so our ARES group has a county-wide exercise coming up and im trying to figure out the best way to power everything without relying on shore power. we'll be running an IC-7300, a small packet station on a separate laptop, and probably a 2m/70cm mobile rig for local coordination. rough estimate is somewhere around 30-40 amps continuous draw when the HF rig is transmitting which honestly is more than i expected when i added it all up.

my question is mainly whether to bring the Honda EU2200i I borrowed from a club member or just stack a couple of the 100ah lifepo4 batteries i already own. the generator obviously gives unlimited runtime but its loud and at the last exercise the EOC people got pretty annoyed about generator noise near the building entrance. the batteries are quiet but i dont know if 200ah is really enough for a full 12 hour activation, especially if we end up doing a lot of HF traffic.

also still havent settled on antennas. was thinking a NVIS setup with a 40m horizontal loop fairly low to the ground for in-state comms, and then maybe a buddipole or something similar for longer range if needed. anyone done something like this for a real exercise or actual activation and have opinions on what actually works vs what sounds good on paper

the battery math isnt too scary if you think it through. 200ah at 12v is 2400 watt-hours theoretical, but you really shouldnt drain lifepo4 below maybe 20% so call it 1900 usable. if your average draw is say 15 amps when you factor in receive time and the laptop and everything, thats roughly 12 hours. probably close but tight. id bring at least one more battery or have the generator as backup and just run it outside around the corner with a long extension cord — most 2200 watt generators will handle that load no problem and you can stick it far enough away that it isnt right in peoples faces.

on the NVIS question yeah a low 40m dipole works well for that, just make sure you're actually getting it low enough, like under 30 feet, otherwise it starts acting more like a regular dipole. some guys in our group use an end fed halfwave on a single fiberglass pole which is fast to set up and works decent for NVIS. the buddipole is fine but kind of fiddly to get tuned right under pressure during an exercise in my experience.

ran almost this exact setup at a real deployment last year (flooding, not just an exercise) and the generator noise thing is real, people do not want to hear that thing all day. we ended up running the honda only during peak traffic periods and coasting on a pair of 100ah battleborns the rest of the time which worked out fine. one thing that bit us was the inverter on the laptop charger being inefficient and drawing way more than expected, worth measuring your actual loads with a meter before you commit to anything.

also just fwiw the buddipole is kind of a pain if the wind picks up, had mine go over twice. if you have a way to stake it down properly its okay but id honestly rather deal with throwing a wire up a tree if theres one available