard me and I logged that contact with Croatia. Not bad, but still disappointing, considering how busy it was. I was beginning to get discouraged, and thinking about calling it a day when I twirled the dial up to the AM portion of the band (29 MHz). Now, keep in mind that my HTX-10 only puts out about 7 Watts AM, and my antenna is tuned for 28.4. I had a nice QSO with M5AFD in Shropshire England. He was surprised at how well I was coming in, but there were a few deep fades. He also complimented me on the audio on the old mobile, and suggested that it would be close to optimal with a punchier mic. I may do just that.

England. AM. 7 Watts. WOW

–Neil W2NDG