Tom, I just knew I would scroll down and see a post from you making that point. But aren’t you being a bit disingenuous? What percentage (roughly) of those 2m SSB/CW QSOs coincided with a 2m contest that you participated in [using contest exchange rules]?
I know your point [because you make it every time this topic comes up] is that: if you want 2m SSB/CW do a SOTA when e.g. a backpackers contest is on. That’s true and that’s great, and I admire your doing that, and if I got my act together I probably could too.
But [and it’s a big BUT] I think the point (or the question) Christoph is making, why isn’t SSB/CW used on all the other days, like when it’s convenient for me to go hillwalking? Chris, I share your frustration, I think there’s something special about those modes on VHF/UHF. Also, I find it a bit unsatisfying to have to piggyback onto a contest where most of those contesters aren’t interested in SOTA.
Maybe I’m just being nostalgic. One of the ways I got good enough for the Morse Test [back in the 90’s] to get my ‘full’ licence was to have 2m CW QRP QSOs – usually portable – with a second-hand FT290 Mk I.
Anyway, to answer Chris’s question, my favoured cause is the abolition of the Morse Test which allowed Class B [VHF and above only] licensees onto the HF bands. Many old-hands like me noted a huge drop off in CW and SSB on 2m after that time.
Conclusion: 2m SSB/CW modes [outside of contests] has joined the club of ‘minority sports’ where you probably have to arrange QSOs by special means other than relying on alerts & self-spots.
BTW: the exception was the SOTA one-day event(s) a few years ago - organised by Tom I think - promoting the use of lesser-used modes.
And one of those was my first CW contact in over 40 years. I’m sure my keying was pretty ropey but it re-ignited a love for CW that I now get a lot of pleasure from, so it wasn’t a wasted trip at all - thanks David!
Next Tuesday, so tomorrow, Uwe, DK8OA and I will activate the GMA summit DA/NI-380 loc JO42VH. Namely as part of the Nordic Activity Contest starting 18.00 UTC. Maybe we’ll hear each other on 2m SSB.
Not disingenuous at all Andy. The data is the data - and it is true.
Let me flip your question and ask you if SOTA QSOs should only be valued when they occur on a band/mode/time that you wouldn’t normally expect them to succeed?
Let me now answer your question more directly and say that some of them are contest QSOs and some aren’t. The SSB ones probably heavily weighted towards contest QSOs, the CW ones probably slightly in favour of non-contest.
But who cares? They are ALL SOTA activator QSOs and SOTA is always my priority when playing radio from a hilltop.
If Tuesday nights and Saturday/Sunday afternoons are not convenient for you Andy, then all you have to do is choose when IS convenient, post an alert, and a topic on the Reflector to drum up interest. As you mentioned, I’ve done this many times for all sorts of things - 2m CW, SSTV, Datamodes, MS etc.
No one doubts the data is true. It was disingenuous because you just put the data up without explaining the circumstance so many readers might think Chris didn’t have a valid point, whereas as you now say the majority of them - I suspect a large majority - were contest QSOs with you on a SOTA summit. As I said before, there’s nothing wrong with that [in fact it’s great], but your original post, unexplained, was misleading.
No. It would be ridiculous to think that, and I don’t know why you would even pose the question. It’s a red herring.
Chris and I and probably others care that 2m SSB/CW has largely become a contest only thing (which is great for contesters, no problem) rather than a general SOTA thing as it was 20 years ago.
Evenings and weekends are rarely convenient for me. My personal circumstances mean I activate weekday mornings and early afternoons.
I have many times taking my FT817 and 3-el Yagi on local SOTA summits to do 2m CW, SSB and FM [usually in that order], alerting and self-spotting, and rarely got a CW reply and hardly more SSB ones.
Searching the reflector I’m reminded I did participate once in the 2m Backpackers contest in 2021. I had some luck (from G/LD-050). But if I ever got the chance to do it again on a Sunday, I would probably activate from a G/SP summit to be in range of more participants.
To be fair, the G/SP summits are not really condusive to VHF contesting. They tend to have plataeu summits. Obviously a few exceptions such as G/SP-015 and G/SP-017 can be good (as well as easy to carry gear up). For the North-West UK I would say that GW/NW-042, GW/NW-043, GW/NW-044 or GW/NW-051 seem do the best.
This is not to say you wouldn’t do better from an SP summit than G/LD-050. If you do decide to do another one check the multiplier status. If postcodes are a multiplier then stay away from North Wales (or at least the western part). I once did a backpackers from GW/NW-014 many moons ago and every postcode seemed to be LL so my multiplier count was 1
Nostalgia is a dangerous thing. 20 years ago there were 29 activators using 2m SSB in the UK, and 169 activations that included 2m SSB. Of these, only 7 activators recorded 5 or more 2m SSB activations in the year.
20 years ago there were 24 chasers active on 2m SSB in the UK, with 293 chaser QSOs recorded. Of these, only 5 chasers recorded 5 or more 2m SSB QSOs.
This year so far, there has been 49 activators in the UK using 2m SSB, though only 116 activations between them. (My contest-combined activations accounted for only 7 of these BTW). Like in 2003, 7 activators were “regulars” with 5 or more activations on 2m SSB.
This year so far, 59 chasers have recorded SOTA chases on 2m SSB, a total of 168 chaser QSOs. 7 of them did so on 5 or more occasions.
So there’s the hard facts. The number of people participating in SOTA on 2m SSB has actually risen over that 20 year period by a whopping 123%, but the actual amount of activity has diminished by around 38%. Then you bear in mind that we’re only 2/3 of the way through 2023, which suggests that QSO numbers could actually be very similar to 2003 by year’s end. 2m SSB is not a “general SOTA thing” now, nor was it in 2003.
Because I don’t know why you you want to disregard thousands of 2m SSB SOTA activator QSOs because I thought it would be a good idea to activate on that band/mode at times when there was lots of activity across the UK and Europe!
Alerting and self-spotting alone doesn’t cut it when you’re planning something relatively unusual (ie not 40m/20m CW/SSB or 2m FM). You need to get a Reflector discussion going to drum up interest and get enthusiastic people involved. I’m happy to “put my money where my mouth is” on this and set up a SOTA 2m SSB activity session, on a weekday morning - simply as a “proof of concept”.
True, there was a migration to the DC bands, but for several years after the abolition activity on 2m SSB remained reduced but worthwhile, as a DX, contest and SOTA mode. More recently it dropped off the cliff when urban noise levels started to climb into the VHF range. Right now I have S4 noise on 2m SSB, back in the day I was working stations fully R5 with no discernable movement of the S metre, now they may be there but drowned in noise. Efforts to bring back activity on 2m SSB (which would be a good thing IMHO) will be hindered by the noise problem. Fortunately if we get any Es openings the signals will be astrong, possibly S9, so noise wouldn’t be a problem, but I doubt we will see any now before next May.
I grow weary going back and forth with you like this, so this will be my final reply to you on this topic. As in previous debates on this reflector you 1) ignore or don’t counter some specific points I raise and 2) you persist in misrepresenting what I said.
e.g. “Because I don’t know why you you want to disregard thousands of 2m SSB SOTA activator QSOs because I thought it would be a good idea to activate on that band/mode at times when there was lots of activity across the UK and Europe!”
I already told you twice, I DON’T think that, in fact, I said it was fine. Please stop making this strawman argument.
If you re-read my post you’ll see I spoke of nostalgia of the 1990’s 2m scene [pre SOTA].
In this comparison you haven’t controlled for confounding factors: the SOTA programme was only about a year old in 2003 with a small ‘membership’ whereas it must be much larger [in the UK] in 2023. A more valid comparison would be to contrast the percentage of 2003 vs 2023 2m QSOs that were SSB or CW.
On a more positive note:
I should be pleased if you did that and, depending on the date / my diary commitments I would try to participate like I did last time you arranged such an event.
I think that’s pretty much what I said - “after a time”.
There’s a negative feedback loop (with a time constant of a few years): many Class B licensees migrate to HF bands for richer pastures … 2m SSB activity drops a bit … 2m SSB ops find fewer contacts … more 2m-to-HF migration … and so on.
That BTW, was the first mention anyone made of “20 years ago” - it was you Andy, and that was the reason I made those 2003 v 2023 comparisons.
This is a valid point. I’ve even acknowledged myself that the actual activity has slightly dropped despite the number of 2m SSB UK participants more than doubling. There is also a valid reason why I chose not to “control for confounding factors” - and that’s explained well by Brian @G8ADD in his latest post. Nonetheless, the activity is definitely there, and there is potential for much more if any of us wants to make it happen.
BTW, back in the noughties, my interest in Tuesday evening VHF contesting was sparked by Paul @G4MD 's proposal/concept of “SOTA Fun Evenings”. These tended to be split between 2m FM and 2m SSB and were popular. The tradition lives on, and in the summer months there can be 4 or 5 SOTA activations combining with a UK Activity Contest.
The main reason, however, that I didn’t compare the proportions of 2m activity that was SSB vs FM between 2003 and 2023, was that wouldn’t have answered your charge of “Chris and I and probably others care that 2m SSB/CW has largely become a contest only thing (which is great for contesters, no problem) rather than a general SOTA thing as it was 20 years ago.” in a mathematically valid manner. As you can see in the 2023 figures, only a tiny proportion of the 49 participating 2m SSB UK activators are doing so in conjunction with a contest. In fact, the proportion would have been greater in 2003, ironically enough!
I keep threatening to relaunch the “2m Multimode Saturdays” thing - but still trying to identify a free Saturday to do so. Looking at my upcoming work schedule, I think it will have to be 2m Multimode Fridays - does that work for you (or anyone else)?
And where would the fun be in that? You know we need to have a discussion on here first before doing anything
In all seriousness, I think the point being made was that if one was to solely concentrate on SSB/CW VHF/UHF activation, there could be a risk of not qualifying the summit. Personally, if I am wanting to concentrate on 2m SSB I would be taking the 9element beam and associated masts and hardware. There wouldn’t be a lot of space/weight left for backup antennas.
It’s a bit of a circular argument really. There are no activators on 2M ssb/cw since there are no chasers on 2m ssb/cw since there are no activators in 2M ssb/cw.
Discussions like this, do help to raise the profile to the point that a set of people will decide - ‘lets do this on this day’ thus making it worthwhile for activators and chasers to make the effort. There will then be more activations for a short while till interest wanes. After a short while again, a discussion topic will pop up similar to this one and round we go again.
Personally, I would attempt to join in with any kind of activity session, but like others that are restricted in how often they can get out I couldn’t guarantee participation. Hence, I probably would look at contest days as the best bet for success.
I don’t want to post a list of inconvenient dates. Being retired I can generally do most weekdays during the day. Put another way, I usually can’t do SOTA in the evenings or at weekends.
But I don’t want to make this a Tom & Andy thing but something many could participate in - that would be more fun. I suggest Tom that you put out a few dates and see if we can drum up others from the reflector.
It goes further. There is no activity (of any sort) on 2m SSB because there is nobody on 2m SSB to work. There is nobody on 2m SSB to work because there is no activity to attract them. There is little activity around here even on 2m FM, the repeaters are the only activity for much of the day, and all they do is pop out a callsign on CW occasionally. You do get the occasional ragchew but most channels are dead. The urge to operate for the sake of operating has receded, and few operators even take advantage of major tropo events, the urge to work DX has almost gone. In the past there were people listening and waiting all the time, the calling channel was monitored and a lift was pounced on, a Scottish-type aurora was announced by the beacon going tone A and immediately there was activity, even on phone. When the sporadic E reached two metres there were plenty of people waiting eagerly to take advantage of it, now its just a few die-hard enthusiasts. I listened for CW activity during the Perseid meteor shower, there was some high speed CW (far too fast for me!) but it was a mere shadow of what it had been a couple of decades ago.
Its easy to describe the symptoms but hard to prescribe a cure. I’m not even sure that a cure is needed. Time has moved on and there is no longer any enthusiasm for the things that once got us worked up, and the occasional burst of induced activity won’t change that. Possibly an official challenge might change things, at least for the duration of the challenge, but I think that the change would be at best superficial. You can’t cross the same river twice.
I’d be interested in a 2m SSB/CW activity session. It would make me finish off the Moxon I started on ages ago (pre-Covid) but never got to work. I bought a nanoVNA partly for this project and have used it to test many homebrew filters and amplifiers but never the Moxon.
It would need to be a Thursday or Friday morning as that is when I can usually get out. Friday would probably be limited to G/NP-028 but on Thursday I could drive to a better summit.
It is just happened I’ve started my SOTA activations on VHF FM and I am still carrying on that way. Although 2m FM works great for me both terrestrial and satellite the only reason I am not trying VHF CW/SSB is that I don’t have all mode radio As soon I get my hands on one I would no doubt will be active on 144.300 and .050 (although likely just speaking with myself )
I might well take my FT817 and aluminium 4 ele Yagi out for an SSB / CW activity session, but not on a regular basis.
If someone cleverer than me produces a design for an inexpensive light weight 2m radio in an Altoids tin or simillar, then I think there will be a resurgance of interest…
You know we need to have a discussion on here first before doing anything