February 28th 2009
All Night
Transmitter Hunt


Hider: Doug WA6RJN

Where: The hills north and south of the 10 near Beaumont and  Banning California.

Hider’s story
WA6RJN

Over the years I had found several Ts in the Banning area. I thought it would be a good place to hide since it should be easy to get a signal back to the starting point. Using my Delorme Topo USA 7 software and AAA maps, I started picking out sites. One of the goals for this hunt was to be able to hear as many Ts as possible at the starting point. A T along hwy 243 was a given. I saw Mt Davis on the SW side which looked good. I wanted something north of Banning as well. I found Mile High road. The name sounded hopeful. The path to the starting point was good but was it a private road? I also remembered finding a T once north of the Indian reservation to the NE of Banning.

I was in Banning a couple of months ago on business and took advantage of the time to check out the sites. Before checking out hwy 243, I drove up the old Banning-Idyllwild road. About half way along this road I found a site that would work. While checking out hwy 243 I tried Mount Edna but could not get beyond the locked gate. I did notice a saddle a little to the north. It was a hike but on the other side of the saddle was a canyon that pointed toward the starting point. The canyon walls would allow the signal to be heard all the way to the starting point but prevent the signal from being heard in most of Banning. I checked out Mile High road and found it was open. I tried the site NE of Banning but found it is now a part of the Indian reservation and was closed.

The day of the hide I gathered my equipment and planned to head out at 5 AM. In reality, I left 40 minutes late. I first hid T2 (4W, 6 element horiz beam) up the Old Banning-Idyllwild road about half way from either end that connects to hwy 243. Next I proceeded to the saddle, hiked up over the top and set up T1 (4W, 6 elem horiz beam). I had made this T a challenge by writing “Did you find T1?” on all the other sign-in sheets. I thought this T would be difficult to find, especially with the hike. Part way up to the saddle I decided to hide T9 to get hiders to stop at the right place on hwy 243 to start the hike. I also posted a sign that said “Did you find T1?” as a clue (although the sign also said “This is a sign, not a clue”) to encourage hunters to continue up the hill.




       
T2                                                         T2 looking to starting point

    
T1 looking to starting point                                                                    T1


          

It was almost 10 AM and I was not able to get up Mile High road before the start of the hunt. I was glad to hear both T1 and T2 come on the air as I their timers had not been reliable in the past. About 10:15 I had T7 (1.5W, 3 elem horiz beam) on the air. I headed over to Mt Davis and set up T3 (.5W, 3 elem beam). Now there were 4 Ts pointed at the starting point. That 40 minutes I was late in getting started would have come in handy to get the Ts on the air by starting time.
        
T7                                                    T7 looking to starting point


       
T3                                                                    T3
I wanted to hide a couple more Ts, one of which should be on the north side of Banning. Looking at the Topo USA 7 map I noticed that Sunset climbed into the hills and may provided a place. Driving up Sunset I found a place that overlooked a good part of the Banning/Beaumont area. I attached T4 (50mW, vert dipole) to a tree stock near a locked gate. One more T to go. I selected the bug T (50mW, vert whip) and decided to hide it on the road leading to T3.



          

T4 on tree stalk                                        T4 looking at Banning



T6, Bug T
Not long after hidinng the bug T I heard JPI and AIN Talking about eating. We all met at the Country Junction for lunch.

        


The GQ/LAJ team found T1 a little round about by going crass-country through burnt brush

       

Overall, it seemed that things went well for once. Althought when I went to pick
up the bug T (it's mounted in a toy VW Bug) I noticed that it had driven off to
another Bush! This must have Happened between the time the first hunters found
it and N6mi Found it

My congratulations to the GQ/LAJ and MI teams for finding T1!
RESULTS:
KFTGQ/KD6LAJ
 T6
 T3
 T7
 T2
 T9
 T1
FOUND T1  TIME
 1:04
 1:20
 2:58
 4:10
 5:18
 6:51
WINNER    MILES
 100.1
 100.6
 117.8
 141.8
 154.1
 155.6







N6MI
 T6
 T3
 T9
 T1
 T7
 T4
FOUND T1  TIME
 4:11
 4:24
 5:56
 ----
 8:16
 8:41
MILES
 126
 126.1
 144
 146
 183
 193







N6AIN
 T6
 T3
 T7
 T2
 T4
TIME
 2:04
 2:15
 3:15
 4:33
 5:50
MILES
 110.7
 111.4
 128.4
 154.3
 167.4







WB6JPI
 T6
 T3
 T7
 T2
 T4
TIME
 2:05
 2:10
 3:53
 6:16
 8:35
MILES
 105.1
 105.5
 130.7
 160.2
 175.2



Jippy's Story

Don and Steve's Story