I woke up at 0530z and my knees seemed to still be working after a running race last night so grabbed my bag and headed out to a nearby summit.
Wx started off ok but after setting up it became drizzly so everything got a bit wet.
Bands seemed a bit dead: self spotted on 20m but got no takers. @SV2CNE was coming through strong to me but he didn’t seem to be able to hear me calling with my 40W.
VI10SOTA was the only dx station I worked, although I heard @ZL1TM working someone before fading out. Couldn’t hear any other summits.
Just about scraped 4 contacts in 30 minutes. Hopefully things will be better later, and hopefully the heavy rain will clear soon so I can head back out.
That was fun (apart from the 0500 alarm call and the initial move out of the covers).
A bit drizzly but not too cold (about 5C at the car). Thick mist though throughout the walk and activation. I saw 3 deer on the way up. They must have been so shocked at this damp, wrapped up, 2-legged apparition carrying a fishing rod that they didn’t bother running away and just watched me watch them.
I decided to deploy the tarp for this one, not the easiest location, but I was quite comfortable inside with a chair and even a table for the radio! Heavy pack though .
Quality not quantity - 4 VK S2S (my worries about the homemade but untested 20m vertical proved unfounded). Also heard VK3??? From VK3/VE-060 working a German station, but couldn’t track him down. VK7HCK was also booming in, but I didn’t bother trying to crack his pileup.
I also heard @SV2CNE loud and clear, but he didn’t hear me.
And the cafe was open for breakfast on my descent
Not great conditions here, wx or rx unfortunately. I got on summit early (forgot about the hour difference), got the ariel up before the rain, then 3 hrs of rain and drizzle and fog and wind. Lovely. Poor radio conditions too. Only 20 odd QSO’s in 3 hrs activity. At least I got a few S2S to ZL and VK, but nothing to Japan. They seem to have clustered on 15m. Nothing heard above 20m here. I was obviously too early for the sensible EU operators who stayed in bed with very little local activity heard. I had to stop as I was just frozen and my fingers stopped working.
Thanks to those who made it through. Can we do another one in August or something, when the wx is a bit more amenable ?
Thanks for all the S2S today 15 in total.
Also worked my first ever VE station from a summit he was not on SOTA but had a chat for a while. Then back into the bedlam.
It pays every now and then to hold up the mob and ask any S2S I got 3 extras that way I would not have heard them other wise.
Couple ops blasting through no matter what but they never got a score from me.
Great day out testing the skills and I must say my new end fed I made 3 turns primary 18 turns secondary worked a treat. Half way between inverted L and inverted V kinda sorta. Best config for the bushes available to tie off too.
Regards all thanks for the QSO S2S or QRM!
Ian vk5cz …
The weather here is really terrible… so I chose a summit where I had at least some protection by a shelter.
I was in time and had everything set up… KX2, MX-P50M, Endfed… but then I had trouble. It took me a while to figure out what the problem was. A defective BNC connector (I had such problems the other day - I must have got a bad series) I will replace all connectors of this type.
So I rebuilt everything and used the vertical with single radial on the tuner of the KX2… and unfortunately no PA.
Unfortunately the wind knocked down the telecopic mast 2 times… but it is not broken.
After 2.5 hours I was totally frozen, have removed everything with clammy fingers and am home under the hot shower.
I had a good morning on G/NP-028. The weather was overcast but dry. There was a cold north wind though. This also meant that planes from Leeds Bradford Airport were flying close to me which sometimes made it difficult to hear callers.
I was set up with my homebrew CW rig and 20m GP on a 10m Sotabeams pole just after my alerted time of 0600Z. A CQ immediately brought an S2S with @SV2NCH/P plus another Greek station. No more response though (or maybe I gave up due to QRM). I tuned around and heard VK2WP quite weak on a summit. I tried calling but with no luck. I found a new frequency for CQ and got a couple more in the log. I went back to VK2WP’s frequency and he was getting stronger peaking at 599 at 0640. Ten minutes later we had an S2S - he was down a bit but still a strong signal.
I called CQ again and got S2S with @VK2IO/P and @ZL3GA. I also had a few more S2S with EU stations. At 0742Z I decided to do something I rarely do and get out the FT817 for SSB. I got S2S with VI10SOTA plus a few more EU.
I tried 15m as a number of Japanese stations had spotted there. I heard a couple very weakly and did try to call but with no luck.
On 20m I had a QSO with Phil @G4OBK who is 75km away so probably ground wave. But his signal was very raspy. Could this be some sort of auroral effect or was his signal also getting to me long path? I did notice a similar effect on a few other EU stations early this morning.
In total I had 31 QSOs with 14 S2S over 4 hours including 3 with VK and 1 with ZL. It was good to get special event stations VI10SOTA and SP15OTA.
Great signal in VK6, really happy to get you in the log, the antenna is doing a fine job. We managed to get 7 S2S contacts and 38 S2S points. You were the only European SOTA Summit station worked.
Beni @HB9HNT and I decided to camp on the summit of Salmone HB/TI-141 for the occasion. During the evening we got a few NA stations in the log (unfortunately no S2S). It was a clear night and pretty cold, with temperatures just below freezing. But it was totally worth it, given the VK/ZL S2S galore the next morning!
I bagged S2S with three different ZL summits (one of them, ZL3/CB-806, was even a complete for me, at a distance of some 18’700 km), and six VK summits.
In fact, today I got my first S2S with ZL, which I never managed during previous iterations of the QSO party (while VK always worked). Conditions on 20m were very good between ZL and HB today; the band was already open at 04:45z and remained so for several hours, with mostly good 559 to 579 signals.
JA summits were not heard here for the longest time; some weak signals appeared on 15m around 07:00z, but I couldn’t get through.
Setup here: trap vertical antenna made by @LB8CG, two elevated radials, 10m pole, KX2, 40 W amp.
We definitely had a great time - and a pretty cold night. I made my first ever DX contact to the US when we operated in the evening after the snowfall stopped - I mean who could resist to get that 3 points of winter bonus in before midnight.
In the morning I made my first DX contacts to ZL and VK. Since I operated on SSB it was a bit harder for me than for @HB9DQM to get that contacts in (without implying CW is easy… )
I was looking at the possibilities of working VK6 from home, and tried listening for you both long- and short-path, but I think, looking at your log, I might just have been a minute or two too late to catch you. However, checking VOACAP’s forecast, south-west WA doesn’t get the same sort of long-path 20 metres window to Europe as te eastern side of the continent. Of course, that’s not exactly un-surprising given the size of Australia. At present there does seem to be a bit of a long-path window, but on 17 metres around 1000z.
For me, this morning’s highlight was chasing some JA summits from home, short-path on 15 metres CW.
Thanks for the S2Ss team. Dave (ZL3DRN) and I had a great time. It was Dave’s first time running an EU pileup so I just sat back and enjoyed the show for a lot of the time! Impressive conditions and a great site at our end - zero noise and an unobstructed sea takeoff to the South East LP. We used the KX2/KXPA100 (at 50W) combo to a 20m 1/2 Square.
Thanks for all the fun, I look forward to the next one.
73,
Geoff ZL3GA
I was able to join in the party from vk3/ve-060, White Timber which was a new unique for me.
As a member of the group based at Mt Hotham, Victoria for the weekend, I had activated two other summits earlier in the day.
I found conditions on 20m chaotic and it was hard to make much progress on ssb, but on CW I made a good number of contacts, including one with EA2BD Ignacio, which I was very happy with. Overall I made 45 contacts for the activation.
At 0500 I had to close down because sunset was at 0600 and I had to drive for 90 minutes to reach the dinner venue at Mt Hotham. I wanted to be out of the forest before sunset, for safety reasons. I think the conditions were good enough that another hour would have netted another 40 or 50 contacts.
Thanks for all the contacts, with these conditions we should do this more often!
73 Andrew VK1DA/VK2DA
Martino IU2IJW and me have decided to partecipate at Spring party. After having reached Mt Tesoro I/LO-222 at 6:15utc, we organized to work with two different stations: with the help of Martino I installed an hentenna for 15mt realized the day before. Which better antenna for attempt to contact Japanes stations of not that an antenna invented by three Japanes OMs in 1970!!
With vna of Martino we tuned the antenna for swr 1:1 at 21Mhz. Martino, thanks for your precious help. I started to call in cw, one of first spot on rbn was in China, I hoped to appear in some spots on Japan, but it was not so.
I looked for s2s when I heard some Japanese activators calls with workable signals among which @JI3BAP and @JA5QJX, I sent some times my callsign and “s2s” but they didn’t hear me. I tried also with an unusual Canadian station but nothing to do. I returned to call. I started to log some stations: the first Japan station It was @7M4QZE/p from ja/st018, I worked asiatic Russia ua9cdc, and the last dx jh1mxv.
After four hours I passed in qrt with 10 qsos in 15mt and 2 qsos in 12mt.
It was a great fun!
Many thanks at All
Arigato
Arrived at the summit, I/LO-286 Monte Altino around at 06.15 UTC. 7 S2S in 20 meters with 5 w and my quarter wave vertical (5 VK, 2 ZL, all CW except for VI10SOTA). Strong signals from Pacific, then also 4 qsos with VK and ZL chasers. Unfortunately a lot of QRM on qsos with stations operating from WWFF areas. As always unfortunately the usual zoo. Anyway, a lot of fun! Thanks to chasers and activators!
73 Fabio
Nice to work you S2S on 20m I think you were on 15m also but not sure. The band was fading to EU by the end of my time.
Sure was fun to test the skills in a pile up again, you had a good signal when in the clear HI. Regards
Ian vk5cz …
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with very little local activity heard. I had to stop as I was just frozen and my fingers stopped working.
