Me and my dad Tom M1EYP will be doing a SOTA tour in these regions from Thursday 21st June to Thursday 28th June, alerts which which summits we activate on each day has been posted onto SOTAwatch already. My dad will pick me up from work on Thursday 21st June and will be be travelling to Steyning in West Sussex which is where we will be staying that night. The reason for activating G/SE summit on Friday 22nd June is because my dad has a gig at a theatre in Eastbourne that night in a band called the Ragdolls. The rest of the week will be spent activating the SOTA summits on Jersey, Guernsey and Sark and then onto Cornwall to activate Hensbarrow Downs G/DC-008 which is the only English SOTA summit we haven’t activated yet along with other G/DC SOTA summits and then on Thursday 28th June we will be driving home via SOTA activations of G/SC SOTA summits. I will be activating on 2m fm, hoping to qualify each SOTA summit on 2m fm, so if any of you live near any of the summits which are alerted and you have 2m fm, please listen out for me and work with if you can hear me. I will also be operating on 20m ssb on any SOTA summits that I am struggling to qualify on 2m fm. My dad will be operation on 20m cw on all SOTA activations. If any of you live near to any of the SOTA summits alerted, please feel free to walk up to these SOTA summits while we are activating them and meet us on the summits.
Thanks Gerald, we look forward to be bring in the G completion club again as well completing 2 more associations GJ and GU.
I hope to work you on 2m fm from the G/DC SOTA summits, please listen out for me calling CQ SOTA on 145.500 and ask any other radio amateurs that you know to listen out for me on 2m fm also. Please also feel free to take a drive up Kit Hill G/DC-003 when we are on this summit activating.
Enjoy the trip. We’ll be on Mull for the second part of your trip, but I fear that we will not have bands in common that we’ll be able to work that distance for S2S - too far for 2m and too close for 20m. I expect Martyn will be on 60m and I’ll probably be on 40 or 80m as well as 2m FM.
I hope you and Martyn M1MAJ have a good SOTA holiday on the Isle of Mull. We may have 40m with us as backup so if we end using the 40m backup if both 2m and 20m are no good, we may work you or Martyn summit to summit.
Tomorrow evening both myself and my dad Tom M1EYP will be travelling to Steyning in West Sussex and this is where will SOTA Tour will start tomorrow. Alerts are on SOTAwatch. If you happen to be in any of the regions mentioned on the title or near them, please listen out for me on 2m FM and work me if you can hear when we are in the regions mentioned on the title. I have 20m SSB backup as well. My dad will be activating these SOTA summits on 20m CW. Please feel free to also join us for any activations if you live near to any of the alerted SOTA summits.
Thank you for the information. If there is an possibility of dad or you operating on 40m or 60m or 80m giving UK hams more of a chance of a contact it would be very much appreciated! There is little chance of a 20m QSO for us in the home country unless sporadic e condx are exceptional.
40m is a possibility, especially on the summits that may get done a second time. Mainly though, 20m is lighter, quicker to deploy, and more reliable, so I’ll be on there. Jimmy will offer a more local service on VHF. I realise that leaves a coverage gap between the two, but you can’t please all the people all the time!
Yes I agree 20m is lighter, faster and you are guaranteed success at this time of year providing it is not early morning or late at night so I don’t criticise your strategy. It is a method I deployed on my recent tour down to FN to good effect, 502 QSOs on 29 summits of which 26 were SOTA Complete for me. On most summits with the prevailing condx solely 20m operation favoured UK stations as I was further away than you will be and so I had most of the UK within the skip zone for the better equipped UK chaser stations. Do what you can for us, but as always the activator is King.
The GJ summit appears to be the rarest one for UK Chasers and is probably the most sought after - that is the summit I will be targetting when you are there on Sunday.
I am hoping to have a beam up before Sunday, making a 20m QSO with you a distinct possibility.
Good luck with the tour Tom & Jimmy and your gig as well, trust it all goes to plan.
Thanks Phil. Logistically (timings, accommodations, sailings etc) it’s been pretty huge, then there’s incorporating a night’s work into the schedule while we’re away!
I’m now starting to think that 40m may be the main band with 20m relegated to the back-up. We’ll see how things go. For tomorrow’s activations, if there’s any chance of getting the 4 QSOs on 2m FM handheld, then I will due to time constraints.
In the event Tom we had an easy QSO on 20m yesterday thanks to some Sporadic e and a steady signal, however not long after our 0953z QSO you faded out.
I have to say my new antenna for HF, erected the previous day, helped - the culmination of 18 months work dealing with unsympathetic neighbours, the local council, the planning inspectorate and finally a 4 month waiting list for a Hexbeam from MW0JZE in Llanelli! I may have struggled to make the 20m QSO with my OCF dipole - reception would have been difficult as you were just audible on that occasionally, but 559 on the Hexbeam most of the time.
Thank for giving me GJ/JE-001, I hope to visit the Channel Islands in the Autumn for the three SOTA Completes. I worked Bill GU4WSB/P on Guernsey and Sark when he was there at Easter.
Well, we couldn’t find our 40m dipole before setting off from Macc. We have 60m with us, but probably won’t use it. Clothes and toiletries have to be added to the rucksacks today for 24 hours on Sark, so the extra antenna is jettisoned!
