Hilltopper Tallboy: Building, aligning, testing and on the air

 

I've had a hankering to build something lately and happened across a relatively new offering from the 4 States QRP Group: the Hilltopper Tallboy, a monoband QRP CW transceiver kit.

Available for 15 to 40 meters (and maybe 60m soon), I ordered a 20m version. It arrived 5 or 6 days later and I started building it right away.

The Build 

The kit's contents were well organized as were the accompanying instruction.

Parts are sorted into one of 10 bags and the assembly follows the bag's numerical sequence. There are exceptions to this as parts are sometimes required from the ESD bag or the bag containing the matched crystals.

 

The largest bag - and the one responsible for my initial impression of "Man, that's a substantial kit!" - is the one containing the mechanical components: knobs, jacks, hardware, etc.

Status of OHR-100A build; Tallboy (20m) arrives

OHR-100 status - click for larger

The 20m OHR-100A kit build is progressing nicely but with a few slowdowns.

Capacitor values can be referred to in a variety of ways and, in the case of the kit's build instructions, both ways are used. The inventory sheet and the step-by-step instructions each use different methods to refer to some (most) of the capacitors.

'82' in the inventory means 82pF. But '820' in the instructions also means 82 pF.

Also, a few are missing. Four of the same value are called for; I have three.

Fortunately, Mouser has no minimum order and they are quick to ship.

No biggie, it'll just take a bit longer to complete the build than I'd anticipated. But the kit has sat unbuilt for 30 years; what's a few more revolutions on the big blue marble...

As a consolation, my Hilltopper Tallboy arrived today and there's more to it than I expected.

Video: Winter Field Day 2026

This year's WFD was mostly a POTA event. I started out giving my WFD exchange but got only POTA exchanges in return. The only known WFD for me were on SSB.

Conditions were good - plenty of North American stations on both CW & SSB, Germany on CW and Spain on phone.

And the weather? Fantastic - I rode home with the jacket stowed.

Goethe State Forest (US-4622) is an amazing place.

I've activated it before but only from the parking area. This time, I rode throughout the forest prior to getting on the air and I had the place to myself. Didn't see another soul for the 3 hours that I was riding/activating.

Here's the vid (directly on YouTube):

 

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OHR-100A - Let the build begin

I recently purchased an unbuilt OHR-100A, a popular monoband QRP kit first offered by Oak Hills Research in the 1999. This one is for 20 meters and looks to be a real gem.

Included in the kit is the optional 10-turn VFO pot to increase tuning resolution. This renders the front panel VFO dial markings as invalid so I ordered a Freq-Mite from the 4SQRP club which also arrived in today's mail.

There is plenty of room inside a finished OHR-100A to install other options necessary to putting a radio on the air and I'm already considering battery and keyer possibilities. 

OHR produced several excellent QRP transceiver kits but one of their most useful kits was the WM-2 wattmeter. I've had one for decades and it still looks and works like new. For those wanting an equivalent (almost identical) analog QRP wattmeter kit, click here and scroll about halfway down the page.

OHR was founded by well-known QRPer Doug DeMaw W1FB. Following his death in 1997, Marshall Emm N1FN took over and continued until 2020 when he became an SK.

I'll begin the build this coming week.  

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Today's POTA activation - What would you have done?

 

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