Invalid Activations

In reply to OH6FQI:

Hi Jaacko,

I think the number of summits with useful buildings on them are so few as to be an insignificant factor in carrying out an activation. There are far more summits with no shelter whatsoever. Surely we all prefer to operate out in the open if we can - that’s what is so attractive about SOTA.

I’m not sure if Crowborough SE-007 has actually been qualified from within the pub, but other structures have certainly been used in poor weather conditions. Take a look at the Isle of Man’s 5 Star SOTA shack - - YouTube

73, Gerald G4OIG

In reply to G4OIG:
“I’m not sure if Crowborough SE-007 has actually been qualified from within the pub,”

It`s certainly been activated from the beer garden. The umbrella hole in the garden furniture fitted the “standard” sota pole like a glove.

In reply to G1INK:

Might have guessed you be in the beer garden… lol

In reply to G1INK:

The umbrella hole in the garden furniture fitted the “standard” sota pole like
a glove.

For making me laugh so hard I shall buy you a beer next time I see you Steve! :wink:

The (unofficial) view I take is that something that is already there on a summit that can be used by anyone wandering up is fair game to use on an activation.

If there was a structure (hut, shed, compound) that was private and could not be used by everyone then I would consider anyone using that to have an unfair advantage.

However, these are my views and you’re all welcome to disagree.

Andy
MM0FMF

In reply to M0KPO:

What do we do about the summits that you drive on like some of the
TW/MW etc, I would say that anyone that has activated these must have
broke the rules. I parked in the lay-by at one of the TW summits,
walked maybe 100ft and activated, so I broke the rules, the summit
though is a massive area, what was I supposed to do, walk the 15
miles. I can name some summits in Mid Wales where this happens so what
do I do, remove the activations and start again.

The vicinity rule was deliberately left vague because any rule detailed enough to cover all possible summit geographies would be impossibly long and complex.

I have been told of a summit which has a car park at the top and no other part of it is accessible. Well, if you look at the dictionary for “vicinity” you get such terms as “near”, “not remote”, “adjacent” and so on, but no mention of specific distances. To adhere to the spirit of SOTA in this case I guess you would set up as far from your own car in the car park as is practicable, but would the same conditions apply if the car park was within a large and fully accessible AZ? In such a case the spirit of SOTA would impell you to move well away from the car, even though the car park is within the AZ, although few could be bothered to go all the way to a scarcely perceptible highest point which might be miles away. No matter, as long as the activation is within the huge AZ. Many of us do in fact prefer to activate from the actual summit, even use the trig point or other summit marker to support the antenna, if only because it isn’t easy to guesstimate a 25 metre drop, but many summits are hugely popular places on a fine summers day, and it would be silly to activate from the middle of a hurly-burly of tourists - so the spirit of SOTA permits you to activate well away from the summit in one of the less popular directions, and thus Snowdon can be activated! Another point, it would be silly if your activation was invalidated because whilst you were active the shepherd drove his trike across the summit, or somebody drove past you on Ruardean Hill, but that doesn’t mean that you can leave your car and operate from a mate’s car! If you have to operate from a car park or layby, you may have to operate from near a vehicle belonging to a third party, it would have to suffice that you did not attach antennas, rest gear on or sit on that vehicle, and of course it would be daft to do this with a strangers car, anyway!

So there is no charge, and you are not guilty, have no fear!

73

Brian G8ADD

In reply to G8ADD:
Here is a good one, but not in the spirit of SOTA.

Get the Missus or a mate to drop you off at the summit, and then get them to drive away to Morrisons or Tesco to do the shopping and then arrange for them to pick you up on the way back after you have gone QRT.

You will not have been operating within the vicinity of your motor vehicle.

Phil

In reply to G4OBK:

Sure, Phil, and of course the point is that SOTA is based on trust, and the “spirit of SOTA” is the litmus test that will be applied to any situation by the vast majority of honourable SOTA people.

73

Brian G8ADD

In reply to G4OBK:

Any summit that has:

A) a road to the summit that one’s wife could drive on
and
B) a Morrisons etc. within reasonable distance for said wife to adjourn to during the activation

is by definition not going to be much of an ascent in the 1st place! :wink:

Andy
MM0FMF

In reply to MM0FMF:

Any summit that has:

A) a road to the summit that one’s wife could drive on
and
B) a Morrisons etc. within reasonable distance for said wife to
adjourn to during the activation

is by definition not going to be much of an ascent in the 1st place!
:wink:

I wonder which is the highest Morrisons in the UK.

Perhaps I’ll email them and ask them.
:wink:

73,
Walt (G3NYY)

In reply to G3NYY:

Ours (Buxton) is approx 1000 ft asl.

In reply to G3NYY:

I wonder which is the highest Morrisons in the UK.

That’s easy. Robin Morrison GM7PKT of course.

Tom M1EYP

In reply to M1EYP:

I wonder which is the highest Morrisons in the UK.

That’s easy. Robin Morrison GM7PKT of course.

Ha ha!

I think our local Morrisons in Tewkesbury is one of the lowest … only 40 ft asl. I activated the car park of that Morrisons on 70cm one day last week. Does that count for MOTA (Morrisons On The Air)? Anyone for M2M?

73,
Walt (G3NYY)

P.S. Sorry I missed you and Jimmy on my local summit, Bredon Hill, last night. I was otherwise occupied in the curry house at the time! If I had known, I would have taken a hand-held. :slight_smile:

In reply to G3NYY:

Does that count for MOTA (Morrisons On The Air)? Anyone for M2M?

You’ll need to define a what valid shopping trip is first Wlat before you can start activating MOTAs! :wink:

Andy
MM0FMF

In reply to G3NYY: Lets extend it to other retail outlets, Sainsbury’s for instance?

Regards, Dave, G6DTN/M0DFA

In reply to M0DFA:

Will activating Waitrose give you more points than Lidl or Aldi?

Andy
MM0FMF

In reply to G8ADD:

The vicinity rule was deliberately left vague because any rule
detailed enough to cover all possible summit geographies would be
impossibly long and complex.

I have been told of a summit which has a car park at the top and no
other part of it is accessible. Well, if you look at the dictionary
for “vicinity” you get such terms as “near”,
“not remote”, “adjacent” and so on, but no mention
of specific distances. To adhere to the spirit of SOTA in this case I
guess you would set up as far from your own car in the car park as is
practicable, but would the same conditions apply if the car park was
within a large and fully accessible AZ? In such a case the spirit of
SOTA would impell you to move well away from the car, even though the
car park is within the AZ, although few could be bothered to go all
the way to a scarcely perceptible highest point which might be miles
away. No matter, as long as the activation is within the huge AZ. Many
of us do in fact prefer to activate from the actual summit, even use
the trig point or other summit marker to support the antenna, if only
because it isn’t easy to guesstimate a 25 metre drop, but many summits
are hugely popular places on a fine summers day, and it would be silly
to activate from the middle of a hurly-burly of tourists - so the
spirit of SOTA permits you to activate well away from the summit in
one of the less popular directions, and thus Snowdon can be activated!
Another point, it would be silly if your activation was invalidated
because whilst you were active the shepherd drove his trike across the
summit, or somebody drove past you on Ruardean Hill, but that doesn’t
mean that you can leave your car and operate from a mate’s car! If you
have to operate from a car park or layby, you may have to operate from
near a vehicle belonging to a third party, it would have to suffice
that you did not attach antennas, rest gear on or sit on that vehicle,
and of course it would be daft to do this with a strangers car,
anyway!

While that covers the issue of “vicinity”, I’m not sure that the “final ascent to the summit may not be assisted by any form of motorised transport” rule isn’t also a problem for those summits where there is parking at the summit. In such cases one might actually wish to descend from the parking to do the activation. I haven’t yet activated Wendover Woods, but looking at the map it looks like it would be tempting to park at the top and walk down to the trig point. One might get round that case by changing “ascent” in the rule to be “approach”, but as with vicinity, there are still questions about how far “final” covers.

At least some of the issue here is how much activators need to go out of their way to avoid using motorised transport to approach hills with good motorised transport access. It’s partly about convenience - most of the summits with car parks could be approached by walking along the road (I don’t know of any only approached by motorways!) but that might be either inconvenient or dangerous. For some hills with road access it’s less onerous than others to contrive a longer approach (I did Long Mynd as part of an 8 mile walk because it was a nice walk, but other summits have less walker friendly approaches).

I’m afraid that this thread has left me rather less sure about what the minimum human powered approach to a summit should be.

Caroline M3ZCB

In reply to G8ADD:
I agree, trust is the key word.

2 years ago my wife and I went up Brocken (highest peak in the Harz Mountains) on the train as we did not have time to walk the whole distance. I had my Vx7 with me but did not activate the summit as I felt that it was not in the spirit of SOTA. With hindsight I should have alighted at the previous station and walked the rest of the way (>150m ascent) and met my wife at the top. I was very glad that I did not set up the HF station up there as we had one amazing thunderstorm with near horizontal lightning!!! Very Scary. I went and hid in a well earthed building (the old STASI radio reception tower).

There are several nearly drive up summits near me and I hope if I activate them it will compensate for some of my longer activations (Snowdon - PYG up & railway footpath down - and the Aran Fawddwy/ Glasgwm pair). Meanwhile I am looking for some easy walk-ups in Shropshire for the Bank Holiday weekend. I’ve done Titterstone Clee, Stiperstones and Corndon. They have to be acceptable to the xyl, 2E1FKA!!

All the best to everyone.

Mike G4DDL

PS I suspect there are very few people deliberately cheating. Even if people have driven to close to the summit, most at least get out of the car to operate from the actual summit. Please don’t let us spoil this by legislating it to death just because of a small number of incidents.

In reply to G4DDL:

PS I suspect there are very few people deliberately cheating. Even if
people have driven to close to the summit, most at least get out of
the car to operate from the actual summit. Please don’t let us spoil
this by legislating it to death just because of a small number of
incidents.

We must retain flexibility in this. A young and fit ham might romp up Tryfan, or rope up for the “Inn Pin” but we need to retain a range of summits suitable for the older, the less fit and the handicapped participants. It seems reasonable to me that the “final ascent” should to some extent be tailored to the capability of the participant so that whilst a fit ham might choose to activate say the Long Mynd by walking in from the Cardingmill Valley (I’m not saying he should!), a less fit ham might park by the summit road and carry his gear to the trig point, and a handicapped ham might carry his gear to a comfortable spot nearer the car, perhaps even by wheelchair, but still within the AZ, both the latter without feeling that they have transgressed. This is why there is no prescribed final ascent distance or height gain, there is only the purposefully vague ruling about the “vicinity” of the motorised transport (whether it be car, train or cable car) which trusts the individual to interpret the rule in terms of doing their best within their own capability.

73

Brian G8ADD

In reply to G8ADD:

Brian,

hopefully nobody will be prosecuted or excluded based on “purposefully vague ruling”.

“Think before you post” should have been applied before starting the thread (threat?).

73,

Gerd.

Caroline,

Negative numbers are your friend!

In the example you quote, you could always do a person-powered final ascent of -5m.

Tom M1EYP