Ho-Hum, Another Equipment Failure

THREE miserable positions reported...

A very short ride today, almost didn't record it, but Oh Well.
After looking at the GPS mileage I'm not so disappointed, though ten miles is about HALF what my daily goal is to try to keep the A1C and the endocrinologist happy.  (And me alive, I suppose...)
Jacque had dropped me and Jazzy off earlier in the morning at our friend and neighbor's house so I could retrieve our Ford tractor and mowing machine.  Jazzy had to go with me on the tractor since she gets into too much trouble at Phyllis' place, where Jacque and Phyllis are working frantically to finish a show quilt for the NM State Fair .
So I trussed up in the belly-harness and strapped the Wiggly Pup and off we went.  Last time she rode with me on the tractor she got pretty stressed out by the vibration and noise but she seemed quite calm this trip.  I'd planned to take the setup over to Sarah and Justin's and mow their 3 acres of tree-high weeds but I ran out of time.  So after getting home Jazzy and I decided to take at least a short bike ride, traversing pretty much the same route just taken with the tractor with a 4 mile loop added at the turnaround point.
Even after such  a relatively short ride I was feeling a bit whupped when we got back.  After looking at the temperature (90-something) on the log I realized that may have had something to do with the fatigue.
I'm repeatedly frustrated at the poor radio coverage out here, especially for the APRS/GPS system for logging points on the routes I ride.  There's a low ridge 3 miles east of home that appears to block the low power beacons I transmit from the bike, and the so-called better stations up on the mountains like Sandia  Crest seldom hear me there either.   So I hit on the idea of an experiment:  Use a quieter channel and see if I could get more positions logged through my home station Igate.  The higher-altitude mountaintops get overloaded with so much traffic from all over the place I know they have trouble hearing weaker stations like my bike-mobile.
Trouble is, it didn't work.  Evidently something is wrong with my bike radio or antenna since ONLY 3 positions were logged, all within a few hundred feet of home.
So now to troubleshoot all that and report back....

Ride Started:  12:47 PM    Ride Ended:  2:24 PM
Beginning Battery Voltage:  13.8       Ending Voltage: 13.2
Lowest Temp  91 F      Highest Temp:  91 F 
Stats from the GPS:    Total Miles:  10.52
Overall average speed            Moving Avg               Max Speed
  6.4 MPH                               8.8 MPH                    28.4 MPH
Total Trip time                       Moving Time             Stopped Time
1 hour 39 mins                      1 hour 11 mins           27 minutes