back to 2025.10.18 JOTA foxhunt at Ingawanis

9 review:




Today's forecast was possibly the best weather we've ever had for JOTA. Temperatures were mild, skies were
clear, there was very little wind, and no rain at any point in the day. The only issue I ran into is there
was a lot of morning dew, making the grass wet and soaking everyone's shoes. This also made for some pretty
dense fog on the drive into camp.

I arrived uncharacteristically early this time around, but ran into some confusion about where I was supposed
to set up the fox-hunt and solar. I ended up unloading all my gear at the Picnic Shelter, which was also where
Dave (KD0DK) was setting up for the Morse Code activity. By the time we realized Fox Hunting was planned to
be near the Dining Hall there wan't enough time to move everything. We decided to just move the solar and do
the fox hunt at the Picnic Shelter. (the Picnic Shelter is a much better location to run the fox hunt from anyway,
being centrally located in the camp instead of on the edge of the South "cliff")

Solar was probably unnecessary today. I didn't really have the time to spare to set up and monitor it, and it
was set up on the other side of the dining hall. I also wasn't available to answer any questions or provide
any information though so it wasn't very useful. I think just setting out a large solar wallet would have been
plenty for today.

Due to the huge turnout, instead of four groups of five, we had six groups of nine. Although this shortened the
time available for each group, it was just enough time for mos of my groups to find all three training foxes.
The larger group size required me to split the group into two separate units, and run back and forth between
them as I trained and assisted them. It worked out in the end, although I ended up with a sore knee after the
event.

Later inspection of a few of their antennas showed assembly problems. One was missing its hairpin and wouldn't
have worked as expected. Another had the handle on the wrong end, which worked but the scout had to keep in
mind it was pointing in the opposite direction. I also saw one made with a type-F (instead of BNC) connector,
along with 75 (not 50) ohm coax. I had no way to connect this antenna to a radio, and I'm not sure how the
coax would have affected the antenna. I think this was due to scouts being sent to hardware stores instead of
electronic stores to get the cable. 50 ohm cable with BNC ends will be hard to find locally.

I haven't heard any official feedback yet, but from what I have heard, group leaders were disappointed with the
lack of attenuation and "getting a 9 in every direction" using the extra radios and scout-built antennas. The
antennas were MUCH better quality than those made in previous years and I think would work well for transmitter
hunting, so we should make similar plans for future events. There was some discussion about adding offset
attenuator construction a part of future JOTA events.


1 complications

2 after-event work


89 WH of solar:



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