The QRPer Board

Hello everyone,

Last week, I made an everyday QRP commitment. I almost fell short of my goal, but in the end, I got lucky.
I blogged about it here, if you're interested

https://keyingthewilderness.blogspot.co ... om-my.html

David W8GM

Awesome article, Dave! You should definitely offer it up for QRPer.com.

Congrat's on the streak. QRP/CW and POTA are definitely arenas for challenging oneself and finding joy in meeting those self-tailored challenges! A week of lunchtime activations is a serious push, and Friday definitely added drama to the story!

You left a note of disappointment with your current rig, so I'm going to be "partisan" here: I love the simplicity and functionality of my QRP-Labs QMX setup. One can lament the need for an external battery and external speaker (or just use earbuds) but I have had great success over the last couple years and the price is unbeatable as well. (Antenna is always a compromise, too: I normally choose to do what it takes to run a resonant antenna and avoid bringing a tuner.)

Next stop: kilo!

72 de Todd W2TEF

Hi Dave,

I fully agree with Todd: Great articles, and I have enjoyed hearing about your renewed interest!

BTW, thanks for the hunter contact yesterday (3/4/2026), as you helped me to finish my Kilo at Cornplanter State Forest (US-5465). My final push there started a few days ago with 61 contacts from my TR-35 and an EFHW. Completion yesterday came with 81 contacts, using my KX2 and a short EFRW.

Best 73 de Brian - K3ES

Whew, those are some endurance-level CW activations to finish out that kilo! Nice work, Brian!

Todd and Brian,

Thanks for the kind words. I appreciate it. I do believe a Kilo for that park is in the future. Time will tell.

David W8GM

Brian - K3ES wrote: ↑Thu Mar 05, 2026 4:06 pm Hi Dave,

I fully agree with Todd: Great articles, and I have enjoyed hearing about your renewed interest!

BTW, thanks for the hunter contact yesterday (3/4/2026), as you helped me to finish my Kilo at Cornplanter State Forest (US-5465). My final push there started a few days ago with 61 contacts from my TR-35 and an EFHW. Completion yesterday came with 81 contacts, using my KX2 and a short EFRW.

Best 73 de Brian - K3ES

if you want to experiment a bit... try laying your EFRW as an inverted L, with the "horizontal portion" oriented to the opposite of your desired "target"; keep the vertical portion at about 1/3 of the overall EFRW length ant use the remaining 2/3 as the "horizontal" (sloping is fine) portion oh and keep the feedpoint (the 9:1 at bottom of the vertical portion) about one meter (3ft) from ground


as for the EFRW, my "go to" reference to pick a length is https://k7mem.com/Ant_End_Fed.html#Not_Random_Multi

Andrew (grayhat) wrote: ↑Thu Mar 12, 2026 3:07 pm
if you want to experiment a bit... try laying your EFRW as an inverted L, with the "horizontal portion" oriented to the opposite of your desired "target"; keep the vertical portion at about 1/3 of the overall EFRW length ant use the remaining 2/3 as the "horizontal" (sloping is fine) portion oh and keep the feedpoint (the 9:1 at bottom of the vertical portion) about one meter (3ft) from ground


as for the EFRW, my "go to" reference to pick a length is https://k7mem.com/Ant_End_Fed.html#Not_Random_Multi

Hi Andrew,

Thanks for the information. My most often-used EFRW antenna has a 9:1 UNUN with 9m (29.5 ft) radiator and a 5.2m (17 ft) counterpoise. When possible I deploy it as a vertical (single suspension point, minimum problem with lower tree branches, and omnidirectional radiation pattern).

I have built or bought 9:1 EFRW antennas with other radiator and counterpoise lengths. Your random wire reference is one of the best I've seen, and I bookmarked it for future use. One point to consider is that the reference's minimum radiator length recommendation is conservative. It recommends minimum length of 0.25 of the longest wavelength, which certainly yields great performance with minimal problems from reflected RF. I have had good success using my 9m EFRW on the 40m band (0.23 wavelength) and I have made contacts on the 60m band (0.15 wavelength).

Recognize that I use 5 watts for my portable operations (I can operate for hours on a light-weight battery), so I do not have to contend with problems from "RF in the Shack".

Best 73 de Brian - K3ES

Hi brian, yes, the K7MEM EFRW "calculator" is rather good even if a bit "conservative" as you say but ... better safe than sorry that said, if you'll ever need a manual ATU have a look here

https://antenna2.github.io/pa0fri24/con ... tcheng.htm

the above is easy to build works from 80m up and can match even a wet string

I've used 29/17 and 35/17. The 35/17 seems to tune a little easier on 40.
The Rybakov seems to be a similar system, but I think it's really an OCFD with a 4:1 unun versus an EFRW. K6ARK has the design on his website for a 15/7.5 version that he says will match up to 40m. I have one in my go bag just waiting for a change to go.