And don’t forget APRS2SOTA.
If you have a 2m FM handheld with APRS Message feature you can use aprs to create a spot.
Upfront registration by email required. See website for infos.
73 joe
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I only do CW on HF so I make full use of RBNHole. I post an alert beforehand and then when I call CQ it gets picked up by the RBN and RBNHole automatically creates a spot for me. So I never need to post a spot from the summit and don’t need to worry about whether or not a summit has mobile phone coverage.
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Do a few dry runs setting up at home in your back garden, more so for HF. An activation can be foiled by a missing connector, cable, battery, clip, mast, guy wire, pen, paper or whatever.
APRS2SOTA has gotten me out of trouble a few times when spotting, but it’s tricky to get it setup and messages formatted etc. You don’t want to have to learn it on a summit in the wind and rain.
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Correct me if I’m wrong, I never tried aprs. It works only if you have an aprs 2m repeater in line of sight right ?
The chances of reaching such a rare repeater at like 100km with 5W in the middle of nowhere, with most likely other mountains in between, looks pretty thin to me, or ?
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Spotting via mobile phone using the Internet or SMS is always the easiest. But it doesn’t always work.
I’ve tried all sorts of methods to Spot from summits in areas with poor mobile coverage.
In my experience/opinion (other opinions are available!) InReach is the easiest and most reliable solution in those cases. I haven’t used it much… but it’s got me out of a pickle on a few occasions. Of course not everyone has an InReach… but if you do… it’s the way to go.
Contact the “gatekeeper” @MM0FMF Andy to register your device for use and details on how to add the correct prefix so it works.
Andy also runs the “normal” SMS spotter for terrestrial phone message spotting too.
Send a direct message via this reflector.
Some of your local activators will I’m sure be able to help you.
73
Gerald
MW0WML
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You could be right, but it’s worked for me anytime I’ve tried it. I know that most of the repeaters here (lower half of Ireland) are linked, so maybe that helps
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Here in Southern California, APRS is reasonably reliable when on a peak. Totally impossible in rural Nevada or Wyoming, though.
Also, here in Southern California, 2m FM simplex is reasonably reliable as long as you have a good view from the peak into the Los Angeles basin. There will almost always be someone listening on 146.58 FM, which is what we mostly use for SOTA around here. The national simplex frequency, 146.52, can be tried if 146.58 doesn’t work, but we try not to overwhelm .52 with SOTA. Any of the local 2m chasers will probably be happy to put up a spot for you on HF as well if asked politely.
And in case it wasn’t obvious, the whole context for putting up a spot is to attract chasers. It’s perfectly fine to call CQ with no spot, but if you are running 5 to 10 watts on HF SSB to a compromised antenna, you might be calling a very long time before someone finds you. Running 100 watts is a bit better, but spotting helps enormously. Once the spot is up, it is good to keep the frequency busy with CQs with pauses for listening in between. If you call CQ once and just wait, chasers may miss your first cq and conclude that they can’t hear you and give up.
Good luck and have fun!
73,
Mike K6STR
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