| | 
I live in the south half of the East bay area of the San Francisco bay area. ( There must be an easier way to say that). I am a HAM (Amateur Radio operator, KC6IPO) and often participate in transmitter hunts in this area sponsored jointly by the South Bay Amateur Radio Society (SABARA) and the Livermore Amateur Radio Klub (LARK). The group's official site can be found at www.thunt.org .
On this page will be recollections of our hunts. I will start it out with some of mine and invite others to add theirs. recollections from other hunts not by our group will be considered for posting.
The first Saturday of each month is our "Fremont area" hunt. The areas included in this hunt are, generally, Union City, Fremont, Newark, North Milpitas and West on 237 to Lockheed.
We also have a monthly "Livermore Valley" hunt for the Livermore Valley North on 680 a ways.
We occasionally have a "Central Valley" hunt which is between Altamont Pass (East of Livermore) and well up the Sierra Nevada foot hills.
Then there are occasionally the "Bay Area hunts which are pretty much anywhere "in sight" of the bay.
We occasionally have a hunt that does not meet any of these restrictions.
All competition is for lowest milage, though on some of the longer hunts, the teams work together.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
I will start with last night's ( March 5th 2005 ) Fremont hunt.
I, as usual, teamed up with Pete, N6YIF and the started as usual at the Fremont start point. On the way to the start point, on the hillside overlooking I680/Mission Blvd South interchange, Pete's doppler antenna array magnetically attached to the roof of his car, came unstuck and flipped over, bending the elements. We flipped it back and straightened the elements, sorta, and continued to the start point. Pete drove as usual. I think we had six teams (vehicles), at the start point and the transmitter, set up by Don IRE activated on schedule.
An email to our email list said the transmitter (fox) would be beyond the usual boundary but would still be easy. The signal was weak and seemed to be directly across the bay. Initial bearings by the various teams varied from 235 to 260 degrees. Pete took his hanheld beam to the top of the nearby hill and came up with 240 degrees so we plotted it and decided to take 237 and 101 to the other side.
We lost the signal shortly after reaching the South Fremont flatlands below the start point. As we started North on 101 we still had no signal. Besides the doppler to give us instantaneous bearings, we were also monitoring the fox on a 1/4 wave mag mount with my HT.
We were getting very concerned until we started to hear the signal at San Antonio Road. I believe we exited 101 at Willow and wandered around Menlo Park awhile until we could get a signal strong enough to get a hand held beam and body fade bearing. It still wasn't strong enough to get a reliable doppler bearing. This bearing indicated we wanted to go up Sand Hill road towards I280. The email notice for the hunt also mentioned the fox would be on "private property" and we should tell the guard at the gate why we were there and we would be let in. Pete is familiar with the area and put 2 and 2 together and decided it might be at the Stanford Linear Accelerator site (SLAC) and, as we gat closer the doppler tended to agree. Sure enough the guard let us in and the rest was easy.
We were the first to arrive, 20 minutes ahead of the second team and our milage was 29.2 miles. We thought we had it nailed but the second team beat us by about 3 miles. Oh well.
One team quit and the others had as high as 60 miles.
As usual we then all went to a local pizza place to swap lies. All in all, great fun.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Today, April 16th 2005 I participated in a "Bay Hunt". The "fox" was to be hidden within 25 miles of the center of the San Mateo Bridge. The hunt started at 10 am. Pete picked me up at 11 and off we went. While waiting for Pete I used the beam on my house to determine that it was generally north of my home in Union City Ca. and was very weak, probably not a line of sight situation. Jim, who hid the transmitter and was with it, got in to the Sunol ridge repeater very well so I suspected the fox was on the ridge above Berkeley.
Pete and I went to the north end of Oakland Airport along Doolittle Drive and stopped to get a bearing. We both agreed the bearing was towards the hills above Berkeley so off we went, making use of the doppler system Pete had on his car.
We went into Alameda and took Park all the way to the Warren freeway in Oakland and the north into Berkeley. We the took Claremont up the ridge to Skyline and turned north to the entrance to Tilden Park where we started down a road on the east side of the ridge but did not where it went so turned around. At this point we had a strong clean signal, probably line of sight. The doppler pointed north east towards the ridge to the east.
I knew of Wildcat Canyon road which went down the east side of the ridge from the north side of the park so we headed there. On the way down we had a good doppler bearing across the valley ahead of us. We crossed the highway at the bottom and went up Bear (something) road. At the top of the first ridge we found we had not yet arrived and the signal was getting shakey. The fox had been there on a hunt a few years earlier.
We continued a ways and lost confidence so made a U turn. I the checked our map and realized that was a mistake so we made another U turn.
About a mile later we found it along the road at the top of the next ridge.
As I needed to be home at 2 pm, I had told Pete at 12:15 that, if we didn't find it within an hour, we would have to turn back. We found it at 1:14.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Today's ( 8/20/05 ) Fox's ( that was I ) choice transmitter hunt is over and was a success in that someone found it. It was a challenge hunt, meaning I got to play dirty, and had a Fremont start point with a 1pm start time. There were 5 teams at the start point, Ron N7TVE, Jim KD6DX, Don KD6IRE with Linda KE6BEO, Gary WB6YRU, and Chris KF6VFU. The 3 watt transmitter box was at San Leandro's Marina Family Park directly south of the San Leandro Marina in a parking lot at the end of Monarch Bay Drive (Neptune Drive on some maps). It was at the end of a parking lot (west end) farthest from Monarch on the west side of a dumpster. The box was on the ground with the vertical antenna 8 inches from the side of the dumpster. this caused the dumpster to not only block the signal to the east (towards 880) but to reflect it across the bay. The start point was not blocked by the dumpster but was blocked by the hills a mile or two north west of the start point so the initial bearings were multiple from the hills above San Carlos and north as well as Coyote hills. Some had bearings they thought could be Alameda and I suppose some figured the reflection off the SF Peninsula was from a transmitter in the Oakland hills. I invisioned this hunt would be more difficult for those that use doppler than for those that don't. Unfortunately is seems all teams were using doppler.
 (Me and Ron. Notice how I am dressed. It was a cold August day.)
One hour into the 3 hour hunt 3 teams were threatening to quit so I started giving clues and asked Andy DD to take a bearing from his home in the hills on the south peninsula figuring it would be line of sight but his bearing also indicated Alameda or Oakland So I announced it was well south of downtown Oakland where two teams were and north of the Hayward / San Mateo Bridge. Andy then reconsidered and said it might be in San Leandro. I said nothing. Two teams did then quit.
During the next hour I gave a few more clues but I don't think they were heard.
The two teams that were in Oakland , Ron and Jim, Were apparently working together by then and proceded south on 580 where they were again able to pick up the signal ( a reflection from the peninsula? ) and found me about 2 hours and 20 minutes into the hunt.
They had been in cell phone contact with Chris who was by then on the peninsula and when they told him I was in San Leandro he called it a day.
I turned the fox off 2.5 hours into the hunt.
The parking lot was full when Jim and Ron arrived so I had them park in front ( east side ) of the dumpster. When I told them the box was perhaps twelve feet away on the other side of the dumpster I got the impression they found it hard to believe that it was that close.
Pizza was the next consideration and I had figured we would go to Mountain Mikes on Marina near Doolittle but we all decided two skip it and headed home.
Jim's milage was lowest at 60.2 so I suppose he is responsible for next month's third Saturday hunt. Ron had 61.8 .
Jim took some pictures and I expect they will be on the www.thunt.org web site "soon" along with a map and a brief explanation how he finally found the fox.
Don KC6IPO
------------------------------------------------------------
2/18/06 "Bay hunt". This is text I sent to our transmitter hunt email list.
Hi all,
Your co-fox here. (Don KC6IPO)
Pete (N6YIF) picked me up this morning and we proceeded to the hiding spot for Today's hunt, High atop 371 foot tall Nicholl Knob in the Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline, a park a bit south of the Richmond/San Rafael Bridge toll plaza. This is just north of a marina in Richmond where a transmitter had been hidden before.
There is a residential area at the north border of the park and a street, Crest Avenue, dead ends at the park. Actually it goes into the park and up to the top of Nicholl Knob but there is a gate at the park entrance so you have to walk from there. We parked near the gate and carried the fox box to the top where we placed it at the base of a commercial radio tower, 18 inches west of the solid steel base of the tower. It was not as effective as a dumpster but it worked well enough ;> .
Talk in was on the 145.230 repeater near Palo Alto. Hunters could start where ever they wanted and were encouraged to co-ordinate with each other. All could here Pete and I on the talk in so we turned on the 3 Watt transmitter with a 1/4 wave vertical on 146.565MHz about 11 am and the hunt was on.
Gary started on a hill side south of San Jose and said the signal was too strong to get a bearing with his hand held beam without going to horizontal to attenuate the signal a bit.
Rich started on a hill side above San Leandro where he was joined by the team of Tony and Ray. Also in the hunt were two other one man teams of Bob and Ron. I don't know where they started.
Andy DD from his home near Palo Alto (?) and a HAM spending the very cold and wet 3 day weekend camping on Angel Island working DX, assisted by giving bearings.
Rich was the only one with a spot on bearing but he said he was afraid we were hiding in Marin County and he wasn't going there. I assured him we were in the east bay and he assured us he would find us.
Once we were certain the hunt was successfully started and after answering questions from a curious passer by, Pete and I went back to the car and drove down the hill to a picnic area where we used the toilet facilities and started eating lunch at a table. after perhaps two minutes of lunch, we heard that Rich was exiting I 580 in Richmond and we did not want to be found in the park so back into the car and up the hill near the gate.
Rich entered the park first, via the tunnel, followed in a few minutes by Tony and Ray. both "teams" soon determined that the transmitter was in the park's hills. As I understand it, Tony and Ray struck up a conversation with a local who told them about Crest Avenue. Shortly they arrived at the gate, not noticing Pete and I. As they unloaded thier equipment in preparation for the walk, Rich drove up, also not noticing Pete and I. Then Ron arrived not noticing us. They then entered the park together.
From the gate the paved road at first goes slightly down hill to a bend from which you discover a very steep grade. The four of them stopped there as I watched with my binoculars. Eventually they decided that Tony should go on while the others waited so Tony did and found the transmitter. By this time Pete walked over to join the three waiting for Tony. Upon Tony's return, they all returned to the gate where I joined
them.
About then we heard that Gary was stuck in traffic on US 101 north bound in San Mateo.
Eventually Bob arrived, grabbed his gear and RAN up a steep, probably muddy, trail going up the knob. He of coarse found it and returned on the trail to join us.
So it was about 1 o clock and no sign of Gary. It was getting colder and a bit damp. Eventually we heard from him, at 40th and McDonald in Richmond, apparently after exiting I 80 at McDonald. Later we heard him stuck at a railroad crossing apparently near Canal and I 580 by a very slow train.
About 2 pm, when the hunt was to end, and after Bob volunteered to run back up the hill and retrieve the transmitter ( THANK YOU so VERY much Bob) and the hunters had left for Fisherman's Hut in San Lorenzo to chow own and debrief some more, except Ron who had to get a haircut, we heard
again from Gary. He was in the park near the picnic area directly below us. We asked him to wait there for us but he didn't hear. With the transmitter still on in the car, we drove down to meet Gary only to find him half way up a trail to the knob and wondering why the signal was now coming from behind him.
We then turned the transmitter off and invited Gary down the hill to join us. After debriefing him and discovering that he was in slow traffic all the way through San Francisco and across the Bay Bridge and that he had driven 90 miles, we awarded him the sticktoittism award. Unfortunately he wasn't able to join us in San Lorenzo.
Pete and I then joined the gang at Fisherman's Hut where we experienced some mediocre fish and chips and some more great conversation.
The End
--------------------------------------------------------------
Fremont Area Transmitter Hunt 5/5/07. I was the "fox" meaning I hid the transmitter. I had discovered this hiding place more than a year ago but this was my first chance to use it.
 The transmitter location as seen from the parking lot accross the street where I waited for the hunters.
 The transmitter was the ussual ammo box type, seen here, putting out 2.5 watts. That is the former Western Pacific, now Union Pacific, tracks where it rises to cross over the Southern Pacific, now Union Pacific, tracks.
It was hidden between Sadoval Way and the Union Pacific ( former
Western Pacific ) tracks on the West side of the BART shops in South
Hayward. The signal was blocked some towards I-880 by the embankment and
scaterred around by the large steel buildings of BART's shops across
the street. The parked rail cars were an unexpected bonus. This made
directional readings weak and erratic and I am told that, even with
doppler, you had to go on faith allot.
There were 7 hunters in 3 teams. Sorry I did not get all thier names.
Rich and assistant won with 15.7 miles taking one hour. Next came Don
(IRE) and gang with 17.5 (?) miles taking about 1 hour 15 minutes and,
after an hour and a half with 17.7 miles came Bob.
Afterwards it was off to Dino's on Industrial just West of I-880 for chow.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
March 09 Fremont Hunt
Hi all,
The March Fremont area T hunt happened yesterday. I picked up the fox box from Rich at
the 7-11 at Niles Canyon Rd and Mission Blvd at 4:30 and proceeded to the corner of
Bronze St. and Copper St. in Union city 2 blocks from the Fremont Niles district line
just north of Niles Blvd. There is a small neighborhood park there in a standard detached
home neighborhood that was rather new and may not have been on some maps.
The 147.015 repeater went dead about 4:45 so we did all communications simplex on the
output.
At the 5pm start time Rich reported that he was the only one at the start point. I
turned on the fox box and the hunt was on.
There was a metal utility (?) box about 4 feet high in the park. I placed the fox box
next to it with the antenna 8.25 inches from it so that the utility box would act as a
reflector. The forward direction was toward the start point and the hills south of Niles
Canyon. The only way to drive to the fox was from Decoto Rd. 1 mile to the north, on the
back side so, in theory, the signal would be stronger from the hill reflections than the
direct signal.
After ~45 minutes, Rich announced he was in the area.
About 6:10 Gary announced he was in the hunt and there had been no one else at the
start point(???!).
Pete announced that he he had started looking for me from his near by home but could
get no response on the repeater and wasn't making any progress hunting so had gone home.
It was then he figured out that the repeater was dead.
I watched Rich drive by 3 times and not stop. About a half hour after his last pass he
walked into the park and found the fox. It took him 2 hours and about 26 miles.
There is another way into the tract. Silver St. becomes (old?) Niles Blvd at the Union
City / Fremont line but for some clearly stupid reason, the street is blocked at the
border. Rich had parked on the Fremont side and walked in. Fourth time was the charm.
;>
While we waited for Gary, who by then was in the area, we concluded that Gary had
started the hunt at 6pm. Rich mentioned that when driving into the tract he saw a sign
saying something like "private property, residents only". I had not seen the
sign. On the way to pizza he pointed it out to me. It was placed in such a way that it
was easy to miss. Because of the blocked street at the border, the only way to drive in
was through a condo complex and all the narrow streets/alleys in it had such signs as
well as the only street going to the housing tract I was hiding in. WEIRD!
Rich and I were speculating on what the function of the utility box was. We were
speculating that it might be for the very nice non standard street lights and I wondered
if the fox RF might cause a problem when all of the street lights went out! OH BLEEP!!
The lights then came back on. We moved the fox about 20 feet away.
While still waiting for Gary, he called in and pointed out that the hunt was null and
void or some such because of the sign. Well, he was right. Sorry Gary. ;<
So the hunt was over. We turned off the fox and Rich and I went to pizza at Round Table
on Fremont Blvd near Peralta.
Good Pizza. Good conversation. Rich said the signal was "squirrely" all the
way. We could not figure out why. Apparently Pete and Gary noticed this too. Weird Hunt.
We need a volunteer for April.
Don Safer
KC6IPO
---------------------------------------------------
Fremont hunt 5/2/09
There were only 2 hunters. Rich and I. ;< I started from home here in Union City and Rich from the official start point on a hill side at the south end of Fremont. Our initial bearings indicated midway along 237. Perhaps Alviso or Great America. I drove down 880 and got off at Dixon landing west where I took another bearing, roughly SW. I drove along McCarthy towards 237 taking a few more readings. I was using body fade and signal strength. Right next to 237 Is a trail head And I considered walking north on the trail but then I heard from Rich that he had found the fox and Pete and could see the fox from his vehicle so I knew not to take that walk. I had some bearings south and some SW. I decided to continue south on McCarthy and west on Tasman. when using body fade and signal strength it is not a good idea to drive freeways in the general vicinity of the fox as you may pass by it and stopping on the shoulder to take a bearing is frowned upon. Bearings along Tasman indicated NW and when I got to Lafayette, north so north on Lafayette into Alviso I went, watching the signal strength. When I got to the parking lot at the bay it was strong with no antenna so I knew I had arrived. Besides I could see Rich as well as Pete and his friend Linda.
There was no competition since only Rich started at the start point. Rich was Doppler equipped. He got on 880 at Dixon Landing and turned west on 237, passing Lafayette to Caribbean where he doubled back. That is the problem with Doppler. It is too easy to pass a turn off and add 5 more miles to your route. I speculate that if I had been at the start point and followed the route I took from Dixon landing, I might have had the lowest mileage and have won.
Then it was off to Round Table on Fremont Blvd. near Peralta for some pleasant banter and Pizza.
| |
