A Sunday session portable QRP SSB on 40m

Sometimes what you intend and what happens can be different things. The idea was to work some US DX during their SSB contest. But I'd got to the pier too late for best signals on 40m and 20m was producing only weak signals. 

Rather than go home I stuck around and had some within VK contacts on 40m. Mostly the usual news broadcast callbacks, park activation and holidaying ham (it was a long weekend). 

The antenna I used was different to usual - a 1/4 wavelength vertical. This probably helped with good reports into VK2 (around 800km distance). Watch the video to see how I went. 

The moral of this is that with QRP under the current conditions you should be flexible. Change your aims to meet conditions. And don't expect to work DX every time you go portable.

For more on portable QRP my book Minimum QRP could be worth getting. Available in paperback or ebook details are here.