To offset the bad news of the day (apparently, our "hobby" balloons are under attack by the Air Force) I wanted to share with you some uplifting news from one of the lesser-known corners of our hobby: Radio Orienteering—also known as Amateur Radio Direction Finding. I'm proud to serve as Board Liaison to the RO Committee.

A lot of folks think that Radio Orienteering is just fox hunting, but that's simply not true. In fact, it's an organized, well-recognized sport in Europe and other parts of the world.

From arrl.org/ro:

"Radio Orienteering (aka, Amateur Radio Direction Finding, or ARDF) brings radios into the great outdoors with maps and compasses, providing a uniquely enjoyable way to learn new radio skills. This radio sports activity deals with the taking of radio bearings to navigate through wooded areas in search of transmitters. It involves constructing direction-finding equipment, training amateurs in the rules of the sport, and organizing events in the USA and other IARU countries."

In the USA, the sport is beginning to make progress in promoting itself with regional and national competitions. In fact, the 22nd Radio Orienteering Championships will be held April 19-23, 2023 in John Robert's territory, near Dallas, Texas.

I wanted to share with you the Committee's "State of the Sport Address," authored by Charles Scharlau, NZØI, for your reading pleasure.

73,

Phil Temples, K9HI

I congratulate all the committee members on your privileged positions in serving the great sport of Radio Orienteering. Our efforts and vision for the future of the sport might well prove crucial for guiding the sport in this country beyond its position as a niche radio sports activity.

Our Progress

Just three years and one pandemic ago, the ARRL Board of Directors recognized our committee as the body to guide this sport in the USA. Since that time, the ARDF Committee has seen the sport through a very challenging time. Yet, with much help from the Backwoods Orienteering Klub of Raleigh, North Carolina, we managed to hold safe and successful USA ARDF Championships every year, the only exception being the cancellation of the 2020 championships planned for Boston, Massachusetts.

During the pandemic years, the committee established baseline rules and sanctioning documents and agreed on an informal interim approach to team selection. In addition, committee members developed and tested designs for modern radio orienteering transmitters and established a cache of equipment earmarked for use at the annual USA Championships and used locally at other times.

In 2022 we introduced, and successfully executed, the concept of remote hosting. Remote hosting involves having the championship’s hosting club negotiate using another orienteering club’s (the remote club) maps and local expertise to hold a USA Radio Orienteering Championships. The remote club typically receives compensation for using its maps, tied to the number of starts during the championships. The concept was used successfully in 2022, with BOK as the host and QOC as the remote club. The concept is being used again in 2023 with NMO and NTOA as host and remote clubs, respectively. Remote hosting promises to open up many exciting new venues for future championships.

This year, we anticipate officially announcing the 2024 USA Radio Orienteering Championships venue at the 2023 Championships in April. Historically, it has been rare for a championships venue to be named a year in advance. Many thanks go to Joe Burkhead for stepping up to the task of Event Director in 2024. We are also looking forward to progress on the various initiatives that 2023 committee members are heading up.

The Three Pillars

Our hard work notwithstanding, several chronic challenges remain, preventing the sport’s growth in our country. These challenges have existed from the sport’s arrival in North America and cannot be resolved quickly. Yet, with all our efforts, a path toward growth is becoming clear. I believe three pillars are required to support radio orienteering’s growth in the USA:

1. Accessible, good-quality, affordable equipment
2. Instruction opportunities led by knowledgeable instructors and online resources
3. Regular practices and competitions

The order of the three pillars is intentional. While all three are essential to having a healthy and growing sport, equipment is at the top because, without it, neither instruction nor competition can happen. Today, quality receivers and transmitters can be acquired from foreign sources at significant cost and effort. While it is practical and helpful for large clubs to acquire a supply of transmitters and “loaner” receivers, that does not address the core issue: widespread propagation of the sport requires that small clubs and individuals can readily acquire the essential equipment. To lower this barrier to entry, the sport needs domestically-available, moderate-cost, reliable, good-performance transmitters and receivers.

When equipment is available, instruction, the second pillar, will be more easily constructed. YouTube videos will no longer be merely theoretical learning exercises: ordinary individuals will be able to acquire what they need to follow along, apply their knowledge, and advance in the sport. Graduates of beginner radio orienteering classes will know where to obtain their own equipment to continue in the sport, regardless of whether a local club has any equipment to lend.

The third pillar, regular practices and competitions, is essential for nurturing the competitive spirit. Competitors must frequently experience the challenge of good courses and measure their performance against others. Historically, practices are where we have focused our efforts in the USA, hoping that folks who experience a competition will “catch the bug” and continue in the sport. But, by all measures, we have not achieved much growth with that approach. Most newcomers to radio orienteering need instruction and available equipment before they can enjoy the sport and consider it a desirable pastime or a worthy competitive endeavor.

Where To Start

Major equipment manufacturers will only offer radio orienteering equipment once they see a sizable market for those products. So we see that our sport is in a classic catch-22 situation: we can’t grow the sport without the equipment, and we can’t have commercial equipment without a large target market. So we must sidestep the commercial manufacturers, at least for now. How, then, do we address the equipment issue?

Radio orienteering equipment in kit form seems like a reasonable alternative to commercially-built equipment. The emphasis on STEM education, and the maker movement, have resulted in a growing population of electronics “makers.” While makers seem like a possible source of ad hoc manufacturers, engaging them will require more than a schematic diagram and an article in QST. Makers are probably not a perfect fit for an outdoor athletic navigation sport. But suppose those kits can offer more applications than just radio-O. In that case, the market for such kits might be expanded sufficiently to gain the interest of distributors such as SparkFun, AdaFruit, Jameco, Digi-Key, and perhaps the ARRL online store.

To keep the cost down, the physical size small, and the performance up will require extensive use of surface mount devices (SMD) in the kit. While a few kit builders might take on the challenge of laying down salt grain-size components, realistically, the kit must incorporate a factory-populated printed circuit board. There are quite a few competing small-batch manufacturers of such assembled “PCBA” circuit boards, so their prices can be affordable. The remainder of the kit must consist of easy-to-solder through-hole parts, and not too many of them. The simpler the kit, the more folks who will be qualified to build it. Our goal should be to make it a good kit for scouts, maker clubs, new hams, intrepid orienteers, and ARRL Teacher Institute attendees. Such a kit would also be attractive to freelance kit builders wishing to market their services to those who want the product but not the building experience. A small manufacturer might eventually use the kit as a model for a fully-assembled product.

Our Task

So, my fellow radio orienteers, I am proposing that before next year is over, we successfully place two simple, affordable, good-quality radio orienteering kits into at least one distributor’s retail channels: one transmitter and one receiver. They will be used on 80 meters and suitable for foxoring, sprint, and small classic radio orienteering courses. When we achieve that, we will have substantially lowered the most significant barrier to the growth of our sport and cleared the path toward establishing the final two pillars. We should do it not because it is easy, but because it is hard, and that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, and unwilling to postpone. While I’m making it sound like a moonshot, much of the groundwork has been laid in the past three years. And although JFK didn’t say it, the project should also be very interesting and rewarding. Before the project is over, I expect that many on this committee will contribute to it in one way or another. I hope that you will all give it your support. Everyone who is keen to contribute to any aspect of these kits, please let me know.

As always, your comments, questions, and observations are welcome and encouraged. Jerry and I look forward to working with all of you in 2023 as you accomplish your targeted committee tasks. A spreadsheet will be distributed shortly, listing the committee task assignments.

Phil Temples <phil@temples.com>