Love your setup and choices. Would be great if you could dispense with the pole. Are most of your summits void of trees?
Hi Pedro,
You are right on this: output power may get reduced as the activation goes on and the battery empties.
I don’t have any means to measure my output power while activating other than the theoretical values 5, 2.5, 1, 0.5 output power level selected on my FT-817ND rig.
Congrats because your signal sounded nice with your 3watts the other day and I heard you working some DX from North America.
Best 73 de Guru
Hi John, glad this attracts you. I have never used a tree to activate before. In most of the summits I climbed so far there wasn’t any, and I always carry a 5m pole with me.
If you want to activate on a summit with trees that’s fine and you get rid of the pole so that you can take other gear in exchange…
73 de Ignacio
Like the look of your gear. I have a similar setup. The key component is the MTR radio.
I have activated summits with this equipment. Current Hardware;
KD1JV MTR v2
Pico Paddle
LNR EFT with 7m of RG174 Coax using a SotaBeams winder.
850mAh lipo
brings the hardware to around 500g.
Add to that a mini pole and notebook (170 + 230) to bring the total to 900 grams
https://vk3hra.wordpress.com/2015/10/12/sub-600g-sota-station/
still have to carry jacket, 2l water and first aid kit but the sub 1K radio station is a reality.
Allen
VK3ARH
Still tinkering with my gear currently .22kg over the limit for CW only, i will also be bringing a Handheld for 2m FM not included in the weight.
Setup at the moment- mtr with a linked dipole for 40/30/20 bands and a 4m telescopic pole.
Hope your plans are all going well.
73
Graeme
2 Likes
Managed to thin my equipment and drop a few pounds of my gear, listed the weight below along with the changes made. I was lucky with work sending me to GW/NW-062 Hope Mountain for a fault and it was a quick dash up to the summit for a test of my equipment prior to setting of for home.
I now have a spare linked dipole for 20/30/40 made with DX UL wire and has only a 1m length of rg174 with a female bnc connector free to good home if anyone would like it.
Total Weight 873g CW only
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238g - Antenna system linked dipole for 17/20/30/40m bands, includes 3 pegs cut in half and thinner para cord, lighter wire and I used cable ties to join the links together. (used new nail clippers for a smooth cut on the cable ties)
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141g - MTR with dc cable, made myself a 1 amp fused cable with powerpole connectors.
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073g - Battery 750mAH rhino battery.
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009g - Log book consists of 4 sheets of write in the rain and 2 pencils.
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027g -Pico key and cable.
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013g - Earphones.
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372g - Antenna pole, I was using a 6m telescopic pocket pole that weighed over 500g but realised my 5m normal type was lighter with the end section removed
Not part of the weight that I have built from a highlander mess kit into storage box/flight deck weighs in at 191g.
1 Like
Fantástic!!!
Congrats
Ready to go
73 de Ignacio
For those who don’t have it written on their calendars the SOTA miniimum weight activation weekend starts a week from today. I’m getting closer but still overweight for the (SSB) set-up. If I could find a site where I don’t need the fishing pole mast, but can use something local for antenna support, I might just squeeze under the 1.5 kilos.
Ed.
Hello Ed,
I think you probably are already within the limits.
Don’t get confused: for a SSB station it is 2,5 kg:
CW only: maximum weight = 1 kilo (1 kilo = 2,2 pounds = 35,3 ounces)
SSB only: maximum weight = 2,5 kilo (2 kilo = 5,5 pounds = 88,25 ounces)
Mixed CW & SSB: maximum weight = 2,5 kilo
All details, scheduled activators and comments and results in the Event, here:
73 de Ignacio
Tested my kit on Tuesday on G/CE-001. All up weight was 901gms including the 5m travel pole.
I can shave quite a bit off that. I’ll use my titanium tent pegs, shorter guy lines, lighter and shorter feeder and shorter pencil with tiny notepad 
6 Likes
AH! OK - rechecking …
Tnx Ed.
UPDATE - 2.5 kilo exactly without the mast 3.1 KG with it. But nothing can go wrong - no tools no first aid kit, no warm gloves, no spare battery, no SOTA flag, no ground pegs for the antenna cords. I had to even take the FT-817 out of it’s leather case to get down to these values!
2.5Kilo kit is:
FT-817 with internal LIPO
SOTABeams 80-20m linked dipole with 80m section removed
Log book
Pens
Microphone
Small in ear earphones
Camera bag.
That shelter (half Tee-Pee) looks interesting, where did you find it?
73, Colin G8TMV
Colin it’s the little UST Tarp.
It’s been discussed here before.
I am finally putting together a short video about it.
Hopefully it will be available in a couple of days (if I can find some time to edit it)
Here are the previous answers:
Ready to go for next weekend at approx 960grs…
Setup
MTR2 v2 30-20-17m
4 band EFHW
5m pole
1000mAh 3S lipo
System budget
battery + lead 126gr
radio 122gr
iHeadphones 12gr
notebook+pen 20gr
key 58gr
pole 370gr
tuner 80gr
4 band linked EFHW + winder 154gr
pole velcro straps 20gr E
Some further savings possible if I leave the 40m wire element out and were to optimised other bits…
73 Angel
3 Likes
Hi Pete,
just found on youtube your nice evening flight video with your new Hubsan.
Now eagerly waiting for your next SOTA activation video, filmed from a bird’s eye view 
73 Stephan, DM1LE
Just been in to my local Lidl store and purchased two stunt kites at £3.99 each, good value surprisingly as it comes with 50m high quality kite string with winders. May be also of interest to anyone else building an antenna, the second kite is for the kids.
73
Graeme
Angel, Since I have worked hard for several years to get the weight of my HF system down, I wanted to toss out a comparison to what you are doing (which is very very good!)
Set up:
MTR2 v3
5M pole
350 mAH 3S liPO
System weight…
feedline none
battery 40g
earbuds 12g
pen/log 8g
radio 122g
paddle 18g
tuner 12g
5M pole 210g
pole velcro none
20/30/40 ant 72g
TOTAL 494g
I like to think of my system as “Ultra-Lyte.” The heaviest item is the pack itself. I have a very light runners’ pack, itself just ten ounces, and I use that when I need to carry water. If the trek is less than two or three hours round trip, and weather is not too hot, I can carry my set-up in my pockets and forget the pack as well.
73, Fred KT5X (aka WS0TA)
1 Like
12gr??? DIY?
Im adding up my weights lately and my KX3 setup +etc is 2.1kg (can go down to 1.8k but not less I think)
Hi all,
is it including the shelter, water, fire and food? 
Are somewhere complete rules please? .pdf? Tnx Petr OK1RP