i know its not sota, but had a nice qso this morning with a sota chaser gd3yum/p, been such a long time since we had the high pressure on 145mhz, started the qso on gb3mn (145.650), and while i was making my way back to bolton from preston, heard martian again on s20, we qsy’d to 145-575 where signals where 5x7 both ways, we had a good chat, and said fond farewells before i lost him, and then the frequency went mad, all them stations going mad for a qso with the isle of man, hope everyone has some sort of good working while the high pressure is here, like everything in the uk wont be long before its gone, happy dx-ing into G,
Cheers martian,
Steven m0sgb
In reply to M0SGB:
Steven
Yes, I know what you mean. I had a day off today so I went on to one of my local hills (Liddington near Swindon - 277m ASL) with my FT-60 5w handie & a homebrew Moxon antenna out for it’s first test. I couldn’t have picked a better day, working into Leicstershire, Nottinghamshire, Worcestershire as well as a few closer ones. One of the Notts stations even gave me a 59, not bad from a 5w handie at that distance. Biggest surprise was working GW4HDR/P climbing Carnedd llewelyn in Northwales. He was just using a handeld with (I assume) a rubber duck antenna as he was still moving and hadn’t summited. Unfortunately, he wasn’t doing a SOTA activation!
13 QSO’s in all and all were good conversations rather than quick callsign, name & report type QSO’s.
A really enjoyable couple of hours.
Jonathan
M6HBS
In reply to M6HBS:
i to had the same contact today with gd3yum through the GB3VT it was nice to have the qso made a nice change Dave M3xie
In reply to M3XIE-1:
I’ve just spoken to Martin simplex on 2m FM, he intends beaming towards London & the South before he packs up & is currently active on 145.375 MHz
59+60dB here in Blackburn.
73,
Mark G0VOF
In reply to G0VOF:
I forgot to mention that i did speak to antony ei2kc this morning as well, the high pressure will be back on monday so might go out, i remember a few years ago going to do sp-002 black hill, 3 ele sota beam and 5watts handheld and made some great contacts into germany, then put the 817 on the beam and had nothing but eastern europe 5x9 all day, so sounds like the good old days are coming back,
Steven m0sgb
In reply to M0SGB:
In reply to G0VOF:
“the high pressure will be back on monday so might go out”
As far as I can see a cold front followed by a trough line will pass over on Monday but the high will return Tuesday.
Good tropo openings are much rarer than they used to be, but at least we seem to get more frequent sporadic E on 2m nowadays!
73
Brian G8ADD