so i've been a ham for about 3 years now mostly just doing HF with my Icom 7300 and never really thought about QRP stuff because honestly i figured why would i want less power right. but my buddy kept talking about his little MTR trail friendly rig and i got curious and ended up ordering a QCX mini kit from QRP Labs a few months back and just finally sat down and built the thing last weekend.

it took me probably 6 or 7 hours total and i had to reflow a couple solder joints that were giving me grief on the toroid winding section but got it going and took it out to the park yesterday with a random wire antenna up in a tree and worked a station in Ohio from Pennsylvania on 40m running 5 watts CW. i know thats not some huge DX accomplishment but something about it just felt different, like more satisfying than any contact ive had with the big rig. hard to explain really.

anyway im kind of hooked now and wondering if anyone has suggestions for what to build or try next in the QRP world. im thinking maybe a 20m EFHW antenna to make the portable setup a bit easier. also curious if anyone runs QRP on digital modes like FT8, does the low power thing still feel rewarding on digital or is it kind of cheating since the software does all the heavy lifting

yeah that feeling you're describing after the first QRP contact is real and it honestly never totally goes away, at least it hasnt for me in like 15 years of doing it. theres something about knowing you're getting out on basically a flashlight battery worth of power that just changes how you think about the whole radio thing.

the EFHW is a great idea for portable, i run a 49:1 unun with about 66 feet of wire and it loads up really nicely on 40 20 and 15 without a tuner which is huge when you're trying to keep things simple in the field. just watch your matching on the QCX since those finals are not super forgiving if the SWR gets ugly.

on the FT8 question, i go back and forth on this honestly. i do run QRP FT8 sometimes and ive worked some genuinely impressive stuff, but i think for the pure satisfaction thing CW or even SSB QRP hits different. that said getting a new entity or a tough state with 5 watts on FT8 is still pretty cool. dont let anyone tell you its cheating, you still need a decent antenna and you still have to actually make the contact.

I'm kind of in the same boat as you, just getting into the QRP thing. built a pixie kit off amazon a while back which was basically useless but it got me interested. the QCX mini is on my list. did you find the toroid winding instructions pretty clear or did you have to look up a video or anything? that part always stresses me out a bit.