N5ZY

Join us on-the-air during the No Static VHF Activity weekend! These two days everything 6m and up will be radioactive. For this rover event I will be a lone bison rovering Oklahoma, weather permitting. Weather predictions are forecasting warmer than normal (Spring in January!) No artic blast! After last year I decided I needed ski goggles if that happened again.

• Grid Squares – Where and when
• APRS Position Beacon
• Visual Map
• Frequencies
• Antennas & Radios
• Previous Results
• Post Contest Soapbox

Sign-up for my Rover Grid Alert SMS/Text during the contest when I’m at a grid!

To receive an SMS/Text when I arrive at a new grid please enter your contact information below. Upon arrival I will message you from an App, not a group chat with reply-all chaos!
Just a few important messages like:
– N5ZY/R QRV EM16 – 6m/2m/1.25m/70cm/33cm/23cm
– N5ZY/R QSY 222.0
– N5ZY/R QRT Equip Issue

Grid Squares – Where and when

Ambitious yes.. and I’m sure the plan will change as soon as the contest starts..

Local TIme	Grid	LAT,LON	Note	Gmap Link
SATURDAY 1PM until band dies
1 – 2PM	EM04	34.74529,-98.53184	Mount Scott	GMap
3 – 3:20 PM	EM14	34.99589,-97.96661	HE Bailey Roadside	GMap
5:30 – 5:45 PM	EM05	35.53702,-98.03445	Fort Reno, El Reno	GMap
6 – 6:20 PM	EM15	35.59956,-97.95969	El Reno hilltop	GMap
7 – 7:20 PM	EM16	36.02990,-97.90134	Hennessey	GMap
8 – 8:20 PM	EM06	36.39038,-98.05105	West Enid	GMap
SUNDAY 6 AM until band dies
7 – 10 AM	EM16	36.07556,-96.00352	Turkey Mtn W	GMap
10:15 – 10:45 AM	EM26	36.07182,-95.90466	61st & Sheridan	GMap
11 – 11:25 AM	EM15	35.97550,-96.04911	Sapulpa-Glenpool Farm	GMap
11:35 – 11:50 AM	EM25	35.94451,-95.98986	Glenpool Farm2	GMap
12:10 – 12:30 PM	EM15	35.72960,-96.00381	Okmulgee	GMap
1 – 1:15 PM	EM25	35.43613,-95.96398	Henryetta H2O Twr	GMap
3 – 3:30 PM	EM24	34.89444,-95.75993	McAlester H2O Twr	GMap
4 – 4:20 PM	EM14	34.93815,-96.01854	West McAlester	GMap

APRS Position Beacon

I will use APRSdroid to beacon my live position.
You can see where I am using https://aprs.fi/ and searching for my callsign N5ZY.

Visual Map

Saturday Afternoon EM04, EM14, EM05, EM15, EM16, EM06

Start at Mount Scott then work my way North along the grid line. Overnight I will drive to Tulsa and stage for Sunday.

Sunday EM16, EM26, EM15, EM25, EM24, EM14

Start at Tulsa Grid corner then work my way South along the grid line. In this map of Tulsa I highlighted terrain above 750 ft. and plotted my activations accordingly.

The remaining daylight hours of Sunday I will drive South along the grid line. Again terrain above 750 ft is shaded and plotted my activations accordingly.

Frequencies

For 2026 I’m adding 10 GHz however at this writing I’ve not yet tested it and setup will require several minutes.

Band	WSJT-FT8 (USB)	Call Freq (USB)	QSO Freq (USB)	FM SIMPLEX	FM SIMPLEX 2	FM SIMPLEX 3
6 M	50.313	50.125	50.145	52.525
2 M	144.174	144.2	144.220	146.52	146.49	146.55
1.25 M	222.174	222.1		223.5
70 cm	432.174	432.1		446.0
33 cm	902.174 ?	902.1		902.125
23 cm	1296.174	1296.1		1294.5
3 cm	10368.200 Q65-60D	10368.100		10368.100

Antennas

Bands	Antenna
Verticals
2 M	Whip while driving
2/70/23	Comet Base Vertical CMA-GP-95 while parked only and while the rotor is NOT in use! 6 dBi @ 146MHz, 8.6 dBi @ 446, 12.8 dBi 1.2 GHz
1.25 M	Comet CA-SUPER22 while parked only 6.6 dB @ 222 MHz
33 CM	Comet KP-20 while parked only 9.2 dB @ 902 MHz
Horizontals
6 M	Par Electronics Stressed Moxon, (50.3 Mhz) or M2 Antennas 6M-3SS beam or Par Electronics 6M Omniangle (OA-50)
2 M	M2 Antennas 2M7X (144-148MHz) 7ele 12.3 dBi
1.25 M	M2 Antennas 222-10EZ (222-226 MHz) 10 ele 14.1 dBi
70 CM	M2 Antennas 440-11X (420-450 MHz) 11 ele 13.4 dBi
33 CM	M2 Antennas 917HD (900-930MHz) 17 ele 17 dBi
23 CM	M2 Antennas 23CM35 (1250-1300MHz) 35 ele 20.94 dBi
3 CM	Ebay 22 dBi (10.368 GHz) rectangular horn

Radios

Radio	Desc/Use
IC9700	2m, 70cm and 23 cm USB and FM
IC7610	6m
IC7300	To use with transverters
Q5 Signal L33-28hp50	Converts 10 M to 33 cm
Q5 Signal L222-28hp100	Converts 10 M to 1.25 M
DEMI 10368-144	Convert 70cm to 3cm @ 3 watts
Anytone	VHF Mobile

Previous Results while rovering

Yr	Mo	Category	Div	Nat Rank/All Cat	Div Rank/ALL Cat Me/Total	Div Rank/Rovers Me/Total	Score	QSOs	Mults	Comment
2022	Sep	SngOpLP	WGDiv (OK)		9/25	n/a	513	28	19
2023	Jan	ClascRovr	WGDiv (OK)		23/47	2/2	399	17	19
2023	Jun	LimtdRovr	WGDiv (OK)	411/1588	51/100+	3/3	15228	157	94
2023	Sep	ClascRovr	WGDiv (OK)	174/686	7/25	1/4	4182	67	51
2024	Jun	LimtdRovr	WGDiv (OK)	154/1133	14/72	4/7	15566	180	86
2024	Sep	LimtdRovr	WGDiv (OK)	129/636	6/41	2/3	4922	89	46
2025	Jan	ClascRovr	WGDiv (OK)	205/764	11/40	1/1	2366	72	26	Brrr!! Artic Blast!
2025	Jun	ClascRovr	DeltaDiv (AR)	131/1257	6/33	3/3	35,462	233	149	Good test
2025	Aug 222 and Up	Rover	Area 8		4/5 (raw)	2/2 (raw)	7,148 (raw)			Retreated Sunday 4AM from Hail storm
2025	Sep	ClascRovr	WGDiv (OK)	35/540 (raw)	35/540, 3/32 (raw)	1/2 (raw)	29,562 (raw)	191	78	Missed last grid due to LiFePO4 depletion
2026	Jan	ClascRovr	WGDiv (OK)				3,690 (raw)	71	41

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N5ZY Rover – January 2026 VHF Contest Soapbox

The 3-steps for rovering:
Step 1: Make a plan. This can consume a LOT of time.. an entire weekend and several evenings after work.
Step 2: Forget the plan because nothing ever goes according to the plan.
Step 3: Improvise wildly and pretend this was the plan all along.

Only 480 miles this time—a few hundred short of my goal—but the radios were just providing static noise and not any QSOs. Murphy was my co-pilot this weekend. I committed to rovering weeks earlier based on “warmer than normal” forecasts, spoiler alert: that forecast was wrong a teensy bit.

Saturday morning at 5:30 AM, 19°F outside, and my car battery greeted me at 12.2V. A little voice said “that’s your warning not to go.” I told that voice to be quiet, spent an hour on the trickle charger, and headed out—only one hour behind schedule. What could go wrong?

I arrived at Lake Lawtonka with no time to charge before Mount Scott. I launched N1MM and encountered a cascade of error messages—database corruption.. I downloaded SQLite tools, performed emergency database first aid, and departed for the mountain just in time.

Mount Scott was brutal. Mid-20s with 50 mph gusts. In a moment of questionable judgment, I decided to assemble the 3-element 6m beam on the roof. The wind persistently shoved me into my antenna mast, which I suppose was preferable to the alternative of becoming Oklahoma’s first airborne ham casualty of 2026. Numb fingers meant dropped hardware and needing pliers for turning simple PL-259 connectors. Tourists kept yelling “Whatcha doing?” through their car windows. I resisted the urge to shout back “Just enjoying the thrill of hanging on for my life!” or “Get out of your warm car and come have a look!” LOL!

Sunday morning, Starlink went completely offline. I had unknowingly exhausted my 10 GB monthly allotment (I use it daily to/from work). Surprise! Tired, cold, frustrated, and logging few contacts. Then the grand finale: after a pleasant 2m FM simplex chat, I told the locals I would drive a mile to the next grid line. I put the car in drive, proceeded under the first tree, heard a noise, and saw coax dangling down the back window—I had forgotten to lower the 6m loop. I found my antenna and carbon fiber mast in a ditch looking rather sorry for themselves. The steel mast was bent back 20°.

With 6m now a pile of regret in my backseat and no internet, I did what any sensible operator would do: procured a Braum’s cheeseburger and headed home!

The new 10 GHz gear never made it out of the vehicle given that I would be asking someone else to go stand outside in these conditions for 30 min and make a QSO with me. It just didn’t feel like something a person should ask a friend to do.

Silver linings: My Kia Niro EV averaged 1.8-1.9 mi/kWh despite the cold and antenna windload, charging reliably at 50 kW. My N5ZY Co-Pilot app performed admirably after a few field adjustments—tracking battery voltage, grid changes, syncing WSJT-X logs to N1MM, and beaconing to APRS (until Starlink expired). The new Samlex PST-600-12 DC/AC inverter was significantly quieter. I added a second 300AH LiFePO4 battery (starlink is hungry). I added a Victron Energy SmartShunt with bluetooth for my “N5ZY Co-Pilot” app. I stopped using Gaia GPS maps and exclusively used CalTopo along with kml files I created using Anthropic’s claude.ai. I’ve found claude.ai to be an indispensable tool for creating KML files, writing Python code, etc.

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In this photo you can see the carbon fiber mast with 6m loop, and the others. I’ve added the crossbar and moved 432 and 902 onto it with a touch of space on the end to hang a 10368 horn antenna. To keep the microwave coax as short as I can it will have to go through the sunroof..

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Miserable band conditions for a contest but normal for mid-January.

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Sometimes the contest tests you more than your equipment. Already planning improvements for June—starting with a better co-pilot than Murphy.

73, N5ZY