The sPARC gap
Newsletter of the
Portland (Oregon)
Amateur Radio Club
(c) PARC, 2004
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| Volume 22 | May, 2004 | Number 5 |
| Past Issues Index |
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here is a facet of Amateur Radio that has sprung up throughout Europe, Asia and Africa, and has just recently (since 1991 or so) seen any activity in the Americas. Amateur Radio Direction Finding as a competitive sport (done on foot, not in cars) doesn't require a license to participate, and can be regarded in several lights: You don't have to be a long-distance runner, it's good exercise, and it combines Orienteering with finding specific goals (in this case, 5 transmitters set out over about a 10 KM course). In some parts of the world (principally, the old Soviet bloc), it's been a prerequisite to getting a license to transmit. It has lots of other uses besides the recreational and competitive: hunting downed aircraft or keeping track of tagged wildlife come to mind.
With several major and minor international competitions coming up this summer, Dale Hunt, WB6BYU, is returning to PARC to discuss his favorite aspect of the service we call a hobby. The United States Championship will be taking place in Santa Barbara, California, the weekend of the SeaPac Convention. In August comes the Friendship Radiosport Games in
Khabarovsk, Russia (see the related article on page 2). Finally, the World ARDF Championships take place in the Czech Republic in early September. Dale is likely to be a participant at the FRG and at the World Championships.
WB6BYU coming to the finish line, at the 2003 U.S. ARDF Championships (from
www.homingin.com)
ARDF puts the sport in Radiosport. The length of the course guarantees that even if you walk it, you'll have gotten a lot of constructive exercise. It also allows you to sharpen your skills at navigating with a map and a compass.
There are a couple of pertinent websites connected with ARDF that might be of interest to anyone that cares to partake.
The first one is www.homingin.com , which is maintained by Joe Moell, K0OV. Joe is the ARRL's principal resource for issues concerning direction finding. He wrote a column for 15 years in 73 Amateur Radio Today, and he has continued it in CQ VHF. Joe's site has postings for all of the major events. connected to direction finding. He also has several construction articles for appropriate equipment and antennas, especially for 2-meter hunting. Joe is also the co-author of Transmitter Hunting -- Radio Direction Finding Simplified.
Closer to home is www.ardf-r2.org, co-run by WB6BYU and Ken Harker, WM5U. It addresses matters of competitive direction finding in IARU Region 2 (North and South America).
Front to back, this group was Daniel Nagy, Karla Leach, KC7BLA, Ken Harker, WM5R and Dale Hunt, WB6BYU, at the US ARDF Championships in Cincinnati, OH, 2003. (from
www.homingin.com)
Anyone can participate in foxhunting, regardless of their license status. Families have been known to go to these events together, competing in the various age and gender categories. Strange things sometimes pop up in competitions: at the Friendship Radiosport Games in Khabarovsk in 1995, Kevin Hunt, WA7VTD, stumbled over a couple being amorous in the woods, and one of the other competitors found a dead body. Things aren't usually that dramatic. They are, however, decidedly less sedentary than most of our other hamming activities.
Dale will also be bringing equipment for
ARDF, including 2- and 80-meter direction finding gear, and some foxes will be deployed for people who'd like to take a shot at direction finding.
-AL7W