Hi Guys,
The XYL and I paid a visit to the local club's field
day effort Saturday afternoon. The idea was to "visit"
for an hour, poke a head in each tent, say hello, and
move on.
On the way out, the XYL pointed out one last tent. I
almost walked by it. A quick look inside and I did a
double take (triple take) - somebody brought their NEW
ORION to *field day*? !!
Yep, there *it* was, with two ops on headphones doing
40m CW. I was just behind them taking all of it in,
since I didn't know either of them and had never seen
the radio in person.
All of the sudden the op at the paddles gets up, takes
off the phones and says "We need some help here, you
do CW"?
Holy crap!
Yes, why, yes I *do* do CW!(hi). Fifteen seconds later
I was transmitting on the Orion.
What a blast, that Orion is a real radio and that
display is actually very attractive in person, even
given the screen formatting / fonts niggles. There
were stations operating on 15m and 20m yagis and the
radio displayed no desense whatsoever.
The rigs owner, KF6C was running the computer and
giving me tips on making adjustments to the rig on the
fly. So much fun. The antenna was a 5/8ths vertical
weather balloon.
I ran for about 90 minutes and experienced one lock up
that required the rig to be rebooted. The receiver
went to S9 hash and the spectrum screen filled white,
even without an antenna. The rig worked fine after the
reboot but still bothersome, I suspect for the owner.
I commented that the audio did not have a pronounced
digital sound to it, and the owner suggested that the
roofing filter configuration seems to affect this
greatly - interesting.
Amazing to find an Orion so close by, it sure made
this field day one to remember!
73,
de Don WB8YQJ/6
(Field day W6NWG)
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