I would not agree with the idea that operating QRP from KH6 area is a waste of time and have 3 years experience of operating QRP from Guam to back it up.  Your antenna is an excellent choice, I have one as well and spoke to Hawaii (big island) from Guam with it at 5 watts (0 sunspots that day)...

My recommendations:

Antenna height!  Try to get it as high as possible, there are plenty of trees on Hawaii to facilitate this.  Since you are using an end fed antenna, no radials will be required.

You will be operating CW so you are already ahead as far as mode goes, I used PSK31 with great success (although your K1 won't allow this mode).

Upper bands will be your best friend.  I would highly recommend purchasing another Par End Fed for 15 meters, this band is loaded with JA ops and is usually open during the day.  20 meters will of course provide many contacts.  I have seen 10 open as well, hell, it was open yesterday afternoon.  My first 10 meter contact was with the Par End Fed from Guam into mainland China, QRP.

While I am by no means an "experienced" QRP operator, I can assure you that QRP can be done from the islands and with minimal trouble.  Salt water helps as well...

Regards and good luck!

Garry (AH2DR)

Thank you Lon, I will check into that possibility.  I don't feel like buying more equipoment and like the flexibility the usb stuff gives me.

I currently use USB to serial converters for rig control (FT-817) and for my TNC (Kam XL) via my laptop, Sony VGN-TXN15P.  Only problem being the RFI generated by the USB converters (I guess this is an issue with USB equipment).  I have seen PCMCIA to serial adaptors on E-Pay and other computer sites and I wonder if this might be the fix to my problem.  Anyone here use a PCMCIA serial port adaptor?  Any info would be appreciated.

Regards,

Garry (AH2DR)

You need to go to Delorme's website and grab the com port director program.  This will take the NMEA data from unit and output same to a virtual serial port.  I use it and it works great.  Only problem you may have is that some client programs may not see above COM 4.

Regards,

Garry (AH2DR)

Small Wonder Labs makes a transceiver kit for $130.00 which you may be able to find a builder for.  Various bands are available, I know when I lived in Everett, not too far from you, 40 meters was a great band for PSK31.  Don't count out CW, either, which you can find a great many rigs for much less than $300.00.  If your sole interest is PSK31 or other sound card modes, seems like the Small Wonder Labs radios are probably the way to go.

That being said, you may want to scrounge up a little more cash for a standard HF transceiver as whether you think you have a horrible voice or not, you may want to operate sideband.  Your other issue will be the antenna.  Unless you have the space for a standard dipole, you will need a tuner, and will have to factor that into your station.  Good luck.

Garry (AH2DR)

Yes, that is it...

Out here in Guam you cannot miss it, chews up the bottom of 40 meters, leaving only 50 khz at the top of our allocated portion for operation.  Sounds like a wood pecker and pretty much obliterates the band.  My other personal favorite is the Chinese broadcasting on 14.275...