Almost exactly a year ago I had a new hip fitted and although I’ve been reasonably active in POTA this year I have not done any serious SOTA summits other than G/DC-008 which is only a gentle short walk.
To mark the first anniversary of the operation I tackled the tallest summit we have down here in Devon and Cornwall, G/DC-001 High Willhays.
To keep the weight of my pack down I took a 60m-15m QMX and a Yaesu FT-65 HT. Mast was a 6m carbon pole and this supported EFHW antenna which are all homemade and cover 40m to 15m. These are fed through a homemade 64:1 Unun.
I normally set up on the east side of the summit but today the wind was coming from the east so I found a sheltered spot on the west side. There was a moderate breeze blowing but it did nothing to clear the air - I was in low cloud the whole time.
I opened on 40m SSB and had a 57 report from Ken G0FEX who said my audio was very clear, “punchy” was the term he used.
I than had two difficult QSOs with operators in West Wales who gave me reports like 32. This was followed by a much clearer QSO with Richard M1AOB.
A change to 20m brought 3 more QSOs with good reports and no comments about the audio. I can only assume there might have been some sort of propagation anomaly around the W stations.
I finished on 2m FM and had a chat with Don G0RQL Damian M0BKV and Richard M1AOB.
So what did I learn today? Firstly, the hip will outlive me I think, it worked perfectly today. This was the first real trial of the QMX with SSB and I was very impressed. My EFHW antennas need a bit of work though. The problem is they are of course all different lengths and as moving the mast was difficult because of the terrain it meant having to change operating position when changing bands. I could of course use a random wire and a tuner but I would like to give resonant antenna a good trial first. The solution will be to alter the antenna so the distance from the Unun to the top of the mast is the same with each band using cord to extend the higher band antenna. I want to add a 60m antenna to the set so that will be the longest and then alter all the others so match the 60m distance which will of course be something like 15m.
I saw you were operating today too but you were on 2m at the time and I was on HF. I doubt I could have reached you from Devon on 2m. It might have been worth a try but the HT was buried in the rucksack at the time.
That’s the exact setup I’ve settled on. Very pleased with it so far.
Great news - you’ll be amased with what you can do with replacement hips these days. Game changing for health and fitness. Staying active is the best thing anybody can do, no matter the age.
And a perfect summit to give your new gear (hip included) a thorough test - a lovely place to be.
Likewise - I was pleased with my maiden activations. I believe I can still tweak the mic settings, but I’d need to test it with a static station who has the time/patience to help me get it spot on.
I personally won’t be using 60m (licensing limitation + extra wire to consider), but I’d be keen to know your solution for future reference.
Thank you, I’m not sure how often I will need 60m but as the QMX can do it I suppose I need to give it an airing at least once. I’ll just go for a straight bit of wire. I know you could make it shorter adding a coil but I want to keep it simple.
Glad to see you back on the hills John. Good work with the QMX. I have just completed a modified high band one - not yet debugged!
I was very fortunate that Hans released the ssb firmware in time for our trip to GM in May - I was already considering the dreadful possibility of 3 weeks SOTA at 3wpm and wondering if RBN would work at that speed. My 60-15m QMX is proving excellent in use with either my old linked dipole for 60m and (sometimes ) 40 & 20m or my newer EFHW for 40m which also works with no ATU on 20m and 15m. It now has 533 ssb QSOs in the log, mostly 40m and 20m as I only use the very long 60m wire on hills with nice easy ground - otherwise I find it heavy and prone to get embedded in banks of heather.
Rod, thank you. Very interesting to hear you’ve been using the 40m EFHW for 20m and 15m. I hadn’t thought of that but now I remember this can be done so I must give it a try. I’ve made seperate antenna for those bands so if I don’t need them I can reduce weight and bulk further.
