Yesterday when I was driving towards Lauhanvuori OH/JS-032 I remembered suddenly that I had forgot external battery at home. What to do I thought and the worst case rose already to my mind – useless trip god dammit. But then I remembered that internal batteries of my FT-817 are full loaded and I have 1.4 Ah power for running. But how long it lasts with 5W? Ooh, I do not need to use the whole power, perhaps less is needed.
I have never before used less than 5W in the summit but now I decided to test with 1W which could make my summit possible. Station up and on the air. I was not sure if I could get any qsos. But, but when I added a new spot and sent the first cqs on 14 MHz – what happened – a huge pile up! Quite soon I had 14 qsos and reports were “normal” compared to 5W. Then I changed to 10 MHz, 21 MHz and at least 18 MHz. After 1 hour 37 minutes I had 32 qsos in four bands. Two summit to summit qsos and longest contacts were to 9H and CT.
Lauhanvuori is National Park were people are walking on free time. My station was in one cross and many people passed me looking what I was doing. Team of ladies passed me too and they looked me very deeply but did not say anything. When they returned after on hour they stopped to me and asked if they can ask what I am doing? Well, ladies got a 10 minutes presentation in live what is ham sprit and especially summit on the air.
Working with 1W was very encouraging and I suppose that in future I will make tests with lower powers. This experience was a good example of CW power!
73, Saku OH2NOS