There has been some discussion about a SOTA contest on the SOTA Australia news group, but SOTA is international, so I am putting up a working concept here.
There are a range of contests around which are QRP, or incorporate SOTA in some way, but also SOTA is not just QRP. It was thought that having a contest that is built from the ground up SOTA would be of benefit. Some have also suggested the idea of sprints, etc, but a 24 hour contest would be best in order that everyone around the world who participates can have a full set of daily propogation opportunities. It also allows for strategies involving multiple summit activations.
Anyway, this is the conceptual rules:
1/ Objectives: To provide an opportunity for SOTA chasers (potential shack sloths) and SOTA activators (potential mountain goats) to take part in a special SOTA activity day. To encourage QRP operation at home and in the field. To promote amateur radio.
2/ Date: TBD
3/ Sections:
-A: SOTA peak activator: At least one SOTA activation in the log, but not all QSOs need be activation QSOs.
-B: Chaser. No SOTA activations in the log.
4/ Sub sections:
(a) 8 consecutive hours
(b) 24 hours
5/ Scoring: Scoring contacts take place between a SOTA peak activator and any other station. Non SOTA peak stations do not score for contacts between them.
A station may be contacted
- once per HF or lower bands (<30MHZ), once per VHF or higher bands (>30MHZ)
- once per mode where CW, FM, other phone, and other modes are the all other modes (eg PSK, RTTY, ATV, etc)
- once per unique summit for that station and once as a chaser
For example a HF only station operating CW and SSB could be contacted twice per summit and twice as a chaser. A HF & VHF station operating CW and PSK could be contacted effectively four times per summit and four times as a chaser.
QSO value:
1 point per QSO
plus 1 point where the claiming station operated QRP
plus 1 point where the other station is QRP
6/ Contest exchange: RST + SOTA summit code. QRP stations sign /Q or /QRP
eg. On CW G0XXX de VK3AAA/QRP ur 569 VK3/VC001
Or on Phone G0XXX VK3AFW QRP you are 5 by 6 from SOTA VK3/VC-001
Real signal reports are strongly encouraged.
7/ Bands: All non-WARC bands can be used for scoring. Any contacts made on WARC bands (12/17/30m) are to be excluded from the contest log.
8/ All registered SOTA peaks anywhere in the world qualify for activation and scoring.
9/ A SOTA activator station can be worked again if the activator station is on a different SOTA peak, in addition to being worked once (as per rule 5) from a non-SOTA location.
10/ The following comprise multipliers
- Each unique SOTA summit activated by the entrant.
- Each unique SOTA summit chased by the entrant when not a SOTA activator.
- Each unique SOTA summit 2 summit pair.
This provides that a summit may be used more than once as a multipler - once by activating it, once by chasing someone else on it (under SOTA rules the entrant must have yet to arrive on the summit or have left it), and potentially many times through summit 2 summit QSOs.
All multipliers are added together and then multiplied by the the QSO score to obtain the final score.
11/ Activators must abide by all SOTA activation rules. For example a SOTA summit to SOTA summit scoring cannot occur on the same summit. That is contacts within the same summit activation zone do not qualify for a scoring contact. Activations must not be in the vicinity of a motor vehicle and summits must be accessed via non-motorised means.
In addition to the SOTA rules, a entrant station may not chase any SOTA contacts when they are themselves in a SOTA activation zone, but are unable to comply with SOTA rules as an activator - eg being next to a motor vehicle.
12/ Participating stations may use the internet spotting and activity alert systems.
13/ Logs to be submitted in Cabrillo format by email to: …………….
Paper log scans cannot be accepted.
I am not wanting to be the contest sponsor or manager, but am willing to write robot software to go through the logs. The idea for the manager would be to put all the logs in one folder and have the robot go and score them all.
As for potential dates: It’s a compromise between the North and the South. I think the winter should be avoided, ruling out June, July, August, December, January and February. In VK3, Jan and Feb should be avoided anyway due to very hot temperatures and fire risks. Early October through to late November are good here, presuming earlier there is also good in the Northern hemisphere.
April is also a good month, and also early May works here. I would imagine late April/early May works in the north.
Anyway, the idea is now out there. Thoughts?
73 de Wayne VK3WAM
