Winter Field Day 2025 N6CC

UPDATE: 3/5/25. In an effort to encourage grid-down emergency communications exercises with rugged, reliable equipment the following After Action Report is posted.. Why?

The above is KGO-AM San Francisco after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. Done.

A friend and I set up 2 off-grid stations on Brannan Island in the Sacramento River Delta this past weekend. This is an Island in the river system; it is also a Park and we were set up on its high point (23′) above ! sea level. So we were informally operating on an Island/Park and Summit: IOTA, POTA, SOTA simultaneously.

Below is an early morning shot of my portable setup on the island chatting with Andy in Coalinga via morse code. Sending the morning SITREP: Winter Field Day 2025 at N6CC/6.

Winter Field Day is a National emergency communications preparedness operating event and not a contest. Our goal was to exercise our equipment and our “Go Kits” from the field plus have some outdoors fun when no one else is around. To this end we contacted and chatted with our like-minded friends on HF CW (Morse Code), SSB and AM voice modes. We did not claim any contact “points” or even keep a log of contacts.

The American Radio Relay League sponsors “Field Day” every June with the same goals and upwards of 40,000 hams in North America participate. Winter Field Day has the same purpose with the added challenge of cold weather and potentially more austere conditions. Stuff can happen at any time.

The winter weather in central California was mild with highs of around 50 and lows at night hitting 32 F. No snow! My buddy brought his camper trailer, I snoozed in the Bronco Tailgate Motel. It’s my dedicated camping truck which is otherwise pretty comfy.

We were here for 3 days, 26, 27 and 28 January 2025. This included Sunday of the Winter Field Day Operating Period. Below is the simple site overview:

We operated 2 separate stations on site, both included PRC-174 manpack HF sets. These covered 2-30 mc providing 20 watts of CW and SSB plus 5 watts of DSB AM. We also had a PRC-77 and a Racal TRA-967 low band VHF FM set for local ops on 6 meters. We were both running low (20′), horizontal HF dipoles on 40, 60 and 75/80 meters. We are both primarily Morse Code operators although we used AM and SSB voice as well.

My setup also included a 1960’s Special Forces long range, crystal controlled AN/GRC-109 CW set. This set can be powered by a hand-cranked DC generator but I (my buddy!) chose my DIY 12 volt power supply this time. The transmitter is tilted up in my transit case to access the built-in (pretty good) CW key; the receiver had a separate long wire antenna.

This rugged set was designed to be parachute-dropped or cached underground or even under 16′ of water if necessary until needed. It was a mainstay for Reconnaissance troops in Vietnam, Europe and elsewhere worldwide.

It’s Bomb Proof (but heavy); it provides dependable comms and is ideal for my purposes. When all else fails it’s Ham Radio. When Ham Radio fails it’s the AN/GRC-109.

I also had an SSB/CW PRC-47, AM/CW GRC-9 and an FM VRC-7 (RT-70) installed in the Bronco for mobile ops.

My buddy is a Marine Corps veteran, I am a retired Navy veteran. Both of us and our friends in the West Coast Military Radio Collectors Group have a long interest in military communications and military radios: hence the “unusual” equipment load out.

Consequently the friends that we contacted on the Nets were running a Korean War GRC-9 on AM, a WWII British Wireless Set 19 HP, a Cold War Russian R-353 “spy” set, a Vietnam era TRC-77 CW set and a 1980’s Yugoslavian PRC-515. The PRC-174’s were a Hughes Aircraft design manufactured in Israel. A very international gathering.

No commercial radio equipment was used in any contacts and we made multiple contacts each with these other stations over 30, 37 and 155 mile paths via ionospheric NVIS. No commercial power, utilities or any other infrastructure was involved at this site.

The worst CW report we received was RST 569; very good. However CW (and some 60 meter Voice) comms were often being “jammed” by the incessant, non-stop digital drone of %&*@! computers slowly texting “599” to each other tying up the 7040/7050 kc CW freqs. Sorry, Rant over. Improvise, adapt, overcome.

While working Andy on his Russian spy set I donned my Russian Navy Ushanka hat as a symbolic but warm accessory. За тебе товарищ!

My setup was solar powered via a 12 volt garden tractor battery recharged by this 20 watt solar panel. I also had that smaller panel to charge the cell phone if needed (the phone wasn’t used). A small DC-DC converter generated 24 volts from 12 volts for the PRC-174. The other station on site used 2 deep cycle 12 volt marine batteries in series for his station. If my fishing skills were not laughable we could operate here indefinitely!

The OSHA-Approved, hasty power system. It easily kept up with the demand, day & night:

Speaking of cold, woolen trigger finger mittens are called for and especially good for operating CW with the J-45 Knee Key driving the PRC-174:

Night time is the right time: The Aether never sleeps.

As part of my contingency field kit I also sent and received some HF Winlink radio-internet-radio EMail messages. This was utilizing a simple PC notebook driving a Signalink USB interface to the PRC-174 handset connector for transmit and receive.

EMail messages were sent and received well. This is a very handy off-grid capability if commercial power, cable, WiFi, internet or cell connectivity is compromised locally or regionally. My messages were handled by the automated gateway station W7DEM in Reno NV. It was an easy 141 mile HF radio shot. This is on 7102 kc, up into the otherwise rarely utilized 7100-7125 kc sub band. This system will also do RTTY and RATT Teletype modes.

But at some point you have to EAT! (It’s a rule…) Roughing It.

Coffee ‘N Code: Life is good – We got this!

Some Techno-Details: Below is a report from the automated Reverse Beacon Network of test messages received that I had sent in CW during the exercise. These 10-20 watt portable sets get out quite well on 40 meters with simple dipole antennas. Several spots with excellent signals were in excess of 500 miles but I was not trying for long distances. They can go much further on the higher bands if needed. (I have worked over 30 states and into Europe and Japan with the GRC-109 in the past.)

● spotter	● spotted	distance mi	freq	mode	type	snr	speed	time	seen
N6TV	N6CC	39 mi	7050.0	CW	CQ	10 dB	16 wpm	1744z 28 Jan	2 days ago
K2PO/7	N6CC	527 mi	7050.0	CW	CQ	17 dB	16 wpm	1744z 28 Jan	2 days ago
K2PO/7	N6CC	527 mi	7050.0	CW	CQ	16 dB	16 wpm	1751z 27 Jan	3 days ago
W6YX	N6CC	29 mi	7050.3	CW	CQ	15 dB	16 wpm	1729z 27 Jan	3 days ago
K2PO/7	N6CC	527 mi	7050.4	CW	CQ	18 dB	15 wpm	1728z 27 Jan	3 days ago
K2PO/7	N6CC	527 mi	7050.0	CW	CQ	20 dB	16 wpm	1659z 27 Jan	3 days ago
W6YX	N6CC	29 mi	7050.0	CW	CQ	17 dB	16 wpm	1659z 27 Jan	3 days ago
N6TV	N6CC	39 mi	7050.0	CW	CQ	12 dB	15 wpm	1659z 27 Jan	3 days ago
N6TV	N6CC	39 mi	7050.3	CW	CQ	14 dB	17 wpm	0012z 27 Jan	4 days ago
WA7LNW	N6CC	468 mi	7050.4	CW	CQ	12 dB	14 wpm	0007z 27 Jan	4 days ago

I am a long time member of the Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Communications Unit attached to the Emergency Services Support Unit. This is great training and preparation for “When all else fails”.

Of course this was a fun “ham radio” oriented exercise but the principles, procedures, equipment and overall utility of grid-down communications is universally applicable.

Got Comms? Yes. Mission accomplished.

BT

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