Always the optimist. Better buy a thick woolen shawl to keep warm.
If running SSB, you need a good station to reach JA from VK3 on 6 m, some 8,000 km via TEP, and an outstanding station to exceed 12,000 km, say beyond Western USA, the Carribbean, Eastern Middle East.
Oh and you need to live in the shack during the Equinoxes. Tell family and friends you are going on Retreat.
VK6, VK8 and VK4 are closer to Eu than VK5 or VK3 and more likely to make the grade.
For the 10 m activations I have done this year I have qualified because of great operators in JA and ZL with the occasional Stateside call making up the log. Not a solitary G and no Eu SOTA stations. Not even the stalwarts like Tom are in the log.
So making a World record class contact on 6 m from a SOTA summit isnāt probable for the SE of VK.
Troppo, sporadic E and meteor scatter will be required to qualify.
Qualifying on 6 m will be like winning the Stawell Gift. Fun to try but with 40/20 m in the pack so the outing isnāt wasted.
73
Ron
VK3AFW
Likes a challenge but knows when to retire to the cafe/pub.
Further to my request when was the last time G8ADD did a SOTA activation? 2016 on 2m FM. So if he is deciding what challenge should be put in place I rest my case. How about giving the actual activators a bit of slack here and giving a challenge more relevant to the times. The 10m challenge is great because of the good conditions on that band now as it would be on 15m also for a few years. You canāt deny my commitment to SOTA during the VK SOTA season which is Summer in EU and winter here. Average of 45 summits per year and 9000 km of driving to get around plus accommodation fuel expenses. Then there is the permission to access summits on top of that, 6m next year ! a joke canāt even get a winter bonus here,
Sorry had to say it.
Regards
Ian vk5cz ā¦
Brian is not making that decision - any decision is made (quite democratically) by the members of the MT. The MT has global representation too, it is not UK centric
I am one of the old stalwarts whose bones restrict him from many further activations but a mere child in terms of Brianās years
Iām going to have to check the database, my last activation was last October, perhaps I had a senior moment and forgot to enter it! There wonāt be many more unless they are drive-on or shortish walks, my family kindly informed me that I am too old to walk the high fells alone and I depend on them for transport. Sic transit, but I have a head full of memories - you can take an OF out of the mountains but you canāt take the mountains out of this OF!
Now with regard to 6m DX, I personally have never got further than the USA on six, though note that it was with 5 watts to a long wire. However, a friend and his brother told me once that they made it to VK in the great opening of Xmas in, I think, 2003. Perhaps that was BS, I never checked, but it seems that it can be done but it needs a sky-high MUF. Six is not easy, it needs the full co-operation of the sun and the Es gods, so thatās why it is a challenge, but you donāt have to engage with the challenge if you canāt be assed. However, do not expect me to vote for a dead easy challenge like, say, 15m when the MT is discussing challenges. Nor, I guess, will any other members of the MT. Iām sure we all recognise that VK and ZL face greater difficulties than most do, we can sympathise but we cannot re-draw the map. I could visualise a āwork VK and ZL challengeā making you guys the quarry of the SOTA world for a year, but its probably superfluous, who over here wouldnāt drop everything to complete with an antipodean station? Sorry mate, weāll do our best for you but geography is a tough opponent!
Training a 12-week puppy (which weāve done 5 times over 34 years) is easy compared to a completely untrained 4yo adult (ex stud) dog whoās never been in the āgreat outdoorsā. It might take a long time and a lot of patience.
He came to us underweight [the vet said, feed him up, which we are] so heās even more food obsessed than the average golden retriever. He didnāt respond to his name when we got him (the breeder probably didnāt need him to have recall) but his recall is good now (except if food is āofferedā elsewhere). It will take a lot of small steps.
Heās been great on previous SOTA walks (not straying when off lead and sitting quietly at the summit with my 12yo cocker spaniel whilst I play radio). The school holidays started last week and G/LD is a very popular holiday location. I broke my own rule (which locals told me when I moved to G/LD 5 years ago): I should have eschewed a popular Lake District summit this time of year to avoid the crowds (or activate very early morning ā but thatās no good for high MUFs and 10m).
Myself and Josh WU7H (as MM/WU7H) were both able to work Dave G3TQQ and Nick G4OOE today on 10m over a 130km path between GM/SS-158 and G/NP-003. I donāt know what the propagation mode was there was no QSB on the signals, either CW when I worked Nick or SSB when Josh worked Dave and Nick. We 'd like someone to explain this QSO.
As for the next challenge, after listening today to Josh activating Broomy Law GM/SS-209 on 15m running 10W CW to a 41ft ārandomā antenna, I think a 15 m challenge would be good. Josh was able to work a W0D S2S QSO and then had a number of QSOs into W7-land and W6-land, 8000+km QSOs. I was rather impressed, this was around 1700Z. This morning we has SFI=175 K=3 A=9 and itās now SFI=175 K=4 A=9.
Andy, surely, back in your youth, you āviewed the historical documentsā [think Galaxy Quest] of social life in 1970ās USA Smokey and the Bandit as I did. They used CB radio (29MHz FM) to āworkā inter-State (130+km I assume) as well as locally. I recall calling protocols included āTalk to me, māboy!ā and āHold on to your assā.
On a more serious note, a very similar question to yours was asked here ā¦.
Quote:
Tropospheric propagation also happens at 28 MHz but itās a lot weaker than on the higher VHF bands. On the map above, the two stations about 100kms to the north of me and the station on the west coast of Wales who was about 200kms distant are probably via tropo.
The question then arises as to what is the propagation mode for the signals from England and Scotland in the 400km to 700km range? On the day, it seemed to be too close for Sporadic-E and too far for tropo.
The article refers to a new 10m propagation study in Nov. 2020 issue of Radcom. I donāt know if the study answers the question. I donāt keep back issues of Radcom but it should be on-line to RSGB members.
Iāve not been back long from todayās fun with Joshā¦ I need to unload the car, have a shower and get a large Malt ready. Then I pull this down and study it. Thanks.
Iāve always been fascinated by regional contacts that are too far apart for groundwave, apparently too close compared to skip distance and too HF for NVIS. So, if the Radcom article reveals anything new, perhaps you would share it with us.
I remember that article, and responded to the request for reports. I had worked Phil G4OBK over a 240km path on 2/06/20 from G/WB-015 on 10m ssb, 33 reports both ways.
The study specifically wanted to know about FT8 contacts IIRC, but did thank me for the report.
I donāt remember seeing any results publishedā¦
I have had similar inter-UK contacts, but they are not commonplace, a similar path will work one day but not the next. I listen for all the UK activations and usually anything over about 50 miles if heard at all is unworkable, but just occasionally you get a good contact over 100 - 200 miles. Whatever mode it is that is in play is highly unreliable. Perhaps it is weather related, Iāve noticed in the past that sometimes I can get long paths on 2m that appear to be aligned with warm fronts, perhaps something like this may happen on 10m?
I would love to but it seems the RSGB have changed account details again. My login for my clubās AFS account no longer works. Iād be better using a Ouija board to fetch the details than expecting RSGB IT to stay working.
ā¦which sent me to look at my chasing stats. It turns out I have chased summits on all the bands for which I have both rig and antenna. (I have a rig but no antenna for70MHz.) Of the other bands, 1.8MHz is the one with which Iāve chased fewest summits. 50MHz and 433MHz are my second and third least used. My fourth least-used band still has over three times as many chases as those three put together. Even though my chases have been relatively few, the Ten Metre Challenge has pulled 28MHz up three places in my chasing stats. It used to be the fourth least-used band for which I have both rig and antennaā¦
Two days ago I got just one groundwave contact (on a G/LD summit). Today (on a G/SP summit) not so very far away, same setup, same time of day, I got one groundwave [44km away] and 3 in roughly the same area (southern France, Switzerland and northern italy). I noticed the MUFs there were the highest in Europe. Probably not a coincidence.
If you think the 10 Meter challenge is tough just wait for the 6M challenge. I am not against the idea, but I am afraid it will be a bit disappointing.
Compared to Ten meters Six Meter openings are typically very short, weak, and few in number.
F2 openings on Six are also rareā¦so far this cycle has really been bad for 6M F2. That could change, but this solar cycle is already under-performing on HF compared to previous cycles.
Few radios, especially QRP radios, have six metersā¦so the number of SOTA stations on SIX will be very low to start with compared to other bands.
In the USA antennas for DX on Six are mostly Horizontal (just like HF), so using a vertical antenna from a summit may result in missing many local stations due to cross polarization. Two antennas needed?
Almost all QSOās on Six are now DIGITALā¦SSB and CW QSOās are almost non-existant here in Arizona.
I have made about SIX (6) contacts on Six Meter SSB/CW this ES season. Bottom line is those modes are deadā¦I can call for hours when the band is open, but most everyone stays exclusively on Digital.
The ES season for the Northern hemisphere is typically June, July, Augustā¦with a little ES in December. Not sure when the peaks occurs in VK/ZL. So this event will be reduced to ground wave contacts for most of the year if the F2 does not show upā¦
Bottom line is that a Six Meter Challenge will be a real challengeā¦so donāt expect big scores for this event like we get in HF events.
If we want lots of SOTA Event participation in 2025 we might want to choose something else for the challenge that more SOTA ops can participate in?
Just thinking out loudā¦
73
Pete
WA7JTM
6M DXCC #524 (2002) (127 countries)
6M WAC (1981)
6M WAS #168 (1977)
on 6M since 1965
