so im finally doing a proper field deployment this weekend, kind of a dry run for our county ARES group before the actual exercise in the fall. been collecting gear for a while but never really ran it all together at once and im starting to wonder if ive overcomplicated this.

running an IC-7300 and a 7610 (yeah both, dont ask, the 7610 is for the other op), and we've got a Honda EU2200i for power. the plan was to also have a LiFePO4 battery bank as backup - its a 100ah battleborn setup - but i wasnt sure if i should just run everything off the generator the whole time or cycle through the battery and let the generator charge it while we operate. my concern is the 7610 pulling maybe 22-23 amps at full tilt on SSB and then add in the laptops and a small fan and suddenly i dont know if the 2200 is gonna be happy all day.

antenna side of things im doing a 40m OCF dipole up maybe 30 feet on a fiberglass mast, might throw up a 20m vertical too if we have time. the site is a county fairground, pretty open, which is good but theres some nasty power line noise on certain bands from what i heard from the guys who did it last year.

anyone run a 7610 from a 2200i for any length of time? and honestly any tips on keeping the noise down from the genny are appreciated, i keep reading about isolation transformers but i've never actually used one in the field

the EU2200i should handle that fine honestly, honda rates it at 1800w continuous and the 7610 at full power is pulling maybe 130w input on TX, so even with two radios and the accessories you're well under the limit. the bigger issue is usually motor load cycling, like if you have anything inductive on the same circuit. i ran my 7300 and a linear off a EU2000is (the older one, basically same thing) for about 6 hours at a field day site and it barely broke a sweat.

the isolation transformer thing for noise is real but i found the bigger win was just getting the generator physically far away from the operating position and using a long extension cord. like 50-75 feet makes a huge difference. also run your coax and power leads away from each other if you can, even just a few feet of separation helps. if you're still getting noise after that then yeah maybe look at a line filter on the rig's DC input, there are some decent ones that inline right at the power connector.

cycling through the battery while the generator charges it is totally fine btw, the battleborn stuff handles that well. just watch your charger output doesnt do anything weird when the genny is under load at the same time.

OCF dipole on a 30ft mast at a fairground, youre gonna have a fun time with that noise situation depending on which direction the lines run. we had a similar setup at a hamfest demo last spring and ended up having to rotate the whole antenna about 45 degrees to null some of it out. the OCF isnt as easy to rotate as a yagi obviously but even a little repositioning helped.

one thing i'd say - bring way more rope and stakes than you think you need. every time i think i have enough i end up scrounging around for something to guy the mast with. fiberglass masts at 30 feet with a dipole loaded on one end get really fun in any kind of wind.