Organising an ARDF Event http://myardfsport.com/Hunt_Prep.

htm

Amateur Radio Orienteering

www.myardfsport.com

Organising an ARDF Hunt?

Radio Sport, Penang
Last Update October 11th, 2007

… Planning - Fox master of the hunt

When planning for a coming ARDF hunt, the fox master should
consider the following things.

Weather - Is the weather forecast around the period of the

game date sufficiently predictable? Do not want to face
with a wash out due to thunderstorms.

Any long public holidays may be of advantage but may also

work the other way
where their family events or holiday plans takes priority.

Check with your close and reliable group of hunters

whether the date selected will be suitable and that they
will definitely turn up in support of the hunt.
Always plan for your close group of hunters 1st, then when
the others join in,
well, the more the merrier!

… Site Survey

A public park with undulating surroundings and

ample car park would be ideal for a walking hunt.
Walk the route slowly and note the time taken to
cover the whole area which should ideally be
between 1.5 to 2.5 hours and approximately
covering 3 to 6 Km. ( Don’t think the hunters have
the energy to last more that time period ).

Look out for suitable places to hide the fox units. Put
yourself in the shoes of the hunters and try to
forecast their likely movements and then outwit and
confuse them by selecting the most unlikely place
they would look for. It may be in a quite exposed
location, yet not expected by the hunters. Learn the
effects of bounced signals, to throw the scent away
from the hunters.

... Define the boundaries

( … and the foxes - keep within the boundaries

- No jumping over or crawling under the fence! )

Some parks may be surrounded by a circular ring

road or pathway, whereby you can specify that the
hunting is limited all within the circular ring road or
pathway and another 100 meters from the outer
perimeter of the road/pathway.

Sometimes you may need to provide a map of the

place to the hunters, and a quick way is to take a
snapshot of the guide map of the place often found
at the entrance of the park.
Alternative is to make use of “Google Earth”
topographic picture to create your own map and
mark out the boundaries as well as the “Start/End”
point.

… Notification and Publicity

Sufficient notification of the coming hunt should be given so that the participants can prepare
and clear their other appointments. Typically, 2 weeks notice should be sufficient. Use the
internet, emails and local nets as tools to invite your fellow hams to the event. Entice them
with the past ARDF events if any. If you have sponsors for prizes, do let that be known.

Try to take as many pictures of the event, as this can be used to make a scrapbook on the
hunt and used to attract more participants to the future hunts.

… Equipment Preparation - In this area, it breaks up to two categories, the fox versus the hunters

1. … for the fox beacons.

There are many ways of making a fox beacon, from the most simplest method to the more sophisticated
electronic fox controller units.

Simplest method … Get the chatty fox marshals to do a round robbin group conversation with each
other, lasting approximately 1 minute per transmission on a simplex frequency. The marshals must
stay put at their locations.

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Electronic fox controller units … These are normally consist of a programmable IC chip
and a bunch of other electronic components which will key the transmitter “ON”
(similar like a external hand microphone) for a set duration, and insert an audio morse identifier.
Many of these circuits are available on the internet.

Recommended that the batteries to work the

transmitters be sourced from sealed lead acid/gel
cells and the whole equipment be placed in a
water-proof container. In my case I used the
recycled cartridge containers painted in bright
orange. Even the monkeys cannot carry them away.

Antenna for the transmitter are normally a vertically

placed quarter-wave wire antenna, but some may
opt for a duckie antenna or extend out to the ARDF
standard turnstile type.

A diagonally separated white and red flag is to be

placed in a vertical location, not exceeding 5 meters
from each hidden beacon and must be able to be
fully viewed from at least one angle.

Paw marks …
A method of marking the arrival of the hunters at
the different beacon sites, may consist of a simple
stamping tool, puncher or coloured staplers. This tool
must be attached to the flag and not the beacon box.
The aim is for the hunters to locate the flag, mark
their score cards and quickly disperse from the
location, thus avoiding other hunters from noticing
the actual location of the flag.

Transmission power …
Normally set to the minimum output power, sufficient to be received at the entrance of the game area or
the “Starting Point” of the hunt. A typical power rating may be from as low as 20 mW (nominal 500 mW)
until 1 watt. Modulation mode can either be in AM or FM for hunts on the VHF/UHF band. Once the
beacon frequency, power output and location has been set, it should remain as it is, throughout the
duration of the hunt.

2. … For the hunters.

Very often the new hunters do not know what
equipment to use and how to hunt. It would be good
if a primer course or workshop be held a week before
the actual hunt. So in this way, another workshop
event is created to keep the local ham community
occupied.

Once the new hunters have new hunting antennas,

they will be very eager to participate in the coming
hunt, to try out their newly homebrewed ARDF
antennas - a pride of their own handiwork.

A field clinic or demonstration on how to hunt using

their newly developed tools would be advisable.
Through this trial, the new participants will have a
good chance to understand the performance and
calibrate their new tools.

… Scoring.
Judging is based on the shortest time taken to locate all or most of the foxes within the specified time.
Note that all the fox beacons will Start and End at the allocated time. The hunters may be flagged off

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individually or as a group of 4 with at time spacing of every 5 minutes.

… F & B for participants

Get some helpers who will stay back at the

“Start/End” point to prepare some refreshments …
typically I would buy a crate of isotonic drinks and
cool them in an ice tub. Dry biscuits and bananas will
be a good addition.

If the helpers are gamed to boil hot water and set up

a mini coffeeshop, then the 3 in 1 packets of coffee,
milo and tea will make a good welcoming drink
before the hunt. Somebody recommended that the
hunters gather early at the starting point and have a
simple packed breakfast before the hunt.

After the hunt, everybody can adjourn to have lunch/dinner … we have tried buffet lunch at one of the
hotels where everybody pays for themselves and have a chance to exchange stories of the hunting
experiences.

Do not forget to issue out 500 mls bottled water to the participants before sending them out on the hunt.
They will definitely need plenty of water. If there are young children joining the fun, do have some prizes
like some chocolate bars, potato chips, etc to give out to every one present.

… Prizes and Sponsors

Would be great if there are sponsors for the hunt and prizes thrown in.
Items like Tee-shirts, caps etc makes attractive door gifts, whilst a other prizes will attract more
participants. Who knows, somebody may want to donate a rig as a grand prize!
Normally, prizes are given as per the top results, but it can also based on who is the 1st hunter to reach
the individual beacons and retrieve the prize tag from the flag. With that prize tag, the hunter can then
claim the reward at the “Start/End” point. In this case, all the hunters are flagged off at the same time.
Alternative, a handicapped method may be used whereby, the least experienced hunters are flagged off
1st and a delay of 5 minutes interval between the different levels of experienced hunters.

… Charges
Unless you are loaded and wanting to play father Xmas, a nominal charge is to be levy ed on all hunters
only ( recommended amount Rm 10 ) to off-fray all the miscellaneous expenses incurred like batteries
for the fox beacons, food & beverages and future development of the ARDF hobby

… Postmortem
Gather information from the hunters about their experiences after the hunt and request some of them to
make a simple write up of the way they hunted down the beacons, plus the obstacles they came about
during the hunt.

Were the foxes cunning enough to make them go the wrong way?

Collect all the photos taken of the hunt. Make a summary report and send to all participants as well as
others who missed the event.

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