At the Shelby Hamfest on Labor Day, I stopped at the Lakeview booth (www.hamstick.com) and bought some hamsticks. I got the 10, 20, and 40 meter flavors. I have a huge magnetic puck that I screwed on the 20 meter and placed it on top of the car. It was dead around 11pm. Nothing, not even CW was heard (cloudy, humid, scattered showers around). I screwed in 40 meters and put it back on the magnetic mount on top of the car. I had some decent QSO in nearby states like Tennessee. and Iowa. And England came in 5×9 but he couldn’t hear me. I struggled with a QSO with K7IOC. He was 4×6 for his report and the report he gave me was 3×4. But WE DID get each other’s call sign, city (he was on an Island), names, and report. Did you catch that? I am in South Carolina and he is in Washington State!!! This was on my KW TS-480 in the car on a 40 meter Hamstick on the car. What is interesting is there is big metal garage door to the west of the car, about 5 feet away. I don’t fathom how the signal could have cleared the garage.
I will use the 10 meters hamstick for a local net at 10pm every Saturday night called the Hoodlum net. It works real nice for a NVIS antenna. Where I can’t work local states with the flagpole, the hamstick seems to catch some of the local traffic in North and South Carolina and Georgia better. I actually heard someone in my own city on the 20 meters hamstick. I still need to try it on a tripod with a radial that I have for the Bluestar portable antenna.
I would say the number of operators heard is not as great as the flagpole but you can still work DX and really far stations if you are patient.
