so i've been putting off building one of these for like two years now, always told myself i'd get around to it, and last month i finally just ordered a QCX mini kit from QRP Labs and sat down and did it. took me about three evenings spread over a week, my soldering isnt the greatest but i followed the instructions pretty carefully and honestly the whole thing just worked first time i powered it up which i was NOT expecting.

been running it portable a couple weekends now, just hiking out to a local park with a random wire thrown up in a tree and the little rig running off a small lipo pack. made a contact into michigan last saturday with like 4 watts on 40m and the other guy gave me a solid 579 which honestly felt like a bigger deal than any of the contacts i've made with my 100w base station. there's something about the whole low power thing that makes every contact feel a lot more satisfying, not sure how to explain it.

anyway wondering if anyone else has been doing QRP portable stuff and has tips on antennas for field use. i've been reading about end-fed half waves and wondering if those are worth the hassle compared to just tossing a random wire up

congrats on the first build, that's a great feeling when it just fires up and works. i built mine about four years ago now and yeah the first real contact on QRP hits different for sure.

on the antenna question, i switched from random wire to an EFHW a while back and honestly dont think i'd go back. with a random wire you kinda need a tuner to make it behave and even then depending on the length you can get some weird RF hot spots on the coax shield which is annoying when youre portable and running on battery. the EFHW with a decent 49:1 unun is pretty close to resonant on multiple bands without needing much tuning, packs down small, and if you can get it up at a decent angle it really does work well. only thing is the matchbox adds a tiny bit of weight and complexity but not enough to matter really. lots of guys wind their own ununs which is not hard at all if you have a couple toroids lying around.

what band are you mostly operating on, that might change the advice a bit

the QCX mini is what got me back into the hobby after being inactive for years so good choice haha. i take mine out on bike rides sometimes, just strap the whole kit to the pannier and find a picnic table somewhere. 40m has been treating me well but i've had some really nice contacts on 20 too when conditions cooperate. the efficiency of that chip amp in those rigs is kind of wild when you think about it, getting like 80 percent or so out of the final stage means your battery lasts way longer than you'd expect