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Field Day 2017 After Action Report

FD Checklist - https://www.icloud.com/numbers/0VaJN1hAT7erA-uZOcK5hkkcw#FD_2017_Checklist

Weather:

Weather was in the mid 80’s during both days with an overnight low of 60.

New/Upgrades for FD 2017:

• Battery Box
• Solar Panel
• Mesh Gear Added - New Airrouter HP and AR
• Zoiper IP phone on Android Phone
• SIP Server
• Web Cam streaming to MESH using YawCam software

To Upgrade:

• MFJ Battery Boost for Go Box
• Solar panel for MESH battery box
• DC to DC charger for Laptop

Food:

Went with mostly snack food this year. Grabbed chips, crackers, & cookies from Sam’s. Ate one of the MRE’s from my jeep that needed to be rotated out. Took a case of water in my construction cooler. Placed dry ice on bottom and then filled it with bottled water. Dry ice seemed to last longer than wet ice but kept things on bottom frozen and things on top cool but not cold. Maybe a mix of dry ice on bottom and wet ice packed around the water? Coffee was brewed in my jetboil stove using Folgers single coffee packs. Fill container to fill line and drop in the bag. Cover and boil for 3 minutes.

Sleeping:

Took a hiking sleep mat and slept under the stars. This was much better than last year. Need a light blanket next go around.

Mesh:

NOTE: Need longer ext cord to reach from generator to primary mesh site

Although I had a 15AH battery box built for my mesh nodes, it was not put into service this year. After testing in the office, I knew it would only last about 9 hours. Need to look at a solar panel to keep this battery box charged.

LINK TO MOUNTAIN-

Mesh ops went mostly as expected. Used my nano station to link to K1KY rocket on short mountain. From the nano station, a cat5 cable was used to link an air router HP via DtD. This distributed the mesh to the entire site. On this ARHP, my SIP sever was attached. Through put to the to the rocket on the mountain was ~25Mbps. The only problem was found at the beginning of the day. We could connect to the mountain but was only seeing a few stations that were connected to K1KY rocket via RF. After talking with Tom, I learned that the rocket has a DtD connection to an air grid that is used to link Short Mountain to the LaVergne site. The rocket was not “seeing” the air grid. Tom advised to reboot his rocket on the mountain and this solved the problem.

MESH ONSITE-

Mesh on the backend of the park went as expected although the link to the internet was slow. Through put to the to the internet was ~2.5Mbps. This was determined by running an internet speed test from my station.

The only issue onsite was with KG4IKT station on the front end of the park. His station did not want to stay connected to the internet. He worked on it and thinks it may have been a cabling issue at his station. Because of his connection problems, I disconnected the video stream thinking it might be consuming too much bandwidth.

SIP Server

The SIP server performed as expected onsite. When trying to call any node not at our site, the connection became sketchy. I was able to complete a call to Tom (K1KY) at the Rutherford Cnty FD site. When I tried to call Pj in my office, the phone would connect but only had one way audio if any at all. I suspect this was a limitation of the connection between Short Mountain and the LaVergne mesh sites. Need to talk with Tom about this.

Streaming Video

The video stream was provided through my laptop using YawCam software. Then anyone connected to the Mesh was able to view this with the proper link. This was only tested at our site but worked as expected. I cut the feed off after a few hours as I thought it might be creating problems with Jeff’s internet connection and my Signa Link problems. (more on the Signa Link below)

Logging

Logging was done again this year using the ACLOG Field Day software. Worked beautifully. Need to make sure that the network is configured on each stations laptop. Maybe write a how to page and post to mesh before field day? Freddy’s laptop served as the server again this year.

Solar & Battery Box

We had full sun on the first day of FD. The battery was charged before I left the house and plugged into the solar panel within 30 minutes of arriving at the FD site. Due to working on other things at FD, I didn’t start operating my station until ~6pm. I worked almost all PSK31 with the radio set to 30W. The only exception was 3 voice contacts on 80M. The battery level had fallen to around 40% according to the solar charge controller at 1am. The go box was turned off completely, including my AirRouter and RPi access point while I slept for 2.5 hours. Turned all back on and started operating again around 3:30am. The battery fell to around 20% by the time we stopped operating at 9:30am. The spot that I normally set up in doesn’t receive morning sun until about 11am. Need to consider changing spots next year so the solar panel can grab the morning rays. After I arrived back home the box was set outside along with the panel in full sun. This was set up at 1pm. By 6:45pm the battery was at 60% according to the charge controller. It was brought inside and hooked up the the battery charger to complete the charge. I think I could have continued to operate all day on the second day if I could have gotten the panel in the sun first thing the second day. However, I don’t think it would have made it through a second night. The battery just wouldn’t have enough time to recover during the second day while operating at the same time. Also, if it was overcast on FD, I’m not sure the battery would have lasted all night.

Generator:

The generator worked as expected. Was filled with fuel prior to field day. Started up around 10am that morning. Ran until 1:30 when we decided to add fuel. It still have about 20% fuel left when we added more. Added about 3 gallons and it ran the rest of the time with fuel left that could have probably ran it until dark on the second day. Two stations were run completely from the generator this year. N0JPD and W4WFC. Also, the primary mesh nodes were powered by the generator. At my station, only the fan and laptop charger were powered from the generator. Everything else was powered from my battery.

GO-BOX:

The go box worked as expected with one exception. I plugged everything up upon arriving at the FD site and everything tested good. When I returned to the station at 6pm, I found that the Signa Link was not functioning properly. Went through the usual trouble shooting steps. Verified that the volume was set to 100% on the laptop. Verified that the correct sound card was selected in FLDIGI. Still no connection. Rebooted laptop. Again, verified everything was configured correctly. Still no connection. Disconnected the laptop and hooked it up to my Jeep Signa Link and radio. All worked without issue. Pulled the Signa Link from my Jeep and used it at my FD station. Worked without issue. Just after midnight, there was a bit of lull in the contacts. Swapped the Signa Links back out and the one that was giving me issues went to working with no changes from me. Used this Signa Link the rest of the time and it never gave me an issue. No clue what might have caused this but plan to remove it from the go box and verify the jumpers inside are not loose. I did not experience any noise from the laptop charger that plagued my station in 2016. Also, I ran a hard wired mouse instead of the one built into the laptop. Had no issues working digital on 40M with the mouse locking up. This resolves the issue experienced in 2016. This year I had FLDIGI connected to the logging software API. As soon as I double clicked on a call sign in FLDIGI, this was sent to the logging software. Then I just needed to type in the Class and Section in the logging program. Need to verify that these 2 pieces of software can communicate again next year before FD arrives.

Antennas:

Used the TN07 end fed antenna this year. Push up pole was attached to my jeep hitch. Ran the antenna up the pole to the top and then ran the rest horizontal to a tree. Antenna worked great. No counter poise was used. Next year might consider tying the pole to one leg of my tent that covers my station. This would free up the jeep if needed. For 2M, the Ebay roll up j-pole was used. Did not put it on the push up pole. The height isn’t needed at field day. Opted to hang it on the under side of the tent covering my station. This worked well for what little 2M was needed.