Well there are quite a few who have upgraded their licence from M3 and 2E to full in all cases. Colin went back to his old B call as it sounds better in CW.
70 QSOs tonight on 6m. Good fun. Worked into G, GW, GD, GI, GM and EI. Locators IO64, 65, 70, 74, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 91, 92, 93, 94, JO02, 03. Heard but didnāt manage to work IN99, IO75, 86, 90, JO00, 01. Surprisingly didnāt hear IO80 or 95.
I did go out into the garden and put up the 6m dipole in the dark at about 9pm. Heard very little on the band at my QTH.
At least I tried!
73, Colin
Yes and thereās loads of false spots on the dxsummit cluster! Why do people do that??
In any case, was up early this morning and thought I might catch them long path, but theyāre probably still setting up I guess.
Had to cancel a planned SOTA activation as we just switched (AGAIN) from spring to winter and itās snowing again, there are road warnings all day for the area where the summts are that I wanted to activate ā¦ maybe next week? Problem is the short term weather forecasting here is (IMHO) totally unreliable.
73 Ed.
Additional data: The latest on the website (http://vk0ek.org/) is that theyāre doing a reccie and not yet operational, but weather is good.
Wow, is it really 20 years since VK0IR ! I can remember the thrill of working them and subsequently receiving their QSL card.
I also had hair back then ā¦
73 Andrew G4AFI
Yeah, the pirate spots have been happening for a while.
Watched W5KUB.com live last night/early this morning. Bob KK6EK was live via satphone from the RV Braveheart, they were just getting ready to start taking the gear across.
Last I heard was that the tents are all up and all gear is on the island.
The best place to keep an eye on the activity at this point is http://www.dxa3.org/ This is the near real-time logging confirmation site. The idea is that you can make sure that youāre definitely in the log and therefore avoid making āinsuranceā QSOs freeing up more slots for ATNOs (all time new ones). I sure would like to see my call on that website! My chances are very slim but all I can do is try and hope that my (up to) 100w to phased vertical array will make the trip.
I know this is definitely o/t but I think there is quite an interest in this Dxpedition and SOTA has quite a few things in common. Iām certainly not as anxious about the pile up as I might have been without honing my skills in the SOTA pile ups!
73 Colin
If weāre quick we could get Big Ben approved and then get Heard Isl. added to SOTA VK0. 9000 ft climb from sea-level up an active volcano with glaciers and relatively recent lava flowsā¦ trivial!
VK0/HI-001 would be the ref.
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Theyāre QRV!
Working EU on 40m and 30m right now (1740utc)
Hi Colin,
Great site. I can see they are only on 30/40m CW so far working Japan and European Russia/Poland
(1830 UTC). 436 Qs so far.
73 Ed.
Not SOTA. Not SOTA Fun Evenings.
Still a valiant attempt to contrive some sort of tenuous link there Colin
Mickey YYY will probably work it from Gun tomorrow nowā¦
While not SOTA, I think many of us would like a contact with VK0EK.
While propagation at the moment is not great, it looks like the team are concentrating on CW, with 3425 CW contacts as compared to 168 SSB contacts and 225 digital contacts. (this status at 0600 UTC 25/3).
Lets hope that conditions improve next week, so we SSB-only operators with limited antennas have a chance.
73 Ed.
Hi Ed,
I think this thread should be left with its original title. Changing a thread title is only valid when the new title better reflects the intention of the thread. As the vk0ek operation was hardly even dreamt of when this thread originated 8 years ago, shouldnāt the original title be left intact? All recent diversions are off topic.
73 Andrew VK1DA/VK2UH
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Well you can change the name of the island from Heard Island to Worked Island for me. It was the last of the VK DXCC that I needed - I managed to get through a horrendouse 17m pileup last night - YIPPEEEEEEEE.
Matt
VK1MA
Hi Matt,
Congrats on the VK DXCC (is VK DXCC different from a normal DXCC?).
Was that contact on CW? There are only a few SSB contacts so far. There was a message last night that said they were reducing activities for a while in order to get the 80m and 160m antennas up. So Iām hoping that all went well and soon weāll see them back on SSB at some point (mind you the propagation needs to improve as well before I have any chance of a contact).
73 Ed.
Hi Jack
Shall we talk about SOTA instead?
73, Tom M1EYP
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Tom,
I mentioned VK0EK as it was relevant to ham radio and due to my wish to secure a contact with said expedition, I might have been unable to try for a contact with you on your āfun eveningā.
I regard my post as fine, it was about āfun eveningā. I agree that the rest of the posts should be under an 'off topic" thread.
I also think that the activities of SOTA and DXing have lots of similarities and therefore potentially a suitable subject on this reflector.
So yes, I think this thread should return to the subject of āfun eveningsā.
73, Colin
A number of my work colleagues are keen hill walkers.The comment one guy made that is relevant is that with DST beginning itās possible to go hill walking after work. From mid-May to mid-July it never goes dark up here at 56N, just gets to twilight then brighter. (Itās a real pain when you have young kids getting them to bed in the summer as it wont go dark!)
Itās got me into thinking I need to find a local summit that is about 30mins of effort and get out once a week in the evenings. I may even go as far as using fun evenings for just 2m SSB/FM instead of HF.
I used to enjoy the fun evenings. My local summit G/NP-028 is almost visible from my house, the view is blocked by a church. The drive is about 25-30mins across town and the parking area is within the activation zone. The trig point is probably about 30 minutes walk away, the path used to be very boggy but now itās been paved all the way on.
I think I should have a go at some evening āfunā activations. The only problem with Rombalds Moor on an evening is the fact that āundesirablesā use the remote area for, shall we say, āantisocial activitiesā.
Who needs daylight to do SOTA? 
Yeah no probs Colin. It was connected to the SOTA topic, initially as you said.
I disagree on this point. Fair enough if weāre talking about working the DX from an activation, or the DX being SOTA-qualifying, but this quickly drifted into a conversation about chasing DX with no relevance to SOTA.
I donāt mind the off-topic observations within posts and activation reports, in fact I wholeheartedly support them (and do them!!), but this thread had just completely changed from SOTA Fun Evenings to purely about a DXpedition, with no SOTA relevance whatsoever.
Anyway, Tuesday 5th April is a potential target date to really launch SOTA Fun Evenings for the summer of 2016. Iāll be activating, primarily on 2m SSB. Any other takers?