Intro

As you might have seen in my previous article, I am trying to learn the CW (Morse code) for quite some time now. One of the goals I set to myself is doing a portable operation using a CW only until the end of the August 2025. Since I still have sluggish speed in both sending and (especially) decoding, I was thinking about doing a POTA, where you need only 10 contacts for an activation. So on 27th of August I took my bicycle and went to CZ-0010 - Jizerské hory Protected Landscape Area , since it is close to my home QTH.

Setup

When I arrived at the place I know very well, I wanted to set up my EFHW antenna K24 (pocket-sized lightweight QRP antenna) over a tree branch that is pretty high above the ground, about 15m. So I unpacked my gear and since I have my new arborist throw weight I was hoping for the best. Unfortunately, I was not able to throw that high 🥲. After 5 attempts that ended up about 1 meter below the target branch, I gave up and found a backup tree, much shorter, where I set it up in about 6m above ground.

My rig for that day was IC-705 with external power bank with 15V power-delivery USB-C cable, so I can use full potential of the radio - 10W of output power. In this place, I would like to thank to George Smart, M1GEO , for his work on a IC-705 supply voltage vs output power experiment , which helped me a lot when selecting the right power bank to buy. And by the way, he also made a CW contact with me on this first POTA activation, what a coincidence!

Another kudos goes to Honza OK1FUN , for giving me this idea of using power bank + usb-c power delivery cable with IC-705, instead of having external battery LiFePo4 battery, which is the setup I was using before.

The power bank setup is much lighter, cheaper and there are many many of powerbanks you can use. You don’t have to care about having a LiFePo4 battery charger, as you can basically charge power bank with any usb-c cable…

Also, you do not need to buy expensive “official” battery packs from ICOM, as they are expensive and low voltage, so you do not unleash the full power of 10W that the IC-705 can deliver, but just with external power supply with about at least 13 volts.

I am using a Windcamp ARK-705 cage/scaffolding for my IC-705, and there is a neat space on its backside, where you can put your power bank using zip ties, of if you want it to be easily swappable, using a velcro straps (that’s what I am using). So I do not see any con here, just all pros!

IC-705 in Windcamp ARK-705 scaffolding + power bank + shortened 15V power delivery cable

For keying, until recently, I was using Putikeeg CW paddle (you can see it in the My First CW Contact blogpost). But few weeks ago, I stumbled upon an article on a blog of Milan OK1IF who tested and praised another chinese CQ paddle branded as TUMD portable CW key. I really liked his review and since it was not that expensive, I gave it a shot and ordered that one (along with the other TUMD “tabletop” CW key too, because it looked also very good).

Once both came to my mailbox, I must say that Milan was right in his review. I have instantly fallen in love with the portable version, as it goes soooo smoooothly. The other key, tabletop version, is also very nice. I have not tried many CW keys in my life yet, but with those two, I do not feel the urge to find some others, at least for some time 😁.

TUMD portable CW key/paddle

Operation

After setting up the gear I started to call CQ on 40m band using the beginner (sluggish) speed of 12WPM. I have also set up a old phone for a video recording, so I can save it to Youtube as a non-public video just for me and later compare my CW progress over time.

Reverse Beacon Network picked me up pretty quickly and sent me to the DX cluster. My CW partner-in-crime Petr OK1PTR was waiting for me and was my first QSO in this POTA operation. We are struggling with CW together, so thanks for being on the same boat 😂. After our contact, he put me into the POTA DX cluster and from now on, I was enjoying the pile-up. Fortunately not so strong, because I am not that good yet in reading callsigns and I need my time. There were few situations where multiple stations with the same signal strength and similar tone came to me and I was not able to decipher anything, so sending a good old question mark few times finally made me decode at least beginning of one of the callsigns so I asked for that one first and then the others.

During the operation, I was asking operators for repeating their callsigns, because I still have problems with some characters and I need to think about them in order to decode them correctly. So thanks all for patience. But everyone was really patient with me ❤️. As you have probably figured, I am not using any sort of CW decoder and I do not want to use it, ever. I want to be able to decode in my head like a master operator 😂

One german station was trying to ask me something, but I was not able to decode all of it, sorry, I will be better next time!

After about 90 mins, the 40m band was out of contacts, so I thought I will try 20m band for a bit, since there was just a little bit of time left for me, before I needed to return back home, also, the sun started to set slowly. On 20m, I was able to do 8 more contacts.

Beginner CW op in action

Surprise

on 20m band, in one moment, I heard ZL prefix in the callsign. At first, I was like “this is impossible”, and asked back with ZL?. He came back again, I read the callsign and I was like “I must have heard it wrongly, let’s ask again to be sure”, so I send him back the full callsign with a question mark and the reply was RRR meaning Roger, meaning that I indeed read the callsign correctly! This was a double wow moment for me because:

  • I have licence for about 2 years and until now, I did not have any New Zealand in my log
  • This was my first CW portable operation

I made a video snippet, so I can flex on the internet. Sure, for many HAMs ZL might be not interesting, or is a common DXCC, but for me, for the reasons above, this contact means a lot.

QSO map

QSO map - inner Europe + DX from ZL

Conclusion

From my point of view, this was a great success. On my way back through the forest on my bicycle, I saw two hares, which was nice, and then 10 meters before my house, the chain on my bike was torn apart, I was pedaling probably too hard 😅 Anyways, I cannot wait for next opportunity to activate some outdoor area, being it POTA or WWFF using CW. CW on!