A couple of friends and their sons joined my youngest and I for a quick overnight camp out to William O’Brien State Park.
Located just 45 minutes or so north east of St. Paul, MN, it lies just east of the St. Croix river which boundaries Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Our group campsite was a short walk from the parking area. Thankfully, they have carts available as this was car camping and we didn’t go lightweight.
My son and arrived earlier than the rest, so after taking some time to setup camp I immediately got to work getting the station setup.
The group sites here have lots of tables and multiple fire pits to host quite a few people. Overkill for the 7 of us but nice to have some space to ourselves.
For this outing I brought the MTR-4b v2. On the eve of the initial release of the brand new MTR-3b from LNR Precision on October 1st, it seemed appropriate to activate with this little workhorse.
Coupled with the JPC-12 vertical, I was up and running in just a few minutes. Being outside the cities and without infrastructure nearby, signals were clear and many.
Fortunately, after getting spotted on http://pota.app, the hunters didn’t take long to materialize and within about 20 minutes I had logged 12 contacts and then shut things down to focus on the important part of the trip – my son.
All in all it was an evening of good friends, food over a campfire, and sleeping to the serenade of coyotes under a blanket of stars.
KH1 In the House
I got home earlier today to find something unexpected – my KH1 had arrived! Ordered on September 15th, and shipped the 23rd, this was well below the expected 15-21 business days noted on Elecraft’s shipping status page.
I haven’t had much chance to do anything except opening the shipping box and taking stock of things, but will certainly circle back with my thoughts and experiences shortly.
It covers 80m, 40m, 30m, and 20m with great receive audio and a host of features packed into a small space.
Despite the fact that it is very well built, I tend to baby my investments and look for ways to protect them when taking them out of the house. As such, I started searching for a case that would fit this little transceiver and maybe 1-2 other small items.
I found the Amazon Basics Hard Travel Carrying Case for 5 inch GPS to be a perfect match. It completely encloses the MTR4B v2 in a firm EVA case with just a little give. There is a mesh pocket where I put my Powerpoles to barrel plug adapter.
It measures 6.69 x 1.96 x 5 inches and is very lightweight.
I added a small 1mm sheet of closed cell foam which I place inside against the controls and screen to give just a little bit more protection.
Using a stick to keep it open for your viewing pleasure
Because I power this radio off of a 3s Lipo battery (and you can power it off of a 9v smoke alarm battery as well), I also wanted something I could carry that in which would provide protection. You do not want to accidentally puncture one of these with your radio gear, so having something that can provide protection in a lightweight manner is essential.
With that in mind, I also use the Amazon Basics External Hard Drive Portable Carrying Case. Made of the same material as the case I use for the radio itself, it gives enough room for 1-2 of these Lipo batteries placed side-by-side as well as a pocket for the XT60 to Powerpole adapters that I made.
The battery case holds more than enough power for hours of radio playtime
Combined with a resonant dipole or two and my arborist throw-line, it is a lot of capability in a very tiny (and now well-protected) package.
This year I decided to learn CW (for the nth time).
I mean to finally learn CW and actually use it going forward. I also wanted to start operating from the field as much as possible.
As such, I started to acquire some mobile rigs – mostly QRP – to push me to make good on my investment and spend the time practicing CW and getting on the air. The good news is that I made my first CW contact on Memorial Day this year. My QTH introduces a lot of RFI so the QSO was quick and dirty, but we exchanged callsigns and actually did a follow up email or two.
I’m hooked.
However I looked around my home office and realized that I’ve got a few rigs now.
Quite a few.
So I’m putting together this comparison chart both for my own reference, but hopefully for yours as well.
Now, which radio to use next…..
Radio
Modes
Bands
Watts
Voltage
Notes
Elecraft KX3
All
160m-6m
0.1-10
9-15VDC
The Cadillac of my QRP rigs
Xiegu x5105
All
160m-6m
0.1-5
9-15VDC
Built in 12v 3800mah battery
LnR Precision MTR4B v2
CW
40m, 30m 20m, 10m
5
5.5-12VDC
Do not use more than 13v supply
Ten-Tec R4020
CW
40m, 20m
5
9-14VDC
Can receive SSB
QRP Labs QCX-mini
CW
Single Band (mine is 40m)
5
7-14VDC
Kit – high quality components, great documentation
Many options, each with its own awesomeness
Random Thoughts
Largest to smallest, which almost corresponds to feature sets as well
Elecraft KX3
I do not know where to begin. I purchased mine used and upon first boot, was blown away by the receive capabilities, filtering, etc. It is a robust, feature-rich, and portable transceiver that checks all the boxes and does so in a first class manner
Xiegu x5105
This is the latest addition to my kit. Radioddity.com had a great 2021 Field Day sale on these that came with the CE-19 adapter and a custom backpack. I took this in the woods all last week in northeast Wisconsin. The built-in battery pack that can be charged while it is in use is amazing. The retracting feet put it at just the right viewing angle. There are some nits such as latent noise when on headphones, but being slightly smaller (and significantly cheaper – less fear of breakage) than the KX3 means that I’m looking to use it more often.
LnR Precision MTR4B v2 (Mountain Topper)
Wow. So on opening the package I was amazed at the build quality here. Sturdy case, compact size, and a lot of built in features make this little rig a favorite of mine. Part of the compactness means that you give up a couple of things that other rigs offer – no volume control (watch those strong signals), no ATU (use a resonant antenna – problem solved), and a lower voltage input before you start to max out the PA FETs. It has built in message memories, beacon mode, and more.
The voltage input is the biggest issue with me for this rig – I have a couple of 3s LiPo batteries that I use just for this radio – but that is a minor nit given the great receive and overall performance that comes with it. Given that you can run this thing off a standard 9v smoke alarm battery, I’m not complaining (too loudly 😉 )
By the way, Amazon has a great and inexpensive case that fits the MTR4B v2 and power cable with adapter for Powerpoles to XT-60. You can find it here.
TEN-TEC R4020
I picked this up the last time I thought I was going to learn CW. It has largely sat unused fora few years, but I do pull it out on occasion. Small, easy to use, and built in AA battery tray (bring a screwdriver to open/replace batteries). Not much to say here other than it is capable and when I bought mine on Ebay, was relatively cheap for the quality.
QRP Labs QCX-mini 40m
This is a kit build and I strongly recommend it as both a great build experience and a great little radio. It is half the size of the LnR Mountain Topper above, has a built in CW decoder, volume control, message memories, and more. With the exception of one toroid that is somewhat more complex to wind than most I’ve done, it goes together easily with some of the most comprehensive and easy to follow instructions that I’ve ever seen in a kit. If you want to dive into kit building, or just want another one to add to your shack, I cannot recommend this one highly enough. For the price (<$100USD with a solid metal case), it is top notch.
kd0hbu 