On Sunday 6th October I activated VK2/ST-001 which is the site of a weather radar installation owned by the Bureau of Meterology.

The previous activators from Canberra had provided plenty of good information about how to get there and what to expect when I arrived.  See VK1NAM’s blog and VK1DI’s blog for those details.

The Cowangerong Track off the Captains Flat road was littered with stones, rocks, dirt etc, due to recent road treatment by the machine parked on the side of the road a few hundred metres in.  It is about 10 mins drive to the mountain from the Capt Flat road.  I drove right up to the peak and turned back down to be sure of being outside the activation zone.  This took me almost all the way back to the Cowangerong Track.

It was a few minutes walk back up the slope to the summit, where the compound surrounds a few buildings and the weather radar tower.

I first setup in the clearing to the south of the compound but after listening to 7 mhz and having one contact with the background noise at s7 I decided to spend a bit more time and move my whole station further away from the compound, going about 20m into the forest roughly south of the compound.

39 contacts made.  Stations worked: VK1NAM/3 VK3AFW VK3PF VK3GAJG VK3JM VK1RX VK2YW VK5LY VK3CAT VK3FPSR VK2FHRK VK3FB VK3UBY VK3LO VK3DET VK3GHS Vk5WG VK5CZ/p VK3AMB VK3YY/p VK3YE/pm VK1DI VK3MCD VK2GEL/p

And after 0000 UTC, VK3CAT, VK2JI (30m) VK7NWT VK5LA VK5PAS VK3AFW VK3UP VK1DI VK3PF VK1MA/2 VK3FPSR VK3UBY VK3MRG and VK1NAM mobile in vk3.

Duration of operation from first contact to last was about 2 hours 30mins less the 20mins while moving the station away from the noise.  This operation was completely done using a 3S LIPO battery, which was 12.4v at the start of the operation and was 11.4v at the end.  The two SLABs I took were not needed.  The ATU ran off the LIPO too, for the few seconds of power it requires when changing bands and resetting.