What use is an F-call?

Today I was unable to run my weekly net from my QTH, so I planned to run my station portable. Last night I put my battery pack in the boot of my car, put the mag-mount on the roof, screwed in the antenna and folded it over so I wouldn't damage it when I drove out of the garage in the morning. I also put my radio, a Yaesu 857d on the passenger seat, ran the power cord from the boot to the front-seat, plugged the antenna lead in and added my log book.

This morning I drove out of the garage, stuck my antenna up, plugged in the power and made a test transmission, only to see the SWR go through the roof. I wasn't sure what was going on, so I checked the antenna connector, all solid, checked the mag-mount on the roof, unscrewed the antenna and then screwed it back in again. Another test transmission, another high SWR and no repeater beep acknowledging my existence.

I checked on the local aviation beacon but couldn't hear it.

I went back into the garage, pulled out another mag-mount, plugged that in, had to hunt for an adapter cable to get from BNC to PL259, and tested that. Still no go.

I'd moved my radio to another location during the week, wondered if I had damaged it in transit. Pulled out my second radio, another 857d, and plugged that in it's place. Still no luck.

I reversed back into the garage, 10 minutes before my net was due, getting pretty frantic, then plugged in my QTH base station antenna, still no go, on either radio.

I then remembered that I had a hand-held, so packed up the other radios, wound up the antenna leads, pulled off the mag-mounts and went to find a nearby hill capable of elevating me to the point where my hand-held could make it into the local repeater.

I started the 'net on time, but lots of stress and hurry was involved.

While doing the 'net, an 857d still sitting on the passenger seat, I turned it over to look at the antenna connectors, there's two, one for HF and 6m and one for UHF and VHF. The HF antenna has a PL259 connector on it, the VHF/UHF one has an N-type connector.

If you've been paying attention, you now know what I did wrong.

If not, the high SWR was the reading where the antenna length is close to 0, that is, the state where you don't have an antenna plugged in at all.

Doh. In my haste I'd plugged my UHF/VHF antenna into the HF port, no workies.

I did the 'net on my hand-held, not ideal, but workable.

Next time I'll take a little more time in preparation. I'm also going to have a think about making the terminations of my antenna leads correct for the radio, that is, PL259 for HF and N-type for 2m and 70cm.

You live and learn.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB