Pismo Beach, July 6 2013

Sat, 28 Mar 2015 03:47:00 GMT

My wife and I were in Pismo for my sister’s wedding. Although we didn’t have a lot of time for it, we just had to try setting up on the beach.

The first major issue was more about driving on sand for the first time, so I won’t discuss this too much. I will say that if you want to try this and have not driven on sand before, read up on it before going. We didn’t get stuck, but easily could have if we were a little bolder.

The second major issue was that the 40 meter dipole I had planned on using was broken when I pulled it out of the box. We planned on meeting my father on that band, so we tried the G5RV Jr. for the first time. Having not read up on how the G5RV works, I didn’t realize that the propagation pattern is not like that of a dipole. I still don’t completely understand it, so I will refer the reader to the other great resources on the internet as much has been written on the subject.

As I mention in the video, we did make contact with my father, KA6ZMU, so it was a successful attempt. Unfortunately, the tide was coming in, so I was unable to do anything further. I really want to try this again soon to make sure it all works as well.

For anyone wanting to try this themselves, a couple things to note. First, the state rangers (or whatever they are called for places like this) were pretty curious. We were visited twice, with one group thinking we were doing some weather experiment. Once I explained, they had no issues. Second, sand is a very different surface from others. Not only was the 2x6 base a little less stable under the tire, but I lacked the skill to go too far off the compacted “road.” I didn’t have to employ the traditional tricks (board under the tire or deflating tires), but I got far enough off the path to get a little nervous. I was glad I was able to do as well as I did.

Still worth doing again.

Direct Like to Video: https://youtu.be/_uF6nt5TIfc

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Wed, 11 Mar 2015 02:16:02 GMT

Our first video has just been posted, so I'm sure we'll start getting some traffic. I'll be posting the write-up on the video soon. Note that there will continue to be changes as we build this site up.

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Pismo Beach, July 6 2013

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