Amateur Radio Station WD8RIF | POTA Activation McCausland Wildlife Management Area

On Friday, December 13, 2024, two members of the Southeast Ohio Radio Adventure Team performed a successful activation of McCausland Wildlife Management Area (US-12043) as part of the Parks on the Air (POTA; link) program.

Following a successful activation of Apple Grove Fish Hatchery (link), Eric McFadden, WD8RIF, and Miles McFadden, KD8KNC, visited the nearby McCausland Wildlife Management Area to perform the fifth POTA activation, and the first CW POTA activation, of the recently-added unit on a cool but sunny Friday morning. They were accompanied by little Theo-dog.

Eric had been able to learn next to nothing about McCausland WMA through research on the web and didn't know what he would find when they got there. His research had failed to disclose a dedicated parking area, and all possibilities he saw on maps and satellite imagery for operating locations had left him concerned that access points would be snowy or muddy, so he had asked Miles to drive his snow-tire equipped, all-wheel-drive Subaru Impreza, it being less likely to get stuck in any snow or mud than Eric's front-wheel-drive, low-ground-clearance Honda Fit. Following the successful activation of Apple Grove Fish Hatchery and a quick lunch in Gallipolis, OH, they arrived in the area of the McCausland WMA about 1730 UTC, and Eric was quite pleased to find a dedicated gravel parking area available for their use.

Miles parked the Subaru and he and Eric set up the station. Because Eric wanted to continue testing his recently-built, WB3GCK-inspired end-fed Zepp counterpoise-less wire antenna (link), they again deployed it as a vertical on Eric's Jackite 31' telescoping fiberglass mast on a drive-on base. Because the temperature was chilly, Eric chose to operate inside the car and, because he wanted to see how well his Elecraft KX2 would work with the antenna, he mounted his KX2 in an AK6Q mount (info) to the clever, articulated, multi-purpose mounts Miles had installed on his Subaru's passenger-side dashboard.

The antenna on the drive-on base and the KX3
mounted on the dash; photos by Miles McFadden.

The antenna under test was a speaker-wire end-fed Zepp, with a radiator having an overall length of 29' and a matching-section/feedline length of 14½'. (WB3GCK tested lengths of 25' and 50'; Eric felt the 29' length might be easier to match because it's nowhere near a halfwave on any band of interest.) Once station set-up was complete, Eric first tested to see if his KX2's internal ATU could find a good match on all the HF bands of interest, but he was disappointed to find that his KX2 struggled to find matches on some of the bands.

Eric finishing arranging his operating position and was on the air at 1753 UTC.

As he had hoped, Eric had good cell-signal at this location and was able to access POTA Spots to spot himself, if necessary, and to find Park-to-Park (P2P) QSO opportunities.

Eric began his operation on 20m, finding himself a clear frequency to run, calling "CQ POTA", and was auto-spotted on POTA Spots. However, because he had failed to cancel his announcement on POTA Spots for the earlier activation, he was auto-spotted as being at Apple Grove Fish Hatchery! Fortunately, he was able to quickly self-spot himself at the correct park. Eric's first QSO came at 1756 UTC with VE7KDU in British Columbia—a good indication that his antenna was working well. QSOs came quickly, with his twenty-fourth QSO coming at 1823 UTC with KD4CB in South Carolina. This run included a QSO with CU3DI in the Azores and QSOs with operators located in British Columbia, Florida, Georgia (2), Illinois, Kansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Ontario (2), Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee (2), Texas (2), and Washington.

When activity on 20m died down, Eric found himself a clear frequency to run on 40m, began calling "CQ POTA", and was again auto-spotted to POTA Spots. However, this time the best SWR the KX2 could find was 2.6:1 and he decided to convert the end-fed Zepp (EFZ) to a 29' end-fed random wire (EFRW) by disconnecting the matching-section from the KX2 and connecting in its place a 17' counterpoise wire which he asked Miles to stretch out directly on the ground outside the car. (This is effectively the same antenna Eric has successfully used for hundreds of NPOTA and POTA activations, except this time it had only one counterpoise wire instead of the usual three.) The KX2 easily found a good match for the modified antenna. His first QSO in this run came at 1830 UTC with N4EX in North Carolina. QSOs came very quickly, with his seventeenth QSOs in this run coming at 1846 UTC with W8BG in Ohio. This run included QSOs with operators located in Georgia, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio (2), Ontario (2), Pennsylvania (5), Tennessee (3), and Virginia.

Wanting to see if he could make additional QSOs on 20m with the modified antenna, Eric found a clear frequency on that band to run, began calling "CQ POTA", and was again auto-spotted to POTA Spots. His first QSO in this second run on 20m came at 1851 UTC with K1RIF in Massachusetts. QSOs came quickly, with Eric's eighteenth QSO in this run coming at 1910 UTC with K9YLK in Colorado. During this run, the KX2's internal battery died, the radio abruptly turning off, and Eric had to scramble to find his second battery and connect it to the KX2's external power socket. This run included a QSO with ON4VT in Belgium (see eQSL), a P2P QSO with W8TMI at Potterville State Game Land (US-11967) in Michigan, and QSOs with operators located in Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia (3), Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey (2), New York (2), Pennsylvania, and Texas.

In all, Eric made fifty-nine QSOs QSOs. All of Eric's QSOs were CW and were made with a transmitter output of five watts.

Miles did not operate but helped with station set-up and tear-down, took care of Theo-dog, and did all of the activation photography.

Eric was disappointed that his KX2 couldn't match the EFZ on all the bands of interest but he wants to test the antenna with the addition of a 4:1 balun inserted at the feedpoint. As at Apple Grove Fish Hatchery, Eric credits his high number of QSOs made during this activation to the fact that this was only the fifth activation of this unit, and was the very first CW activation.