Nordic Ham

honestly for repeater use you probably wont notice the difference. the pattern thing matters more if youre doing weak signal work or trying to hit something specific and youre off to the side of it. for just hitting the local machine the roof center is technically better but a good lip mount is fine. ive had a diamond K400 lip mount on my jeep for three years now, zero issues, doesnt scratch, clamps on solid. the coax routing is a little awkward but nothing you cant manage with a good drip loop. if you ever think youll do serious vhf contesting or SOTA activations from the vehicle then maybe reconsider the roof hole. but for everyday use dont stress it

Just got back from Dayton and wow, some interesting developments this year. Icom was teasing their 60th anniversary radio with circuit boards on display - looks like it'll be an HF rig with dual receivers, possibly an SDR replacement for the IC-7851. FlexRadio showed off their new 8000 series that will eventually replace the 6000 series. The ComJot CJ-1 caught my attention - looks like a thick smartphone with VHF/UHF capability, can do DMR T1/T2, and the phone can actually interface with the radio for APRS. Interesting concept if they can deliver. Not much new from the big three otherwise. Kenwood reps mentioned a tri-band mobile is coming, but no timeline given.

so we have a county-level ARES exercise coming up in about 3 weeks and im trying to figure out the best way to power everything without just dragging a big honkin generator to the site. the EC wants us to be able to run HF and VHF simultaneously, which means the IC-7300 plus a 2m mobile rig and probably a laptop for winlink. rough estimate puts me at maybe 30-35 amps peak if i'm actually transmitting on HF at 100w while the laptop and the other radio are doing their thing. ive been going back and forth between just using my honda eu2200i with a good filter for RFI and calling it a day, or trying to build out a LiFePO4 battery bank big enough to last a full 8 hour deployment without recharging. the math on the battery side gets pretty ugly when you account for the HF duty cycle — like if we're running any digital modes the avg current draw isnt as spiky but it just keeps going. for the antenna side i'm leaning toward the Chameleon MPAS Lite as a vertical since we might not have good tree support at this particular site. last exercise we were basically in a gravel parking lot next to a community center and radial situation was a nightmare. has anyone run that antenna on 40m for any kind of actual traffic work and gotten decent results, not just a signal report from 200 miles away? anyway curious what other folks are running for portable power on longer deployments. not trying to start a generator debate just want to hear what actually works in the field.

i went for the first time last year and honestly didnt know what to expect but it was pretty cool. bought some coax connectors and a random tuner that may or may not work, still havent tested it. the tailgate swap stuff is where its at if you ask me, the vendor tables inside were kinda overpriced compared to what you can find outside

so ive been running my IC-7300 stock for about two years now and honestly its a great radio out of the box, no complaints. but ive been reading forever about swapping out the stock roofing filter situation and whether it actually makes a difference on a crowded band. ended up pulling the trigger on the FL-5000 optional filter last month and did the install myself, which took maybe 45 minutes if you count the time i spent second-guessing myself before opening it up. honestly the difference on 40m during a contest weekend was pretty noticeable, at least to me. adjacent signal rejection felt tighter. hard to say if that's placebo or real but i was pulling calls out of the noise that i was struggling with before. could also be atmospheric conditions that day who knows. anyway the mod itself is dead simple, just the filter and some care not to strip those tiny screws. wondering if anyone else has done this and whether they went further with any other mods — ive seen some posts about the TX EQ settings and the DSP tweaks but havent messed with that stuff yet. also curious if anyone has done the hardware AGC mod that floats around on the forums, never been fully clear on whether thats actually worth the hassle or if the software DSP handles it fine these days.