[SARES] A personal case for being prepared

Have you ever had something as simple as a handheld's antenna fail?  In the 
middle of hosting a net?

This unfortunately happened to me last night as I hosted the SARES portion 
of the SVECS net.
Others offered to jump in and help run the net (and I almost got to the 
point of needing that help), but I had enough "spare parts" in arm's reach 
to keep going.

I host the net using a handheld and a gain (1/2 wave telescoping "HotRod") 
antenna.

In the middle of the net, my signal stopped getting out.  I rapidly switched 
to an identical spare radio that I keep on standby for just this case. 
Having only a rubber-duck on the other radio, I switched antennas.

This didn't work -- so I grabbed the original radio (now with the rubber 
duck) and was able to successfully conduct the local net using the rubber 
duck.

Reporting to the main net takes more power from my QTH -- so I grabbed a 
third handheld which had a better rubber-duck and more power (7W vs. 5W). 
This worked well on the main net.
And then the batteries gave out (I didn't have the third radio charged, 
although the other two were).

Lesson #1:  Perserverence and redundancy are vital.  My supply of "spare 
parts" kept me alive as net control.

Lesson #2:  Even something as simple as a telescoping antenna can fail 
suddenly, without warning and invisibly.  After the fact, I realize that 
this is the cause of earlier intermittent problems.
(I have since repaired the antenna -- the base coil was crimped at one end 
under a heat-shrink AEA cover and had failed.  A little dab of solder fixed 
everything)

Cheers, and stay prepared.

   - Skip AA6WK




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