|
 Organiser Colin M G4CDM |
Sunday 3rd
Sept 2023 Multi-Tx
DF
|
 10 Txs and associated triffids provide the amusement. |
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Colin says:
This site had been previously used for a part driving / part walking DF event about ten years ago. The size of the site is just right and the vegetation was good with some impenetrable bushes and other areas of ivy-covered dense trees. Just to the east is a grassy recreation area with a car park, making it the ideal starting place.  When surveying the site in advance, I started by earmarking the “difficult” areas for “red” TXs and the ghost since these areas are the most difficult to find. Having chosen these I followed the TX chain backwards to find the yellow and then the green sites. I used a GPS receiver to check that the distances between were acceptable and to store the coordinates for deployment on the day. Most of the TXs were spread out but two were close to each other, A and M. Although close, there was no direct route between them, as competitors found. |
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On the day I arrived on site at 9am and using three deployment regions I set off to plant the TXs and Triffids. No real problems encountered other than leaving the aerial pole at one of the TX sites and not realizing until I was about half a kilometer away! The test signals had started before I completed the deployment round but this was not a problem. When back at the start all stations were clearly heard. |  |
 Ten teams arrived and dibbers and joker TXs were duly issued. |
  Initial bearings taken, everyone shot off towards the west. |
 Andrew - first Multi-DF |  Rosie - winner of the last event. |
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 I was helping Andrew, a novice competitor, when shortly after 2pm Colin F found me and said “how quickly can you get me a dibber”. Apparently he had found a TX and discovered that there was no dibber on the end of his dibber lanyard! |  Colin F, now equipped with a dibber!
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| Having got very confused in my searching for B,
A, and C, I (Roy) decided some high 'ghost' points were needed. At first attempt I overshot by some distance, missing a sense reversal and then got myself trapped in another of Colin's mazes. Eventually escaped, returned and located the Tx but then was struck down by the dreaded "Triffid blindness". Spent ages squinting in the 3m radius hemisphere without success and then, to deepen my depression, Tim showed up, already having found 6 txs (groan). Even with 4 failing eyes the Triffid kept us both hunting .......... ah, at last! My spirit ricocheted upward!! Unbeknown to us, Colin M must have been watching with a telephoto lens and got this shot of us leaving. Below, George had turned up, just after, clearly with sharper eyesight but where's the hat? |  |
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Results
|
 Congratulations to 'weight lifter' Ben for winning the event,
|  and well done Gary for being second
(plus also having the highest “raw” points points before handicapping). |
 Chris was 3rd,
|  and Colin F retained the Hero trophy.
|
Times - Oh the Multi-Spice, note all the
red times, click on this to read explanation. Gary was also cutting it
fine with only 49 seconds to spare!
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| Over to our winner Ben: I set off westward down the large path down the slope from the south western corner of the park. At the bottom of the hill I got the next transmission of A and it seemed to be at a right angle to the path where it came to the bottom of the hill. I turned left following the westside bank of the small stream and crossed the stream at the earliest available point. I followed about 3 paths running roughly parallel to each other in succession, thinking A was off of each of them. It was just off of one of these paths that I walked within a yard of M having thought it was an ideal location. I then found the path up the bank which A was just off of, it then took some time to find due to the near identically coloured ivy. I was fortunate to be logged as first to A, as I believe Colin F had spotted it first. I was much quicker to locate B. Once again I searched down the wrong path twice but I anticipated I may make the same mistake (having learnt the site had a large number of closely packed paths) so was much quicker to move on from each path. I reached the approximate location at around the same time as Roy and Chris, I think this was Roy’s joker which he’d mistakenly revisited but I think I managed to get in just ahead of Chris. | 
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| I
then headed roughly northward with the railway line on my left and
reached the rough location of C. C initially confused me as I was
interpreting the transmission as it coming from right in the middle of
some fairly dense woods, but I then spotted a narrow path leading in –
which I followed approaching the location at the same time as Colin F
and Gary. The three of us were searching slightly north or north east
of the exact location when the next transmission came on. Myself and
Colin F were luckily closer than Gary and I managed to spot it just
ahead of him – managing to get in first to C. The trio F,G and H were the hardest for me to find. Whilst I got to the approximate location of F quite quickly (mostly directed by my initial bearing from the start point), it took me at least two further transmissions to narrow its location down to a small area, and once found Chris had already beaten me to it. G was a very similar story of being on the wrong path when the transmission came on and Chris beating me to the section of woods it was in. I actually managed to spot G from quite a distance and Chris was stood right next to it, although unfortunately for me he spotted it just before I got there. I didn’t actually find H, having made the decision to move on to K after thinking H was in a seemingly huge patch of dense woods and wasn’t worth risking the time to find. I got to the clearing where K was just as the transmission stopped, I then waited in the clearing for the next transmission as I wasn’t sure if I should continue down the path or not. But once the next transmission came on it was clear K was on the North side of the clearing. |
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The
Oxenhill Shaw Maze !
| I
had checked the rough direction of L on my walk from H to K so was
confident I should leave clearing and follow the wide path down the
hill. The next transmission lead me down the small path L was on. It
took me a little longer to locate than it probably should’ve, but this
may have been as it was mounted quite high up and I am short. It took me 2 transmissions to get the rough location of M. Once on the right path it didn’t take long at all to find as two other competitors emerged from the exact patch of woods I had searched for A in at the start. I distinctly remembered the spot from the large log just off the path and the small metal fence running through the woods a few metres behind. And M was on one of the exact trees I must’ve searched for A back at the start. I then headed to the far north side of the site to try and locate H once more, but I ended up returning to my joker of A without having found it. In hindsight I should’ve spent more time attempting to find H as I had much more time han I needed to reach A again. |
 Very well done Ben, I have added you to my shortlist of people to follow on the next event! |
Changes to Hero League
|  Despite
suffering from DDD (Delayed Dibber Delivery), Colin F clung on to
the Hero trophy, having Ben to thank for keeping Gary from the top spot.
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| Thanks
to Colin for an excellent event and to Rosie for finding a pub for me
and a few others who needed some anesthetic after a tough day! Next event is on October 1st, Chris will be in charge, watch the noticeboard for details. |