The night was dark and stormy and the street lights were ……………………….
Well not quite but it was wet as 3 of 4 teams assembled at VK3OW’s for the start of the nights fox hunts.
For the first hunt the 2 metre transmitter was hidden in a mature cypress tree in a small plantation about 800 metres from the start. I used an XG3 signal generator as the fox set at -33 Dbm output level. As nobody could hear this I generously increased the level to 0 Dbm. First in was Darian from the FAST team who found the fox after about 3 circumnavigations of the tree. Next was Bruce from the CI team. After first finding the decoy transmitter and than crawling around the base of the tree several times he decided to try higher up and found the fox, 6 minutes after Darian. I probably should have reduced Bruce’s score by a point for finding the decoy but I’m not good a complex maths when I’m wet. Next in was the MZ team, just outside time.
While the teams collected runners and moved to the meeting spot the BLN team arrived. We knew they were coming but unfortunately they didn’t make the start in time for the first hunt.
The next hunt was a distance based hunt, ie the hound who travelled the shortest distance to the fox was the winner. There was no particular time element to this hunt although if two teams had come in with the same distance we would probably have used time to separate them. As it turned out we didn’t need to. We also ran the hunt on 6 metres to add a degree of complexity. Actual points scores were determined as follows. The team with the shortest distance were awarded 0 points and the team with the longest distance the max 10. FAST, who were a close second got 2 points and BLN who were a long 3rd got 7. If we do this again perhaps we’ll try a point for each additional Km.
The MZ team won this one with the FAST team only 0.5Km longer. They were followed by the BLN and CI teams with rather longer distances. Perhaps the Subaru is a bit too fast David?!
The third hunt was in what is probably a power line easement and not shown in street directories. Stephen and I entered this via a gate in the back fence of Ernie VK3FMs and enjoyed a coffee with him while we waited for the hounds. Thanks Ernie. The throb of the BLN Subaru was soon heard out the front of Ernie’s and it paused briefly when the team discovered my car. Reasoning that the fox was close (it was) they were then heard investigating all the Courts in the general area and also the small park west of the easement. The actual “public’ access was 2-3 km away. In the meantime Darian arrived and found the fox. Next in was the MZ team closely followed by BLN. We stopped the clock at 15 minutes. Incidently the modulation on the TX was deliberate. The intention had been to AM modulate the carrier with a half hertz sinewave. The time available to achieve this however was very limited with the resulting waveform remotely resembling a lopsided peaky triangle.
The next hunt was run by Henk and Dianne. First in was the FAST team followed by CI, BLN and closely MZ.
The final hunt was a straight forward 2 metre hunt in Candlebark park. MZ were first in for this one, followed by CI, BLN and FAST, not being so fast for this one.
The hounds then retired for a well earned supper. My thanks to Jenelle for the soup and sandwidges, Dianne for the upside down cakes, icecream and caramel sauce and Henk for the party pies, cocktail franks etc.
The scores are as follows.
|
Team |
Hunt 1 |
Hunt 2 |
Hunt 3 |
Hunt 4 |
Hunt 5 |
Hunt 6 |
Total |
Place |
||||||
|
VK3CI |
6 |
21.5 km |
10 |
15 |
10.49 |
3 |
11.24 |
3 |
37 |
3 |
||||
|
VK3BLN |
10 |
19.4 km |
7 |
13 |
10.54 |
8 |
11.25 |
4 |
42 |
4 |
||||
|
VK3MZ |
10 |
11.3 km |
0 |
12 |
10.55 |
9 |
11.21 |
0 |
31 |
2 |
||||
|
VK3FAST |
0 |
11.8 km |
2 |
0 |
10.46 |
0 |
11.26 |
5 |
7 |
1 |
||||
|
|
Hunts 1 and 3 were timed with a stop watch with hunts 4 and 5 using actual time.
Thanks to you all for coming on a not so pleasant night weather wise.
regards Ewen