Rare DX from Summit

The question of RARE SUMMIT and DX begs definition.
I’d argue that a rare SUMMIT is one that has been activated less than ten times since the inception of SOTA. Given the number of Technical climbs that may be required, some summits would be priceless. With that in mind, their grid squares are likely rare as well, regardless of the activation zone.

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As predicted, these two-week expeditions are running out of takers. For me, 3DA0RU on 15m yesterday a couple of hours after J5T (an IOTA) on 12m. both from a summit running 50 watts into an EFHW in California. The bands are back, baby.

EL

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Yes, things are looking up a bit. I did work the J5 on 10M SSB
from home a couple days ago, and several nice DX contacts
on 12/15/17M, too, including EA8/DL4FO/P SOTA on 15.
73, John, K6YK

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When I got home from work this afternoon I noticed J5T spotted on 20 CW. I raced up to Flint Peak, deployed my CAT5 twisted pair half-square, dialed the KX3 to 14.032 MHz. They had a great signal.
Within 5 minutes I was in the log. Wow! I had to pinch myself. 5 watts.
JP3DGT/3 on JA/SI-009 couldn’t hear me calling on 15 or 17 meters.
CT9/DK7YY and D2EB had good signals on 40 meters.
Sweet!

72, David N6AN

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hi Mike,
there certainly is a JA0 call area. I have worked a number of JA0 stations and lots from v85 when I was there 30 years ago. Remarkable that you haven’t worked any, given your coverage of most prefixes. You were very lucky to grab a vk8, there are only a few but those that are active are very popular. Greg VK8GM has activated some summits. Many dxers would have worked Stu vk8NSB from Darwin.
73 Andrew vk1da/2uh

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Hi Andrew, good to hear from you!

Thanks for the heads up on JA0.

JA SOTA contacts aren’t that common from a summit here in G. You’ll often go weeks or even months without hearing one and when you do, there’s usually a pile-up from Hell. On new years day 2016, I was called by 8 JA’s while activating G/CE-004 Bardonh Hill, working 20m ssb, trust me, this don’t happen too often.

As for VK8, agreed, extremely difficult to find from a summit. I’ve taken a look at my SOTA logs and I have VK8 logged 13 times. Indeed, 12 of these were Greg VK8GM, who ran a fantastic station. Not too sure where he is these days.
The only other VK8 in my SOTA log is Jim VK8NS who I worked on the 10m band way back in 2015. In fact, 2015 was the last time I heard VK8 from a SOTA summit.

73 Mike

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Hi Mike,
The JA0 call area is one of the smaller in population but in fact JA6 is lower. There is info about the call areas and a map on Wikipedia. Your map above indicates one JA0 station, so if that is from one of your activations, there’s your JA0! The call area is to the west of JA1, the very highly populated area that includes Tokyo.
I met some JA ops at the 1989 Seanet convention in Singapore, including JA0DAI who I had worked from VK and from V85 on CW and RTTY. I worked several thousand JAs on 6m from Brunei and have QSLs for over 200 cities for the JCC award, which I have not applied for, very lazy. I can still recall tuning from 51 to 54 mhz and finding JA conversations on almost every multiple of 10 khz. In the process I learnt a very small amount of Japanese language, enough to have a very poor QSO thanks to a QSO guide sent me by one of my contacts. The basics - numbers, reports, thankyou and goodbye. Those were the days! 60w on 6m was great, at a sunspot peak 89/90.
Hope you’re keeping healthy and enjoying your DX.
73 Andrew VK1DA/VK2UH

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No-one needs to use FT8 :wink:

Not from a summit anyway. It’s been a bit of a godsend for me while /MM with the amount of QRN this ship churns out though.

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I would be happy to use FT8 like Tom does as I enjoy it but I don’t want to be carrying extra equipment and sit for longer than I need whist using the commoner modes, as I feel the cold these days. Probably a life shortener for me, so I try to avoid getting too cold for long periods. I do not need to use it either. Unlike Mike I’m not bothered about working DX on a summit or S2S. Nice to do, the icing on the cake, but I’m happy to work anyone that calls me on phone or in CW. No one is on my blacklist at present hihi

73 Phil

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