Gents,
If I use a digital mode in the field I concentrate on FT8 - I don’t like many of the other modes. It is efficient and there is enough to do in the field without pecking away at a tiny keyboard for the whole of the QSO. If you use scripts and macros then why not the FT8 format?
There are occasions when I do call on the same frequency as the target station. This is usually when I have failed to make a contact using another frequency and his string of chasers has diminished.
FT8 is not my preferred activation mode as the pool of contacts seems no larger than the CW pool here in VK.
I use FT4 on 6 m sometimes as signals are often strong but don’t last for long.
If it’s radio, it’s radio. If I’m licensed to use the mode and it’s valid for SOTA, it’s definitely “real”.
I enjoy activating with a wide variety of modes. I activate regularly with CW, SSB, FT8, FT4 and FM. Occasionally I also activate with SSTV, MSK144, PSK31, PSK63, RTTY, JT65. It’s all good, and they all facilitate my information being passed through the ether. So they’re all real radio!
Anyway, a while back, the Moderator banned “Mode-snobbery” - so be careful
Yes let’s not start a mode snobbery contest. It’s never turned out well for the opponents of newer modes.
I remember reading in old magazines the outrage over AM signals in the 1920s. Just not real radio. Then in the 1950s SSB was given the derogatory title of duck talk.
Now the commercial services and the military have all gone to digital modes so why not Amateurs?
Like you I use whatever mode I think is appropriate.
The only reason for that is that is most people who use JS8Call will leave their stations set to auto-respond whilst they are at work, JS8Call was derived from FT-8 but it is a QSO mode, so you can swap reports easily, if only more people bothered to use it! Doesn’t help that Colin whatshisname ‘Whats Next’ in Practical Wireless basically told people not to bother with the mode! For no other reason than lack of activity. No wonder I stopped buying PW!
I know the score with js8call I been on it since it first started. I am sure the Rpi ops don’t mind me >snr? a quick snr report to count as a contact when they are not by their keyboards. After 42 years on air I think its great to have these new methods to communicate and if scoring a QSO for SOTA or what ever other portable activity you do is legitimate in accordance with the LCD. The last time I purposely set up js8call on a SOTA activation I got 12 QSO’s on the mode, all with a proper keyboard exchange so you can be lucky sometimes. Probably my main personal thing against digital modes on summits I do is carrying all the extra kit in my back pack to the top of the hill not what digital mode I use once there.
vk5cz …
I’m old fashioned. If the operator isn’t actually present and at the least clicking on reply then I don’t want to claim the contact.
My mobile phone imp recently interrupted my listening to a football broadcast and asked what it could do. I told it. “That’s not very nice it said”. Damn self important pesky bit of software.
Please stop feeding me if I resort to just communication with software instead of humans.
I don’t understand this view that FT8 /4 are in some way automatic and that no one is there operating. Sure some good ill leave things running as I do popping in and out the shack bit its not going to be making call or answering any if I am not present to choose who and what I want to work!
JS8Call doe beacon /Heartbeat and that does incite a auto response if you allow it bit its not a contact to log.
Setting up and operating an ft8 station on a summit is probably the most complicated way to work portable. That’s the challenge. Also, it’s not like shooting fish in a barrel, especially when QRP.
I actually like how the chasers have to work a little harder to find you, and you find them too!
Too right Fraser I think those who say the computer doing the work and other disparaging remarks about using FT8 or JS8 in the field have never tried it for them selves. Plugging in a CW key and calling CQ is so much easier in a practical sense as long as you get an answer of course. Its very hard to see the screen out side and if you are on qrp and the whole pass band is chock o block with signals bet you get swamped every time. This was my reason for using JS8call instead because the pass band in never full of signals and its easier to make contacts because those interested in chasing you can see you normally. Both modes propagate very nicely and I’d even go as far to say the Slowest mode of transmission on JS8 is like “WSPR with words” its amazing how well it gets the job done. Bit slow but I got all day and want the contact just like slowing down the CW speed so your Chaser can copy or are electronic keyers dodgy too. As for pinching beacons on js8 its a grey area to call it a QSO, but it is an exchange of callsign and snr report all the same. Bit like scoring the CW ident on a distant repeater, that’s tongue in cheek by the way any Nay Sayers. Move with the times I say pointless waiting with the spark gap set up on 630 khz there’s no one there chasing SOTA ops.
Keep up the good work.
Ian vk5cz …
Hello Rick
If it is very difficult to work CW or phonia in 5 W, imagine RTTY.
An old Radio Amateur said that to do RTTY you need 500w.
Of course this is relative, but it’s a long mode and will consume all your battery and won’t make it to the corner.
For sure! I’ve used the Android App a couple of times with my FT-891. Next experiment is to try an activation with the (tr)uSDX and the Android App. Would make for a light pack.
