I recently posted results from my listening endurance test with the new Icom IC-705 QRP general coverage transceiver. I’ve been on a mission to see just how long the supplied BP-272 Li-ion battery pack can hold up with a full charge in real-world conditions.
Thursday, I took the IC-705 to the field and activated a park using only the charged battery pack. After nearly 2 hours of constant operation (calling CQ and working stations) the BP-272 still had nearly 40% of its capacity.
That’s better than I expected, especially knowing the BP-272 is the slim, lower capacity battery pack.
I have to admit: that was a particularly fun activation because propagation finally gave me a break and I worked stations from the Azores to Oregon on a mere five watts of power.
Impressive!
There’s already a couple user reviews of the IC-705 at eham.net; both award it 5 starts.
Actually I looked it up and went to the dike on Thursday to see if I could pick up a very weak signal from Sandy Mush State Game Land but the condx and bands closing were rendering this hopeless on 30 and 20 and unlikely on 40, even though I heard a few K4 prefixes there. Better luck next time maybe, hope I don’t forget to bring a speaker so I can record that 🙂
~3h is not bad for that battery capacity!
That would have been brilliant had you copied me at the famous dike! I was impressed with catching anything close to DX that day.
My prediction is that you’ll wind up keeping it as it’s so versatile…
I’m really digging mine and have finally gotten around to messing with Dstar…