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eHam Forums => Portable Operations => Topic started by: K2WPM on February 24, 2023, 04:18:29 PM

Title: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: K2WPM on February 24, 2023, 04:18:29 PM
Am I the first one to think this?

When I'm activating, 20 - 30 people calling me, and one guy comes in at the end "park to park."
Okay, hold on, you guys, I have a park-to-park.
But then there's maybe four or five more.
And I have 20 or 30 op's sitting there.

I used to do it myself when I'm at a park and would call another activator, but I stopped.
Now, when I start, I try to break others' POTA pile-ups, just using my call sign, no "park to park."
If I have a decent antenna, I can get in there.
When I break the pile up, I usually say, "yeah, I'm at a park also, K-XXXX." But I think I'll stop doing that.
But even if I don't exchange my park, it still counts as a park-to-park, so long as both logs have the park info.

So why do this?

This struck me a little while ago, when I was a hunter for the weekend.
Almost every activator had the same scenario.
20 - 30 people calling them.
Then a (usually weak) signal at the end of the pile-up, "park to park."
Then four or five more.
And 20 - 30 people sit there for a half hour.

I realized, yeah hunters probably get annoyed with this.

So why not eliminate it?

David, K2WPM
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: LNXAUTHOR on February 24, 2023, 04:47:32 PM
i don't mind waiting on p2p calls... i also appreciate calls for qrp ops... i hope more activators ignore the lids tuning up on freq and calling in with 1500 watts
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: AK5B on February 24, 2023, 05:27:33 PM
I think this whole "activation" thing is rather sad.  I can remember the days when working a station half-way around the world held a certain magic (still does for me) that inspired learning, tinkering and building antennas.  To my way of thinking, making an excuse to operate such as POTA is kind of sad, really.

Just my opinion which most will not agree with but that's fine.  To each his own.
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: K1VTX on February 24, 2023, 05:46:26 PM
Just like any other pile up, I take them as I hear them. "Park to Park, stand by. Can I have the station ending XYZ"?
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: AE0Q on February 24, 2023, 08:00:48 PM
I think this whole "activation" thing is rather sad. <snip> To my way of thinking, making an excuse to operate such as POTA is kind of sad, really.

Gee, how is Parks On The Air getting people ON THE AIR any different than you working DX to make contacts for 6M WAZ #58.  Or a weekend contest, of any variety.  Or my getting CW WAZ #319 20 yrs ago?  Or the Wednesday CWT one hour episodes?

Isn't that what ANY operating "event" or goal does?  Gives hams a reason to turn on a radio to see who is out there?  I know everyone has an opinion, but I really don't see the basis for your comment on this  :-(

Glenn AE0Q
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: AE0Q on February 24, 2023, 08:23:31 PM
Am I the first one to think this?

When I'm activating, 20 - 30 people calling me, and one guy comes in at the end "park to park."
Okay, hold on, you guys, I have a park-to-park.
But then there's maybe four or five more.
And I have 20 or 30 op's sitting there.

Given that working parks IS the goal of Parks On The Air, I'm going to guess that you mean just stop SAYING "park to park" on SSB when calling a park??  This sounds like an East coast, SSB-on-40m problem :-)

I operate CW and activate parks in Colorado, out here in the West where there might only be a handful of people within range on 40m in the daytime.  We have to mostly use 20m or higher and work lots of weak signals to work the mass of East coast stations that you guys are sitting in the middle of. 

I have NEVER had 4 or 5 other parks call me, EVER, in 110 park activations!!  And those have all been single-park activations, two-fers, three-fers and four-fers are almost unheard of out West.  Many days I work 200 stations on CW in a couple of hours of calling CQ and TWO of them are at other parks, and I'm at mountain parks with S1 noise level and full-size wire antennas, where the weakest QRP stations in the field can be heard and worked.

If I hear a weak P2P on CW, I just respond with "P2P ?" but I think most CW activators don't bother with it.  Slide 100 or 200Hz off the activators frequency and you will get right thru :-)  Whatever you do, NEVER call him on CW dead zero beat !!!

Glenn AE0Q
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: W1VT on February 25, 2023, 02:35:15 AM
I think it is great that there is a ton of activity where folks can work 200 stations in a day!
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: AE5X on February 25, 2023, 04:17:08 AM
I don't mind the P2P calls. It's a separate category of "awards", important for some - and the ops calling are likely to have lesser antennas than the hunters at home. When I'm at a park myself, and call another park, I never mention that I'm at a park and do not give my number - I know they'll get credit for it anyway.
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: AE5X on February 25, 2023, 04:33:14 AM
I think this whole "activation" thing is rather sad.  I can remember the days when working a station half-way around the world held a certain magic (still does for me) that inspired learning, tinkering and building antennas.  To my way of thinking, making an excuse to operate such as POTA is kind of sad, really.

The "activation thing" causes an emotional response in you, and that response is sadness? Let's go back in time a bit: How was your relationship with your father?
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: WB8VLC on February 25, 2023, 10:21:39 AM
After today my thoughts are to just rid ham radio of pota ops altogether?

 I am presently listening to N9NFT at a park in Fla. calling cq pota on 29.58 simplex all the time oblivious that it's a repeater input.

At least if you are going to do pota then at least know the band plan so that you are not  interfering with the Portland Oregon 29.58/68 repeater and others on the same frequency.
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: WB8VLC on February 25, 2023, 11:35:12 AM
And if anyone questions why I didn't  just go to 29.58 and inform him about his operation it's because  I was on my Motorola MT1000 10 FM handheld which only had the repeater output programmed and during the times when the repeater was dropping out during the hang timer I could hear him  calling endlessly cq pota cq pota for a full 10 minutes until he finally moved down lower to AM.
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: ONAIR on February 25, 2023, 03:46:25 PM
POTA has become a great resource. It has made some quiet bands come alive again!  I heard that this could soon expand to putting supermarkets, hotels, and even gas stations on the air!  ;)
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: KD8FTH on February 27, 2023, 01:36:55 PM
I have observed the exchange between p2p stations, honestly not taking much more time than any other. Call confirmation. Signal, park identifier 73. Truthfully we are talking maybe a few more seconds per exchange. In my experience.
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: WA3SKN on February 27, 2023, 02:10:28 PM
Make the contact and go on... your not talking 30 seconds here.  It will take a lot longer to change it and nobody will follow it 100% anyway!
"Human nature does't change!"

-Mike.
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: KG4RUL on February 28, 2023, 04:09:11 AM
So it would follow that we eliminate Peak-to-Peak for SOTA and Island-to-Island for IOTA?
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: K1FBI on February 28, 2023, 04:19:07 AM
Make the contact and go on... your not talking 30 seconds here.  It will take a lot longer to change it and nobody will follow it 100% anyway!
"Human nature does't change!"

-Mike.
I've actually had quite a few 1-2 minute conversations with POTA stations. That is what I find so nice about POTA.
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: AE0Q on February 28, 2023, 03:14:08 PM
When I'm activating, 20 - 30 people calling me, and one guy comes in at the end "park to park."

I think the original poster needs to tell us if he means SAYING "park to park" on SSB, or if for some strange reason he meant the counting of "park to park" contacts in the POTA system...  Because folks here have commented on both meanings, and they sure aren't the same !!!
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: K2WPM on March 02, 2023, 07:33:44 PM
I did not mean to suggest the concept of Park to Park is bad.  Just the assumption that calling park-to-park to get into a pile up.  It rather cheapens the concept while also resulting in lengthy PTP episodes during pile ups.  I enjoy the challenge of contacting other activators when I activate, so I don't call "PTP" anymore.  I try to bust through the pile up, like everybody else.  I will continue to give PTP callers priority, absent a groundswell to not do so.

Thanks for lots of great comments, by the way.
Hams are the best.

David, K2WPM
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: LNXAUTHOR on March 22, 2023, 03:39:14 AM
Whatever you do, NEVER call him on CW dead zero beat !!!

Glenn AE0Q

this has been one of the big learning points for me after getting back into CW after a 20-year hiatus... was not always sure what side of the freq to put out my call... what i figured out was to listen to the exchanges, then zero beat the successful callers who get a response from the activator - which has seemed to work for me

amazing how many sad hams apparently can't stand the success of /p park operations nowadays - lots of qrm from LIDs on SSB - not so much on CW
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: K1FBI on March 22, 2023, 04:41:37 AM
Whatever you do, NEVER call him on CW dead zero beat !!!

Glenn AE0Q

this has been one of the big learning points for me after getting back into CW after a 20-year hiatus... was not always sure what side of the freq to put out my call... what i figured out was to listen to the exchanges, then zero beat the successful callers who get a response from the activator - which has seemed to work for me

amazing how many sad hams apparently can't stand the success of /p park operations nowadays - lots of qrm from LIDs on SSB - not so much on CW
Accept for the babies holding down their key to QRM the POTA stations...CW OPs aren't immune from being Lids.
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: K2WPM on March 26, 2023, 07:14:30 PM
was not always sure what side of the freq to put out my call...
IC-7300 is programmed for LSB CW.
I always wondered if I am supposed to change that for 20 meters and above, to USB.
Did you ever get an answer or conclusion on that?
Or maybe I misinterpreted your post.
Maybe anyone else can chime in.  Thanks,
David, K2WPM
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: AE0Q on March 27, 2023, 10:05:55 AM
was not always sure what side of the freq to put out my call...
IC-7300 is programmed for LSB CW.
I always wondered if I am supposed to change that for 20 meters and above, to USB.
Did you ever get an answer or conclusion on that?
Or maybe I misinterpreted your post.  Maybe anyone else can chime in.

In modern radios it doesn't matter.  Assuming the pitch of your sidetone is the same as the CW offset in the transceiver (true in most DSP-based radios), as long as you tune in a station and match your sidetone to the pitch of his signal in your receiver, you will be zerobeat with him, transmitting on the same frequency as the other station you are listening to.

So all you have to do to be offset up or down by a few Hz is NOT match his pitch exactly.  It doesn't matter if your radio uses LSB or USB for CW.  Some radios have a CW-R (reverse) function so you can intentionally be listening on the other side of the received signal, which can help eliminate interfering signals in your receiver passband.

Glenn AE0Q
Title: Re: Get rid of Park to Park
Post by: K0UA on March 28, 2023, 07:36:20 AM
The very fact that POTA operations actually generate pileups is one of the great things about the POTA program. For the guys that hate POTA and are "made sad" about hearing it; get a life. Or start enjoying the one you already have.

POTA is not only a lot of fun, but has breathed more life into Amateur Radio than any activity I can think of recently. Not to mention getting a lot of old hams off of their duff and out into the field. Win, Win, if you were to ask me. But even guys that cannot get out into the field can still participate as hunters.