Primary Repeater - WA8MAC
This Week's Question
"Are you aware of methods and/or techniques to find a fox with just an HT?"
Fox Hunting 101: Finding a Hidden Transmitter with an HT (and Beyond)
A fox hunt — also known as Radio Direction Finding (RDF) or Amateur Radio Direction Finding (ARDF) — is the sport (and the emergency-comms skill) of locating a hidden transmitter using only its radio signal. It's fun on a Saturday afternoon, but it's also the exact skill set we need when a stuck microphone is keying up a repeater, an EPIRB or ELT is sounding, or an unauthorized transmitter is causing interference on a public-service frequency.
The good news: you can fox hunt with the HT already on your belt. The better news: a handful of inexpensive add-ons turn that HT into a surprisingly capable direction-finding rig.
The "Body Fade" Technique: HT Only, No Extra Gear
Your body is mostly water, and water is a remarkably effective RF attenuator at 2 meters and 70 cm. You can exploit that to turn yourself into a crude directional antenna.
- Tune to the fox and watch the S-meter (or signal-strength bars) on your HT.
- Hold the HT tight against your chest, antenna pointed straight up. Your torso is now blocking signal coming from behind you.
- Slowly rotate your whole body through 360°. The S-meter reading will rise and fall as you turn.
- Find the null, not the peak. The deepest dip in signal strength is where your body is blocking the fox — meaning the fox is directly behind you. Nulls are much sharper and easier to identify than peaks.
- Walk that bearing, repeat every couple hundred yards, and triangulate. As you get closer the signal will pin the meter — that's when the next trick comes in.
Make Friends with Your S-Meter
What to Watch
- S-meter bars or numeric signal strength
- Squelch break / busy indicator at low levels
- RSSI in display menus (many HTs show a number)
- How quickly the meter changes as you turn
What to Avoid
- A pegged meter — you've lost all directionality
- Multipath in tight neighborhoods (reflected signal off houses, cars, power lines)
- Trusting one bearing — always triangulate from multiple spots
- Hunting on the fox's actual frequency once you're close — switch to a nearby image or harmonic if needed
Plot It on a Map: Turning Bearings into a Location
A single bearing only tells you a line — the fox is somewhere along it. Plot two or more bearings from different locations on a map and the intersection narrows the fox down to a small search area. This is triangulation, and it's the part of fox hunting that turns guesswork into a plan.
How to Plot Bearings
- Stop at a known location (street corner, parking lot, intersection) and find the bearing to the fox with your body-fade or Yagi.
- Mark your spot on a paper map (or drop a pin in Google Maps, Gaia GPS, or CalTopo) and draw a straight line out in the direction the fox is.
- Drive a couple miles in a roughly perpendicular direction — not toward the fox — and take another bearing.
- Plot that line too. Where the lines cross is your best guess at the fox's location.
- Take a third bearing from a third location. Three lines rarely cross at a single point — they form a small triangle, and the fox is almost always inside it.
Reading the Map for Context
Once you have a search area, look at the map. The fox isn't usually in the middle of a freeway or a pond. Foxes tend to hide where there's a logical reason to be — and the map will often tell you exactly where to start.
- Parking lots, parks, public land — favorite hiding spots for organized hunts
- High ground / hilltops — better range, often where the hunt master is set up
- Driveable side roads, cul-de-sacs — easy in and out for the fox to deploy
- Anywhere the bearings concentrate — not just the centroid, but where lines actually cross
- Hills, ridges, large buildings — can bend a bearing through reflection; expect bad bearings near them
- Lakes, rivers, freeways — unlikely fox locations, but great for ruling out big chunks of map
- Tall towers, water tanks — common multipath source; double-check bearings from near them
- Power lines, substations — noise floor goes up; signal strength can be misleading
The Gear Upgrade Path
None of this is required — the body-fade trick really does work — but each of these tools makes the hunt faster, more accurate, and a lot more fun.
Directional Yagi Antenna
A handheld 2 m or 70 cm Yagi (typically 3 to 5 elements) gives you a real forward gain pattern and a strong rear null. Sweep the beam horizontally and the S-meter swings dramatically. Most hunters look for the null off the back rather than the peak off the front — nulls are sharper and more accurate.
Great for medium-range hunting and triangulating from multiple stops.
Offset / Step Attenuator
An in-line attenuator (often switchable from 0 to 60+ dB) lets you "turn down" the signal as you close in so the meter keeps reading mid-scale. An offset attenuator shifts the receive frequency so a strong fox can't get around the attenuation through the radio's case — essential for close-in work.
Pairs perfectly with a Yagi for the last mile.
Tape-Measure or Loop Antenna
A small shielded loop antenna has a very deep, very narrow null and is perfect for close-range sniffing — pinpointing a fox in a parking lot, in the woods, or inside a building. Loops are also cheap and easy to homebrew. The classic "tape-measure Yagi" is another popular DIY favorite.
Best for the final 50 feet of the hunt.
Other Useful Extras
- Headphones — hear weak signals others miss
- Compass + map (or phone GPS) for plotting bearings
- Notepad to log bearing/location pairs for triangulation
- A second radio set to the talk-around frequency for the hunt itself
- Comfortable walking shoes — foxes always seem to end up uphill
Why an ARPSC Member Should Care
Fox hunting isn't just a game. The same skills are used to locate:
- Stuck microphones that take down a repeater during an event
- Malicious or unintentional jammers on public-safety or amateur frequencies
- Downed-aircraft ELTs on 121.5 MHz (Civil Air Patrol does this constantly)
- Missing-person tracking beacons in some search-and-rescue scenarios
- RFI sources ruining your noise floor at home
This Week's Action Item
Before next Thursday's net, try one of these. The goal is to be ready when ARPSC fires up a fox hunt practice session (or when a real one shows up on the repeater):
- Practice the body-fade technique on any strong local signal — a repeater, a broadcast translator, a neighbor's wireless device
- Find your HT's RSSI / signal-strength display and learn how to read it under load
- Try removing the antenna and walking around a known strong signal — see how directional your body becomes
- Price out a 3-element 2 m Yagi or a tape-measure Yagi kit
- Look into an offset attenuator — the cheapest big upgrade you can make
- Build or buy a shielded loop for close-in sniffing
Suggested Equipment
4-Element 2 m Fox-Hunt Antenna
Lightweight handheld Yagi designed specifically for direction finding on 2 meters.
Arrow 4OFHA2 m Fox-Hunt Loop
Shielded loop antenna for the close-in portion of the hunt where a Yagi gets overloaded.
Arrow FHLDual-Band 2 m / 70 cm Yagi
The classic Arrow II hand-held — great for satellite work and fox hunting on both bands.
Arrow II 146/437Further Reading
Wikipedia: Transmitter Hunting
Background on amateur radio transmitter hunting (fox hunting / T-hunting), including techniques, equipment, and the sport's history.
Visit WikipediaHoming In (Joe Moell, KØOV)
Decades of articles, technique guides, and equipment reviews from one of the best-known voices in U.S. fox hunting.
homingin.comCivil Air Patrol ELT Searches
How CAP uses VHF direction finding to locate downed-aircraft emergency locator transmitters — the same techniques we use on the repeater.
CAP Emergency ServicesWikipedia: Amateur Radio Direction Finding
The competitive, on-foot side of the hobby (ARDF) — international rules, classes, equipment, and how organized hunts are run.
Visit WikipediaBottom Line
You don't need expensive gear to fox hunt — just an HT with an S-meter, a little patience, and your own body as the attenuator. Add a Yagi, an offset attenuator, and a loop over time and you'll be the one we call when a stuck mic is holding the repeater hostage.
About This Data
This data is pulled live from the official ARPSC Net Log spreadsheet. Data updates automatically every 10 seconds during active nets.