Wow what a week and this evening was a culmination to finish off the week of long path propagation across Europe.
From Mt Ainslie VK1/AC-040, 81 QSOs on 20m from 0530 to 0720 UTC. My equipment: FT-857 at 25 watts, inverted V linked dipole with the apex at ~7m and an 8Ah LIFEPO4 battery.
The summit is public access and as you can see from the photos there isn’t space for a 20m 1/4 wave ground plane, hence my only option was to deploy a 20m inverted V half-wave dipole. The inverted V antenna didn’t let me down!
A Summit to Summit QSO with Fraser MM0EFI/P at GM/ES-068. Thanks Fraser for a new GM summit, your signal was strong to me!
Edit - Also two mobile stations worked: PD2GCM/M and DF4TD/M. I am confident this is the first time I have worked two mobile callsigns in Europe from a VK1 summit. How good is that!?
I have lost track of the number of countries worked, however I think Malta and Ireland are new for me, there may be others. Please feel free to browse through my log below:
Mt Ainslie summit VK1/AC-040. Edit: Inverted V dipole is broadside North-South with the elements running East-West. It’s a restricted space therefore there is little I can do to change the set up.
Mt Ainslie is a recognised WWFF Nature Reserve, I will submit the VKFF log file separately to the VK1 VKFF representative.
Happy to leave the weekend to other VK activators, good luck to all chasers and activators. I trust the current long path conditions will continue over the weekend.
Brilliant to get you in the log Andrew. Well done to you and the rest of the VK & ZL crew for getting up hills this past week and providing about as much RF fun as you can get!
Marcin started early in the morning. He called you from Polish sq9ita / p only qrp but you were 55. unfortunately no big antenna from my friends helped. again dx = selfishness. maybe another time
sq9mdf
Ironically, I couldn’t get through to you for a S2S contact on 20M.
I could hear you, but I was obviously drowned out by the amazing signals coming in from EU.
I also managed a S2S with Fraser… thanks!
My set-up was almost identical to yours…linked dipole, 7M squid pole, 8Ah LIFEPO4 battery, FT-897D radio (the 897D and 857D have the same boards). I was running 20 watts.
At times it was difficult to find a clear frequency on 20M there was so much activity.
I hope to activate another VK3 summit over the weekend.
The temptation to work another GM summit S2S is too much. I will activate a VK1 summit from 0530 UTC Sunday to 0710 UTC. Sunset is 0730 UTC and the ambient temp drops very quickly this time of year.
Folks in VK, how about activating a couple more VK peaks?
The VK space weather forecast is indicating enhanced propagation conditions for Saturday. There doesn’t appear to be any sign of degraded conditions in the next 48 hours.
Wish I’d stayed on my summit for last night - but it was about 3 degrees at 4pm (good hard frost here, 1000m below, this morning) and the idea of hanging around another 1.5hrs for the beginning of the opening didn’t appeal. I really do need to toughen-up before winter!
However, did manage to work TM15IF from the caravan on 14.310 / F/PO-207 with armchair copy. Didn’t get the operator’s personal call, but thanks for that, whoever you were! My first F summit.
And I now know what Fraser MM0EFI sounds like. Sadly it was a 1-way only QSO with my 20w from a valley-floor camp apparently insufficient, So still have not got a Scottish summit in the log. Maybe tonight?!
Alert in for 6pm on ZL3/CB-451 - the 6-pointer photographed in my earlier post. Here’s hoping for a warmer evening!
Andrew, I was at qth last night & heard you work your way through the pile up. Well done. I went up to 10M & worked a VK3 on digi, then we both changed to ssb & then moved to 12M. 58 both ways on 12M & 55 on 10M ssb. CW wasn’t an option. I don’t know if you have those bands but just food for thought.
Rick
That was chaos. Sorry to all who didn’t get through. The combination of double-ups and the wind (45km/h on arrival, 70km/h+ on departure) howling overhead made for very difficult copy. Thankfully someone has built a small shieling - that UK style circular stone wall shelter - on the summit. The first I’ve encountered in NZ. So was able to lie down and be out of the wind, but the noise was horrendous!
A real climb this time after the easy bumps and lumps I’ve been activating so far for these ZL-EU contacts. Defined by at least a 1000m climb, and this one came in at +1012m from carpark to summit.
53 contacts all up. One summit to summit with DL3EC - thanks again! All over Europe, a good complement of ZLs and VKs, and one US station.
Apologies to the 2nd attempted summit to summit. Your signal was there for one letter gone for the next. Very rapid QSB if QSB it was. I’d catch one or 2 letters each call, but could never work out what order they all went in. Thanks for all the attempts though - you get the prize for perseverance…
Will go through the logs in the morning and see where you were all from!
Shower, dinner and bed is all I’m up for right now.
Many thanks, that was me as F/M0WIV/P calling from FL/NO-087. Your signal was very clear, 55 to 57. The summit I was on is low (330m) and rounded so not the best take-off. I was using a dipole running N to S and 10W from an IC-705. But even just to be heard in ZL is a first for me. I will indeed persevere and may try again tomorrow after checking the speech compressor settings, which are not optimal I think.
