First of all many thanks to all the chasers who called us during this activation. It was a lot of fun to work everybody. We probably could not pull everybody’s signal through but tried our best.
It was our first ever participation in a SOTA activation with my friend Thierry (F4EGG) and we learnt a lot in the process. The conditions were the biggest challenge. It was bitterly cold to the point where it became very painful for Thierry to help write the calls in the paper log. His hand was shaking and shivering to the point where he had much difficulty writing something that would be later readable. It was a bit of a struggle later on to go through the log and try to decode all the call signs properly but hopefully we got everybody’s call ok (please give me shout if you think I missed you and I’ll double-check the paper log).
The next challenge we had was with the tuning of the antennas. We had an ATAS 25 and a buddipole and struggled early on to tune them properly. It seemed the SWR was a bit all over the map and changed throughout the day even through the antennas did not change position. We assume various factors came into play such as coax length, ground humidity that evolved throughout the day, etc… It seemed it was a lot easier to get a lot lower and stable SWR later in the day than in the very early morning, but yet we seemed to have the best results early in the morning when we thought we were struggling the most.
We learnt that it was not that straight forward to work with 2 nearby antennas as transmissions on one band seemed to affect the other due to close proximity. We ended-up working with one antenna at a time to keep it simple.
It was the first time for me to ever work a pile-up and it was a lot of fun to be on the other side of one and learn to best handle it. I am still a rookie at it but will try to improve.
We also learnt that 40m is not a very friendly band for QRP stations. Very congested and a QRP signal gets run over by big signals all the time even when you’re on the supposed ‘QRP QRG’. 20m was a lot friendlier from that standpoint and the propagation seemed to help. It seems we were short-skipping on 20m but we still managed to get as far as just a little south of Moscow. Not bad with 5w.
As always, practice makes perfect. We had tested our solar set-up multiple times and it worked flawlessly as expected. we were able to plug-in and use 2 FT-817 at the same time but ended-up using only 1 at a time. The challenge was to keep the foldable panel from flying off the mountain due to the wind but nothing that a few rocks could not sort out.
We set our antennas and gear away from the summit path in order to not disturb potential hikers. Our antennas were quite visible and the very few people that came to the summit that day came to have a chat and we gladly entertained them. We acted as goodwill ambassadors of sort for our hobby and it was nice to see people showing a genuine interest in what was going on.
Hi Mike, you were #1 in the log so you can rightfully claim to be the 1st person to have ever worked that summit. You had a great signal.
We stayed on 20m a long time as it worked well for us. We tried 40m and 15m as well but never came close to 20m. We tried to work 14.285 as long as we could until hunger and visitors distracted us a bit.
Thierry was not a believer in solar either based on past experience. After using my set-up a few times, he is now looking to buy his own foldable panel :-). I guess it is all about buying the right gear (not all panels are born equal). My panel is 60w and weighs 1.15kg and it beats carrying 2 or 3 batteries of 5 or 7ah with the weight implications. I was suspicious as well at first but tried it out anyway and I did not regret it!
In reply to JG1XMV:
Bravo Arnaud et Thierry.
Nice hear about you. Few days ago, we were (F5UBH and F5LKW) in Briançon for the WST 2014.
We were QRV APRS but no trame detected …
I sent email to Thierry but nô answer, may be wrong address.
73 QRO
Roger
Hello Roger & Tof. I will pass this thread to Thierry so that he can check with you what happened. He would have replied to you for sure so something must have happened, he is always very happy to catch-up with people. I checked his email on QRZ and it is correct. I think I met Roger near Puy St Andre last year after he activated a few summits near the Prorel. Looking forward to catching up with both of you at some stage.
Thierry and I have our eyes on a couple of summits within the next few days. The next one should be wednesday if all goes well. Hopefully I can activate 2 or 3 more summits before I go back to Tokyo but we are WX-dependent and it has been atrocious as of late (very very cold…).
As for aprs.fi I checked and can see our tracks around Briancon (DPRS, not APRS though).
"…Thierry and I have our eyes on a couple of summits within the next few days. The next one should be wednesday if all goes well. Hopefully I can activate 2 or 3 more summits before I go back to Tokyo but we are WX-dependent and it has been atrocious as of late (very very cold…). "
I hope the solar panels work and you can hear me
I will look out for you and Thierry.
In any event good luck.
I am more worried about propagation, wx, getting better at tuning the antenna and loud nearby signals crushing our tiny qrp footprint. Today we went out with the panel and tested a BNC 750 and a buddistick antenna. I think we’ve got the energy conundrum figured out assuming we are not operating during a storm, trying to fine-tune the rest. Hopefully practice will make perfect.
Hopefully we can choose a nice summit for the chasers out there. See you on the air Mike!
In reply to JG1XMV:
Hi Arnaud,
Thanks for all… What’s the difference betwenn DPRS and APRS ??? Where can we look that trace on DPRS ???
Which to contact you on next summits with Thierry… I’ve made lot of them arround Embrun but lot of them “first one” arround Briançon !!!
Heard you soon
Best 73
SOTA FEVER
Tof F5UBH Normandy !!!
Hi Tof (sorry in English but this way everybody can understand).
DPRS is the digital equivalent of APRS and you can see those tracks on the aprs.fi website as well. For example, if you check Thierry’s call F4EGG (can’t remember if -9 or another one of those) you will be able to see his tracks around Briancon and including a signal he sent from the top of Clot La Cime which is spotted on aprs.fi.
Thierry and I send our DPRS tracks when using DStar handhelds automatically whenever we press the microphone. The advantage of a digital mode like Dstar is that you can send voice (converted to 0 1) and data (such as your GPS position) on the same frequency whereas with APRS you need a dedicated server on another frequency from the frequency you talk on.
I am thinking that maybe the APRS relay around Briancon may be down (actually I think it may have been taken down for good) which is why your tracks may not have made it through to aprs.fi. I have alerted Thierry to this thread and he will chime in very soon to give more information.
Thierry and I have SOTA fever as well but we’re both injured at the moment so we’re a bit conservative on our summit choices, but the next one should be a nice one still ;-).
In reply to JG1XMV:
Hi Arnaud,
Ok for DPRS but can’t saw my DPRS ? I’ve saw these from Thierry on Clot la Cime but nothing from mine !!
Well no problem…
I which to heard you soon on summit near Briançon or wherever…
Bye
Tof F5UBH
If you’re around Briancon you would need to connect to F1ZDF B or F1ZDF C to have your DPRS track make it through to aprs.fi. I know Thierry was away from Briancon a couple of days on a week-end and had to switch off the connection to the internet for fear of a lightning strike frying his internet box (happened once already this year)so in that case, even if you were connected to those servers your signal would indeed not make it through to aprs.fi. It may have been a case of bad luck that you were here when the relays were disconnected from the internet for a couple of days.
In reply to JG1XMV:
Ok Arnaud,
Should try that next year now !!!
I’m there the 5th and 10th (With Roger LKW) August… But doesn’t matter for now…
Which you sunny days… Not like here Rain in Normandy !!! hiii !!!
Bye
Thank you for the 2 S2S from you as well. At first it was a bit surprising as we were not expecting it but it was good fun to hear you. If the Wx permits it we should be on another summit this coming Wednesday. I will put an alert in for it.
Sorry to read that you were both suffering from injuries - what happened or was it muscle fatigue? As a chaser I take any crumbs going, conservative summits or not
Thierry sprained his ankle and has a torn muscle as a result as well. As for me I have the windshield wiper syndrome (soccer injury) impacting my right knee so I have to wear a knee brace when hiking, it especially hurts on the downhill part of the outings.
I have input an alert for our next summit. It will be on the 20th of this month, F/AM-142. It should be a nice warm-up for our next activation. We should be hanging out around the same QRGs as last time. See you on the air hopefully.
Got back from the forest about 10 minutes ago with Bertie the greyhound - quite wet.
I think the sprained ankle of Thierry will soon get better
Knees are more complicated. Like you, a past injury from sport, Judoka, which caught up with me about two years or so ago on my right knee - now repaired for the time being. I regret to write that all the Japanese I had to know for my grading has been forgotten.
I hope the knee does not cause too much problem - not for the activation but for you 8)
Ears wide open for the 20th. In any event good luck with the activation.
