Gliderrider

Flown first by an experienced pilot. And then I take it. It’s a simple glider but I like these types. My hope is to thermal it. For now I’m just getting the cobwebs off my decade away from RC’s. Lots of pattern flying. With the 1600 battery it was really tail heavy. But the old GoPro session was perfect weight although draggy. Perfect fit though. This is a long boring video meant for my own study. Your welcome to come along especially if your researching simple gliders. Mine has a factory installed gyro. Not sure how I feel about that yet. Watch for future flights.

Brookings Aeromates A great group of helpful and kind pilots!

Our video clips from our vacation. Not much family in this one.

Just a 1 pointer and super easy to get to. W0D/ES-002 Eastern South Dakota. Only activated 4 times before. Last activation 2016. Was lucky to work this site before the snow flies. Also was blessed with a Summit to Summit. W6TED called me from Mt Palomar, Ca. You know, the one with the famous observatory. My ops video are kind of raw but I did edited out about 35 minutes of calling ‘cq’. A little chilly and a little windy as a SOTA should be. So fun! Testing out a mountain topper that I built when they first came out. The programmable memories were wonderful to have!

Attempted to activate this one the day before but my battery died with 9 contacts. And my backup battery was also dead. So on this run, I brought everything. That’s why it messy. My next two POTA’s after his were a lot more organized. Using a k6ark ENHW. Always get my best signal reports with this antenna.

Range testing these never used before Walkie talkies. Their frequency was 49.860 MHz. Got them on eBay for $10! And another #10 shipping. I might convert them to the 50 MHz ham band but hate to touch them. Not a scratch on these. Not even in the battery compartment. I love the Morse code feature. Might be fun teaching the code with these to my son.

Just a random tiny kit I got from qrpme.com. Trying to find something like the quirky qrp keychain transmitter. Missing some footage here of test and closeups. If I find them I’ll repost

Still figuring things out with the rig and the ft8cn software. Relatively smooth sailing. This is NOT a polished video. But some folks may find it useful.

A South Dakota point of view. Rented a cabin. Cabins are available throughout the state this time of year. Most cabins have no plumbing. The toilets in winter are pit. Helpful hint.. What we will do next time is keep a porta potti we keep in the car. Warm up the car remotely and have privacy and comfort.

This is a full function 5 band ham radio. Well, it’s a 6 band radio because this one works on the 11 meter band. Great for listening of course. But handy for emergencies. I’m using an external amplified speaker. I buggered the enclosed one up during assembly. Yes it’s a kit. Be careful where you order it. There are copy cats on eBay. UELLYQH is the one I use. You either have to get the high band kit or the classic. The pre made one is a very good one. But it’s for lower bands. However, you could get the premade version and get the high band or classic band kit. The add on band kits are only $28! Once built, it simply snaps in. You may need to tune it. Although you could get lucky. It’s not to hard to tune it. There are some easy techniques. I had to buy a $17 online voltage/watt/amp meter to calibrate efficiency. Simple math that is on the creator’s website. You can find him on YouTube. DL2MAN. I’ve seen this rig on the Walmart app as well. You’ll need to get a strange sized power plug on your own. It can be found on Amazon. In the meantime you can listen and transmit a 1/2 watt safely using a micro usb plug on the side of the rig. That’s used for programming. Although I couldn’t get it to program. Others have had better results. For programming, your usb cable must be a data cable. Many are not. Let me know if you would like me to make more videos about this.

This is in a park during winter 1/14/2023. We had a few days of warm weather of about 32ºf. I forgot my favorite antenna but had backup. MFJ-1899t is a small coil vertical with taps for different bands. Most people don’t take it seriously. Using a tape measure for a counter poise, it performed wonderfully from a cheap tripod next to the car. I used it on 17 meters. But this is about the activation isn’t it? I had a couple of log jams but I expected that and it went better than expected. I’ll admit, it’s a bit of a dry video but it’s a valuable home movie at the very least.

We thought we were rid of them. But we found more. They don’t seem to be in the interior of the house. Before, they were and would fly around. There is also a smell. It’s still there but not as bad as before.

My first experience with a factory made end fed half wave. 40/30/15/10 meters. It worked quite well. Probably would have been better if I deployed it as per manual.

This is a range test with peddling at speeds around 13 to 15 mph mostly. Probably used throttle only for about 5 miles through out the ride

A nice little paved trail on the south side of Brookings, South Dakota. Exploring for the 1st time since our move a week ago.

Expenses forcing us to leave while we can, And other reasons. Gotta keep the family safe and the finances solvent.

Calling ‘cq’ on a pixie transceiver at sunset. Mostly to see if the reverse beacon network was picking up my feeble signal. KD7JG answers me back! Thanks!

My Son and I almost died today. We had to stop on the highway in town for the car in front to turn left. But there was oncoming traffic. So we were stopped. I left a good amount of space between us ‘just in case’. Just in case was today. Right now. The truck came on so fast, I still didn’t have time to get out of the way. The speed limit here is 35mph.

Talking on a 4 watt Handi Talkie 4000 miles. This radio is going through a multi band off center half wave antenna.

Just a couple of clips of Casey’s 7th grade meet at Frogtown, Calaveras County, California

My son and I are looking for a hidden road into some backcountry forest roads. We see it on google maps but like several times before, it’s just not there or it’s misleading. One thing is obvious. ‘They’ just don’t want you back there.

10/20/21 Casey during his 1st season running cross-country in Sonora, California. Representing Avery Middle School.

Approximately 780 miles qso with a 4 watt radio and a hfedz antenna. A multi band antenna purchased on eBay.

Taking my 1st longer ride in the mountains accompanied by my two sons on electric unicycles. I’m right at the weight limit of this bike. At the end of the ride I was still 4 bars out of 5. I still got a nice workout. Using the aftermarket’cloud 9’ $30 seat was a huge improvement and very easy to install. A very fun ride. Can’t wait to get back out there!