2026 ARRL January VHF

No real changes to the rover that are meaningful to a VHF contest since the last outing in September. I’ve made some additions to make it more conducive to HF operations and doing some POTA activations in between VHF contests though. Turns out that came in handy for this contest.

The weather was expected to be miserable, but that’s to be expected in January. Not having a lot of motivation leading up to the contest just decided to stay close to home and hit what is becoming a pretty regular route for me. Taum Sauk Mountain in EM47 on Saturday and the EM49/EM59/EN40/EN50 corner on Sunday. After getting the van warmed up and some supplies packed in, I headed out.

Got setup in EM47, the clock struck 1900z, and we were off to the races. The cricket races that is. Not only did activity seem down, but the propagation gods were also apparently very unhappy. What stations were there to work were very difficult to actually work. Contacts that would generally be relatively quick (as quick as FT8 can be) could take several minutes if they completed at all. Struggled along until 2130z. By that time there was very little left to work and I was pretty bored with it, so switched to playing NAQP SSB for a little while before going home for the night.

Got up Sunday morning around 0600 local to get the van warming up, get supplies packed back in, and off to the EM49/EM59/EN40/EN50 corner with the hopes that Sunday would be better. Got setup in EN40 and… more crickets. Two hours and 20 Qs later the boredom won and I switched it up to running POTA on HF instead before heading home early.

TL;DR The weather was miserable, the bands were miserable, and POTA was more fun than the actual VHF contest.

Until next time… thanks for the Qs!

Gear:
Flex 6600 / Q5 Signal 5BVUX
50 - 500w - Directive Systems 3el Yagi @ 20’
144 - 350w - Directive Systems 6el Rover Yagi @ 12’
222 - 100w - Directive Systems 10el Rover Yagi @ 10’
432 - 150w - Directive Systems 15el Rover Yagi @ 8’