alt text

Field Day 2025 After Action Report

New/Upgrades for FD 2025:

Meshtastic
Meshtastic Portable Repeater
HF APRS
Starlink Internet

Weather:

Rain threatened the site most of Saturday but it never actually rained. With rain nearby the temp remained relatively cooler than previous field days and we had a breeze most of Saturday.

General Notes:

Field day for myself consisted of an HF APRS station with YAAC and VARA. There was also a 2M digipeater deployed and Meshtastic was demonstrated for the first time this year at field day. A few Winlink connections were made using the local packet gateway WC4EOC-8

I was unable to participate on Sunday due to other commitments.

Internet:

I have always considered use of the internet at the Field Day site as a failure. Field Day is about practicing our craft in an offgrid scenario (reference). Should something need to be downloaded from or looked up on the internet, it should and would be noted in the failure section of this AAR. The same applies to using your mobile phone.

With that said, Starlink was added to the RV this year. While the above is still true, Starlink is an additional tool that could be used in an emergency situation. It can be powered from 120VAC available in the RV with the inverter or 12VDC available in the RV or with a stand alone battery. One should still take note of anything that required use of the internet and download that data to your hard drive if at all possible just in case Starlink was unavailable for whatever reason.

APRS:

I ran two APRS setups this year. The first was run from the X1 Carbon laptop which ran VARA as the modem and YAAC as the client. This was setup so I could test APRS over HF. The Yaesu 857d and my EFHW antenna was used for the transmitter. This setup was deployed and only checked a few time during the day. While it was successful in sending out beacons that were heard, it did not hear very well due to the high noise floor and the packed bands during FD. Another test should be run with the setup on a non FD weekend.

The second APRS rig was the Kenwood D74 which was carried on person. This radio was run on extra low (EL) power for APRS since it was very close to the portable digipeater. I ran into an issue where my phone would not connect to this radio so I was unable to run APRSdroid. (See Failures) The D74 was also my connection to the repeater talk in frequency.

APRS Digipeater:

The Kenwood D75 functioned as the APRS digipeater for 2M. This radio was connected to the N9TAX roll up j-pole flown on the TN07 mast above the RV.

Meshtastic:

I had a total of four nodes during FD.

Spec5 Trekker Delta
Home brew portable repeater node
Two home brew personal nodes

I loaned out one of my personal nodes to another operator who is interested in Meshtastic.

The portable repeater was thrown together last minute. It consists of a Heltec V3 board and a 3000mAh battery in a watertight project box. This node was flown near the top of the TN07 mast. It was powered on at 0830 on Saturday and had 72% (3.91V) of battery remaining on Sunday morning at 0800. Because it was quickly thrown together, there is no way to charge the unit without removing the four screws that hold the lid closed. This unit worked well but needs to be modified so it can be charged without disassembly. Parts used in the portable Meshtastic repeater:

The Spec5 Trekker Delta was the node that I carried on person. While I love the battery life of this unit it is a bit bulky to clip on a pocket/belt. Maybe a smaller unit should be considered for this type of deployment?

Solar & Battery:

Consumption Notes

These notes are from 2023 AAR but left for reference.

RV TV - 2A
Each RV light - .5A
RV 12V Fridge - ~2.5A when compressor is running

Generator:

The generator was available but not used this year. This year I chose to setup by the pavilion and utilized the 110 outlet in the pavilion to run the AC in the camper. Since it was proven in the past that the propane generator will run everything, there's no need to waste propane and this system is tested regularly during RV trips.

Propane:

Detailed notes of propane consumption can be found in the 2022 AAR. Propane tanks have been upgraded to 30lb giving a total of 60lb on board. From past experience, the generator will use ~20lb per 12 hours with the AC running. This would give roughly 36 hours of run time with the 2 new 30lb tanks.

Go-Bag:

The modular go bag proved once again to be a winner. When combined with the Checklist Generator, nothing critical was forgotten. (See Checklist)

Antennas:

I use the EFHW kit antenna for HF. A rollup J-pole was used for the digipeater. The EFHW and J-pole antenna were on the same TN07 mast.

Failures:

Two failures were identified this year. The first was with the Kenwood D74 though I don't think the issue is with the radio itself. I attempted to connect the D74 to my Android phone using APRSdroid. The phone would not pair with the radio. This turned out to be operator error and was resolved Sunday morning.

The second was with VARA HF APRS. While beacons that were sent were being heard and gated to the internet, my station was basically deaf. The station was configured correctly as a few beacons were decoded. The belief is that this was due to a high noise floor and the high activity on the bands during FD weekend. This setup needs to be tested more.

Final Conclusions:

It was a fantastic Field Day. The new experiments with Starlink, HF APRS, and Meshtastic all proved productive. Not everything worked perfectly but FD is the best time to explore new possibilities and it is better to fail during FD than when we really need to rely on a particular tool.

Personally I find it extremely rewarding to have time to help other operators with minor issues they may be having. This year included programming an HT, helping to get Winlink up and running for one operator, and helping a second operator program her mobile rig from the front panel.

Ideas/To-Do List:

Continue testing of VARA HF APRS
Continue testing of Meshtastic
Improve Meshtastic portable repeater (See Meshtastic)

Checklist:

Created Thu Jun 26 10:43:13 AM CDT 2025

HF Radio(s)

[x]Yaesu-857

Radio-Accessories

[x]Radio-Microphone
[x]Radio-Power-Cable
[x]Radio-Manual-(On-HD)
[x]Nifty-Manual
[x]Digirig

Modules

[x]HT-Go_Bag-Small
[x]Tool-Kit-Micro
[x]Tool-Kit-Level-1
[x]Tool-Kit-Level-2
[x]Solutions-Bag
[x]StarLink

HT's

[x]Yaesu-VX6
[x]Kenwood-D75
[x]Kenwood-D74

Batteries

[x]Distribution-Box
[x]Anker-Power-Bank

HF_Antennas

[x]My-EFHW
[x]Coax

VHF_Antennas

[x]Ed-Fong-JPole
[x]N9TAX-Roll-up-Jpole
[x]Signalstuff
[x]Coax

Meshtastic

[x]Spec5-TD
[x]HomeBrew-Orange
[x]HomeBrew-Blue
[x]Portable Repeater

Deployment

[x]TN07-Mast
[x]Gigaparts-Mast

Computers

[x]X1-Carbon
[x]External-Mouse

Other

[x]Coax-Adapters
[x]SWR-Meter

Food

[x]Bread
[x]Ham
[x]Water
[x]Chips
[x]Cheese
[x]Mustard

END OF REPORT

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases

Published with Simplenote

Report abuse