I got quite into 2m CW a few years ago, but haven’t done any for a while, save for occasional use to complete a difficult contact in a Tuesday night contest. Anyway, my next two SOTA activations will be exclusively 2m CW. It is the annual Marconi 2m CW 24 hour contest, 2pm Saturday - 2pm Sunday. I’ll go in the 6 hour Open section which allows two separate periods of operation to make up the 6 hours, so an activation later this afternoon, and another tomorrow morning.
Should be a good opportunity to make 2m QSOs into Europe even under flat conditions. I won’t be self-spotting, obviously, but I expect activity to be around 144.000 to 144.200MHz.
SOTAbeams SB5 Rick. Now out of production, but I still use mine regularly and I know Gerald G4OIG does too.
It was very quiet today - just 16 contacts in 3+ hours.
Good spread of activity…
F: JN19, JO00.
G: IO82, 83, 91, 92, JO01, JO02.
GM: IO86.
…just not very much of it!
Also heard GM4PPT and DF0MU out there but they didn’t hear me. The F and DL stations were giving out serial numbers in the 70s. Seems VHF CW needs a serious boost in the UK though
The second part of the contesting, scheduled for a Sunday morning activation, is cancelled - weather, work, lack of sleep, lack of enthusiasm, take your pick.
Cheers. That’s the kit-form yagi-in-a-tube, IIRC, presumably used with horizontal polarisation.
Weather here this morning is way better than it was yesterday, which is to say it isn’t chucking it down and blowing everything about. Hopefully it’ll stay that way. I’m heading for Kempton…
Much better session this morning. It shouldn’t really have happened - I barely slept a wink last night, and I have a big gig in Blackpool tonight. The weather was atrocious - very windy and very rainy - and a croc clip came away from the feeder after just one QSO. I wouldn’t mind but I’ve only used this feeder about 150 times since the last time it was repaired.
I stripped some of the coating of the core with my teeth, wrapped it around the driven element and secured it in place with the now separate crocodile clip. I used a spare cable tie to give best possible strain relief close to there as this was now a very temporary and very vulnerable arrangement!
Fortunately, it worked, and thank goodness, because at long last a bit of UK activity picked up in this 2m CW contest, and also there was a bit of a lift. 16 QSOs were made to add the the 16 from Saturday, but in half the time. Furthermore, they were a bit more “interesting”:
Of course multipliers don’t count for this event, it just goes on accumulated km distance points, but that gives a flavour of what was worked. Smashing, glad I went for it in contradiction of all available logic.
Now to load up on coffee and Red Bull, and pick my mum up for a trip to Blackpool. Now, if only there was a decent show I could take her to…
Nice to work you earlier, I had put my SB5 up at the back of the house yesterday but didn’t hear you, or anyone else in the contest for that matter. Much better activity today though & after working you I had to work someone else & found another six stations in total. Best DX for me were Dave G7RAU & G8T both at 348KM according to Minos. Also very pleased to work Dick GM4PPT at 226KM.
A bit disappointed I didn’t work Denis G3UVR who I heard when we were both calling G8T whilst he was busy working S52, as Denis is one the few of here in IO83 who will use CW in the VHF contests.
As this is purely a KM event it is quite obvious those that can work the continent were doing, so for us in North West G it was a little quiet, think what it must be like up North!
Glad I put the beam up & had a go though, it makes a nice change to have a more complex exchange & different propagation than you get on HF.
Have a great gig tonight & no doubt catch you further down the log.
I carry something similar on my rare activation’s, or when contesting from my motorcycle. It is a smaller version, which although smaller & lighter provides enough functionality for me.
Ah, just like it was on Foel Goch GW/NW-039 yesterday afternoon… and the croc clip on my SB5 did the same thing, but I didn’t discover the fault until I got home as the self-amalgamating tape held it all together. I use coax braid sections between the coax and the croc clips to provide some flexibility, but it still broke. The wind was so strong that it blew one half of the driven element out of its socket on the boom. Probably getting a little loose now as my SB5 (with added 70cm elements) is well worn. Maybe time for an overhaul.
