145 Alive *30th September* 2023

Good to see the event growing. Ill be on Kerloch GM/ES-059

Not sure which radio I’ll take, possibly just a hand held with a decent antenna up a mast.

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Next 145 Alive is this Saturday 30/09/23 13:00 to 15:00 and also a SOTA event on the 7th October for those interested

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Well it looks like the entire Aberdeenshire gang will be on summits tomorrow afternoon.
@GM4JXP Craiglich
@2M0WNA Hill of Fare
@MM0RFN Carn mor Earn
@MM0EFI Kerloch

145 Alive in The Shire. :smiley:

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If I can get the logistics to work, I’ll try and catch you from Creag Bheag GM/CS-111 tomorrow.
Andy
MM7MOX

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Hoping to take a stroll up GM/SS-277 (TP4941) for this event. 2m handheld into a small amp (20w) connected to a flowerpot antenna on a 7m mast.

73
Andy
GM6ZAK

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Just to clarify:
1300-1500 BST
1200-1400 UTC

Sounds like a mini GM 2m summit party is in the making.

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I was pleased to catch you on 2m today Fraser. I only got 3 qso’s on 2m today but that is the first time for that hill, it seems to be a 2m black spot.
I went on to HF and got another dozen qso’s including N4EX in N Carolina and a smattering into Europe including s2s to OE/HB9GVW/p on OE/TI-358.
It got quite cold but at least the visibility stayed good for me, it looked misty and a bit driech to the South.
Thanks for organising the net.
Andy
MM7MOX

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Andy, I didn’t realise where GM/CS-111 was until I got home. I am actually surprised your waves made it over the high Cairngorms from Kingussie to Aberdeenshire. There was a lot of granite between us. Only three on 2m is probably three more than most folk will do from there.

Glad you made up for it with some dx. :slightly_smiling_face:

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I was thinking the same. I liked the comment “a bit driech” because as I drove to and from the vaccination centre that was well South of you, , yes flu and COVID jab time again, it was absolutely pishing down. :wink:

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It was fair weather in Aberdeenshire today, but poor wx forecast to move over later, so I abandoned plans to work half of the UK from GM/ES-001 Ben Macdui and plumped for GM/ES-059 Kerloch instead, with its superb take off down the east coast and over the North Sea.

Tricky running a 2 m net when you really don’t know how to run a net, and when you’re on a dividing ridge line, with stations to the north and south. I formulated a plan on the way up. I’d work the Shire summits, get them to work one another and the get them all to call CQ in turn. Then I’d do the same for the stations south of me…

…except @G4YSS (GM4YSS) broke in from GM/CS-001 Ben Lawyers and scuppered that plan (happily!). Well done John and thanks for your patience up there.

We all worked him and went back to plan. I was scribbling down callsigns as I heard them. I brought in GM4YSS and then @GM6ZAK to work pileups, because I guessed they were getting cold. Kind of forgot about @MM7MOX but he was patiently listening. Thanks Andy.

Anyway, long story short. Everyone (all 20+ stations) got a chance to call CQ and see who they could work. Many were delighted to see so many SOTA guys out today, as was I. I worked six summits in all.

First prize has to go to @GM4JXP Simon, who was probably 20 miles NE of me and on a lower summit. With a bit of encouragement and patience he managed to work just about everyone, all the way down to Falkirk and Edinburgh, which was just superb. @2M0WNA Mike wasn’t so lucky though from nearby Hill of Fare. 2m is a strange animal.

@MM0RFN was late to the party from Carn Mor Earn, but made a few contacts in between the GB3AG repeated going off in his ear! He was also using his club call MS0SCZ just to confuse everyone.

Thankfully the net dried up 90 minutes in, as I was getting cold, with 7°C summit temperature.

A great afternoon and it just shows how well 2 m works for SOTA if only people were listening.


Ready for 145 Alive

Unusual SOTA radio? Grabbed it because I’d removed it from the Land Rover. Did a good job with a 4200 mAh LiFePO4 and the Slim G.

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@2M0WNA Mike wasn’t so lucky though from nearby Hill of Fare. 2m is a strange animal.”

A great event in north-east Scotland, expertly managed from Kerloch GM/ES-059 by Fraser @MM0EFI. I was quite pleased with my four S2S contacts from Hill of Fare GM/ES-070, esp as I was using only 6w from my FT818 into a small hand-held 2-el Yagi. Best for me was about 85 miles into the south of Edinburgh to work Chris @MM0UHR and about 65 miles to John @GM4YSS on Ben Lawers GM/CS-001. Was great to hear so many other stations on the band, although I couldn’t work them all. Thanks to everyone for a fun afternoon. 73 Mike


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I picked GM/CS-111 as my summit for the day for a number of reasons.

  1. No previous 2m activity so a day with lots of 2m action seemed like the best chance.
  2. It was north of where the rain front was predicted to be as Andy MM0FMF confirmed.(I had enough of wet weather last Sunday on GM/WS-319, Auchtertyre hill and riding my bike home on Monday through a monsoon.)
  3. I could walk it from the railway station at Kingussie. ( I didn’t factor in Hearts playing Caley Thistle, or the Inverness marathon, so the train was packed !)
  4. I wanted to hopefully qso with some of the operators I spoke to in May on my tour of summits in Sutherland.
    The train back south was quiet so I was able to sit and upload my log.

Andy
MM7MOX

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[quote=“MM0EFI, post:50, topic:31823”]
First prize
[/quote]. Thanks for running the show Fraser and I’ll credit my yagi for the QSO success story.

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Anyone know when the next 145 Alive event is planned?

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Today.

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You’re kidding me?! I was just reading about the one in September and wondering if there would be another one planned? Or are you only kidding? Lol

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No, that’s too much of a coincidence surely :rofl: I’ve been monitoring 145.500 all day and there was not a sausage

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That’s probably because all of the net controllers were using different frequencies and none of them were 145.500MHz. If you’d scanned around you would have probably found the NE England net.

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Ah ok… thanks for the heads up. I generally only have the calling channels and local repeaters on memory scan as normally that’s where activity starts before QSY and if I were to leave the whole band scanning it would take so long that it would more often than not miss a call on a more generally agreed calling frequency. Didn’t know anything about it today, I never saw any publicity for it :slightly_frowning_face:

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There is a facebook group. I didn’t take part in this one, however I’ll post the frequencies on here next time.

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