SOTA NEWS - JANUARY 2015 - Part 2
NORTH AMERICAN SOTA REPORT - from Skip K6DGW
Here’s hoping everyone had a great holiday season! As is to be expected, the intense cold in the mid-section of the continent, a very wet [and cold] Dec on the western frontier, coupled with the holiday season undoubtedly contributed to a somewhat decreased level of activity. Nonetheless, we finished 2014 about 155% above 2013.
With the exception of yet-to-be associations such as KL7, KP2, and the northern territories of Canada, it appears that the association structure in North America has stabilized … at least until our southern neighbors climb aboard.
NORTH AMERICA TOTALS [as of 2050UTC 29 Dec 2014] Total Activations: 247 [331] Nr Unique Activators: 85 [110] Total Chaser QSOs: 2817 [5061] Nr Unique Chasers: 183 [214] Unique Summits: 276 [263]
2m: 103 (3%) [129]
6m: 0 (0%) [0]
10m: 93 (3%) [330]
12m: 91 (3%) [469]
15m: 124 (4%) [314]
17m: 194 (6%) [291]
20m: 1726 (61%) [2748]
30m: 95 (3%) [125]
40m: 389 (13%) [653]
60m: 1 (0%) [0]
80m: 0 (0%) [0]
160m: 0 (0%) [0]
Unk: 1
CW: 1670 (59%) [3043]
SSB: 1036 (36%) [1869]
FM: 110 (3%) [145]
AM: 0 (0%) [1]
Data: 0 (0%) [0]
Other: 0 (0%) [2]
Unk: 1
As usual, 20 meters seems to be the band of choice, with CW and SSB remaining fairly constant percentage-wise.
AWARDS:
Sometimes it’s all over the news, and sometimes someone slips into an award with extreme stealth, as did Eric, W4EON [NA MG #21] back in November. Eric is also W4V’s first Mountain Goat. Congratulations Eric, Baahh!
Herm, KB1RJD, dropped a note that, “Sequential Slothmates Merle and Herm, KB1RJD and KB1RJC, in NH, are pleased to have edged over the
7,000 chaser points mark. Not an official benchmark but a personal milepost nonetheless. Thanks to all the phone activators for being out there!” As he said, no official award, but numbers with multiple trailing zeros are so comforting, no?
Our Curtis, KC5CW [“North America’s answer to Ferdinand Magellan”] has made yet another expedition, this time to the W9 Association [IL] where he reports,
“After two S2S, one CW and one SSB, and a nice run on 20m SSB I am going to head home [that would be Corinth in NE TX] with a donation of my antenna to the forest. My throw bag wrapped around the branch and I ended up with a 5’ wire on my end after pulling with the rest up in the trees.”
“My wife is hoping I hurry home for more Christmas time together so I’m heading home. I got my main goal, Mountain Explorer Gold so I’m happy.
Thanks to Clay NF1R for QRS even though I still can’t follow much more than my signal report.”
Congratulations Curtis!! And, with the suffix of your call, you are destined to become skilled in the “First Digital Mode.” Antenna donations to the forest are similar to building a barbed wire fence …
if you don’t donate a little blood, the fence will fall over.
And finally, from Elliott, K6EL: “I just received my fourth SOTA award certificate with serial number 001, as predicted at our dinner in Petaluma. I don’t see any path to another 001, so I’ll have to fill my idle time keeping these dusted and hung straight (three for s2s and one for microwave). It’s been an eventful month, with the N7UN calendar, the first General Rules revision in ten years, and the completion of my part in establishing rules for the microwave award.”
I can’t include the award as an attachment to the reflector, but I can pass on that it is SMA-001 Microwave Award for 50 km on 23 cm FM. Nice going Elliott! Possibly the ARRL 10 cm and up test in the fall would interest you?
NEWS:
Fred, KT5X, appears in New Mexico Outdoors with photos and narrative of some of his very difficult, very spectacular activations. It’s all at http://newmexicooutdoor.com/Fred_Maas_Hikes.html
While nearly the antithesis of a summit, check out the “slot canyons”
reported [and pictured] by Doug Scotts at:
http://newmexicooutdoor.com/Doug_Scotts_Slots.html
Slot canyons are common in the desert southwest. For those not familiar with SW US topography, they are literally narrow slots, sometimes just wide enough to squeeze through, carved in the rock mainly by occasional flash floods. I guess they would have negative prominence? For sure, any Q’s you make from the bottom would be real achievements.
Two newcomers to SOTA announced their presence on the NA SOTA Group, Chris, AF7FQ in Mt. Home ID, and Brian, N2BTD in Central Nyack NY.
Welcome to SOTA! I would warn you that it is addictive except it seems you’ve already found that out. 
REPORTS: I got a number of reports in Dec, one stands out as being on the edge of, “Do I really want to do this?”:
Date: Dec 10, 2014
Who: Alan, NM5S and Fred, KT5X (WS0TA)
Peaks: W5N/SM-037 (Guadalupe)
W5N/SM-034 (Santa Clara)
SM-037: Area in the saddle just beneath the cliff guarding summit was
too small to set up two radios. I set up mine, worked four stations (W7CNL, W0MNA, K6TUY, and W0ERI), then handed the radio to Alan. Eight minutes and ten contacts later, I took the radio back from Alan and worked AE0P, WX4ET, KG3W, K4PIC, K8TE, N0EVH, K4EAY, N7UN, KC6SSE, W7RV, and K9ZMD.
SM-037 appeared initially impossible. It is a black basaltic volcanic plug intruded a thousand feet up through a sedimentary sandstone/clay rock of lighter color. My study of the topo had determined that best hope was going to be the southwest corner. Indeed, all other sides were cliffs, but that corner was an extremely steep talus slope leading up to two saddles either side and beneath a cliff guarded summit, both saddles within the activation zone.
This area is an extreme desert. A few tufts of dead grass and an occasional juniper were the only growing things in sight for fifty miles around. The view was spectacular. The eroded topography below was beautiful, Rio Puerco famous for wild boar and dinosaur fossils, cut through the landscape, and at least a dozen similar volcanos poked up through, the largest being the famous Cabezon rising over two thousand feet, that being the next plug to the north of us. Been there, done that.
But beneath the talus slope was extremely steep highly eroded cliffs of sandstone and badlands. We studied it for some time from different angles and at last I said I think we can ascend, and pointed to one ridge … when we walked up to it we found faint evidence of someone else having walked up it before.
This was loose clay and gravel, if wet would be impassable, with hands on the dirt in front of us, it was so steep, we scrambled up. We confronted what had appeared as a cliff of sandstone, to find an erosional weakness that we could safely slip though, and we were above the sedimentary rock and onto the magma/talus slope above. it was a difficult 1,000 foot climb, but never felt dangerous.
The second peak, Santa Clara, topo study suggested also southwest corner, but no, that route was blocked by short cliffs, but cliffs. We wished we had binoculars to better study the slopes.
We chose a spot, and there was only one, on the southeast side, a steep ascent of the sedimentary layer below was easy enough, but above it was a basalt girdle of hard rock cliffs most of the way around. There was just this one lone spot where it wasn’t quite cliffs, almost, and indeed, we wound our way through it and above onto a more negotiable slope.
Up top, I found a geocache … last signature was April of this year, none for 2013, then several in 2012. I left a clear note, “activated for Summits On The Air!” it really was a spectacular pair of activations, but not for the casual hiker.
That’s going to do it from the New World for December … and for 2014.
To all Summiteers and Chasers, best wishes for a great and safe new year.
73,
Skip K6DGW
NA SOTA Reporter Dude
SOTA AUSTRALIA from Allen VK3HRA
This month I (Allen VK3HRA) finally become VK’s fourth and VK3’s third Mountain Goat. Gaining 1007 points in 1007 days (2 years, 9 months, 2 days). This has involved travelling throughout the state chasing summits as the high scoring summits are based around the dividing ranges. Future endeavours will be concentrated to the closer summits based around the Grampians seeking new unique activations.
New Shack Sloths qualifying before end of 2014 include VK3IL David, VK6NU John and VK1ATP Paul.
VK3CAT Tony joined Gerard VK2IO to achieve CW shack sloth status. Upon entering what he believed to be the final contacts into SotaWatch, the score showed only 999 points. Tony noticed a lone AM contact in his logs. Knowing that this was wrong, tracked it down to a CW contact with Wayne VK3WAM on VK3/VN-001 (Mt Torbreck ) for the final 10 points to make 1009.
Andrew VK1DA, Bernard VK2IB, Glenn VK3YY all achieved 1000 S2S points.
VK1/AC-037 (Mt Taylor) joined join the ranks of VK5/SE-013 (Mt Gawler known to some as Mt Nigel) and VK1/AC-040 (Mt Ainslie) with 1000 QSO’s for only 50 activations.
Andrew VK3JBL has a RBN gateway up and running on 40m. Great news for CW activations.
Andrew VK1DA completed the VK2 update for 1st December. This corrected some summit position corrections as well as added new summits. VK2 now has 1219 summits. This will provide many opportunities for new players to bag un-activated summits.
Recent joint activations are providing interesting results,
VK2AFA and VK5TX
Sam and Ben decided try and activate the two un-activated summits at the Barrington Tops area before Ben head to South Australia. Setting out at 5am with a 200Km drive to the Mt Carson turn off were greeted with a locked gate. So set off for a 6Km walk to the summit. Every band was dead so struggled for over an hour to make the 4 contacts amidst a lot of lighting noise. On the way back Sam almost stepped on a brown snake then only to miss another one 5 minutes later.
The second summit was activated with better conditions then the fun began. A freak rock jump up and put a hole in the sump dumping all oil.
So, with no phone signal the 7Km walk back began in hail and rain. After finally getting phone signal and a 2hr wait they managed to get picked leaving the car there for the night. The next day they returned with a second hand sump and some new oil so able to drive home.
800Km, 19Km of walking, a $38 sump and some new oil they activated two new summits and got 18 more points.
VK3BYD and VK3HRA
Warren and Allen exploited the Australian Alpine Walking Track (AAWT) to gain access to 5 summits around Mt Murray including two previously un-activated summits. This was a multi-day activation with early starts and overnight camping in the Alpine National Park. Whilst the roads were open not all were in a suitable condition for access. Excellent weather, the walking track and careful navigation brought the summits into grasp.
Warren comfortably qualified the summits with CW exploiting the new RBN gateway leaving Allen to tidy up on SSB.
VK3CAT and VK3AFW
Tony and Ron recent joint activation of VK3/VT-026 (Mt Toorongo Range) required crawling on hands and knees through the dense scrub to reach the summit. Once the summit was activated and the ants were dealt with, the return trip was all down hill, literally. The aftermath of this activation were ant bites, leech attacks, skinned shins requiring antibiotic treatment.
VK3YY and VK3KAB
Glenn and Kevin have been setting a formidable pace activating all the summits they can find. Despite geomagnetic storms, tracks required clearing, rain, and fog all obstacles were addressed and they have picked up 12 summits in the last 6 weeks.
VK3FCEK and VK3BQ
SOTA is becoming a family affair. Christine VK3FCEK, Andrew VK3BQ’s wife, activated her first summit VK2/SM-001 (Mt Kosciuszko) with Nathan
6 and Toby who celebrated his 5th birthday at the top of Australia.
VK7TW and VK7FREU
Justin and Reuben are again a family team tackling VK7 summits. Current summits include VK7/SC-006 (Collins Cap), VK7/SW-008 (Hartz Peak) and
VK7/SC-001 (Mt Wellington). With VK7 active they will have work qualifying all the summits.
All report having a great time.
Heads up for the VK3 SOTA Conference & BBQ - Saturday February 7th 2015.
All welcome.
Anyway off to finish a 6m/10m link dipole ready for the upcoming 2015 challenge.
73’s for now,
Allen
VK3HRA
THE VIEW FROM THE NORTH - 74 - by Rob and Audrey G4RQJ
The winter bonus coincided with a spell of very poor weather on the higher tops, which seriously upset our activities, but we did manage a trip up Binsey on the 30th of November, too late for last months entry. Binsey is a very pleasant hill at the extreme north of the Lake District which makes it a good hour + drive as we live in the deep south of the area and the roads are not the greatest.
Much depends on tourist traffic levels and today we had the pleasure of a tour bus for virtually the whole length of the Windermere shore, a road where passing is not an option. As we were congratulating ourselves on finally losing it in Ambleside the open top bus from there to Grasmere hove into sight ahead. This is a pretty trip along the shores of Rydal Water and Grasmere at a leisurely pace with no passing places! Just to add to the fun I(Rob) managed to miss the turnoff onto the Carlisle road from the Keswick by-pass, adding more minutes to the trip. Such are the pleasures of living in this beautiful area; remember it’s never as quick as it looks on the map.
Talking of which, a recent road atlas (free with a national newspaper) denies the existence of Ryenose and an Hard Knot passes the road stops at Boot and at Langdale at the other end! Eventually we arrived at the start point NY235351 with room for about six cars beside the road. The stile in the wall, probably the most scary and difficult part of the walk is gone, replaced by a wooden gate and from there the wide grassy path leads to the summit area which is stony with plenty of shelter. A pleasant sun warmed activation followed but the number of vhf contacts was severely down and the HF was patchy, 5Mhz was good, 7MHz nonexistent and 10Mhz such hard work with rapid changes of skip that the rest of HF was abandoned for reasons of time and operator sanity, sorry.
The next three Sundays saw bad weather with high winds and rain to all levels. High winds are a non starter for Audrey as being small she is easily blown off her feet.
Our son came up with a theory from somewhere that half a persons body weight in pounds is approx the wind speed in MPH that will blow them off their feet: Audrey comes out at 50mph approx which is about right under test conditions!
By Sunday 21st we were suffering from cabin fever and decided to climb Arnside Knot for zero points. On the way there we pass Kirby Moor, Gummers How and Hutton Roof Crag, all about the same height as our target and deep in cloud. Arnside Knot is marginally better, so up we go. We are currently testing our new “Arctic Parkas” from Mountain Warehouse (usual disclaimers) There are pocketed, fully real down filled with taped seams inner down proof lining and water proof breathable outer. Also they are longer than the modern coats many of which are little over “battledress” length not the best thing for those of us long in the back. Not the best thing for out and out climbing but for moorland walking and sitting for long periods. A good buy at round the £100 level if you work all the discount tricks. On this trip they proved to be more than adequate in some pretty foul weather further reports may follow Activity wise things were dire with half a dozen or so regulars on 2FM. Think the overall activity levels on 2m have fallen recently and SOTA is suffering as a consequence, the days of the odd interested spectator calling in seem to be fast disappearing, maybe the emphasis on DX working and contest styles are deterring them? Personally we are always up for a quick chat if weather conditions etc allow.
And so we come to Dec 28th and what will probably be our last activation of this year. We have been looking for a perfect blue cold frosty day to activate our local 4 pointer Black Combe and today is it. Not a cloud in the sky as we trundle round the Duddon Estuary, the other side of the peninsular that separates us from the rest of the world. This is an A road but once again it looks better on paper than reality, at one point it passes through a farmyard with single file traffic! This tends to leave the hill little activated in spite of beautiful views and a great takeoff. The start point is Whicham church yard, about 200yards east of the A595 and A5093 at Silecroft and easily missed.
The church has revamped its car park, leaving more room and a polite notice points out an honesty box which in good conscience is fine considering the huge fees demanded in the Lake District honey pots. We always drop in on the two RAAF personnel war graves in the churchyard. So sad that these lads travelled half way round the world only to die on our fells and be buried in this pretty little churchyard. At the rear of the churchyard a lane leads upward to the hill, in fact from this point the only way is upward for the next one and a half hours or so. Wainwright said of this path "it can be climbed in slippers but the slope is relentless” this can be proved by slogging up it! Today the lower slopes are much warmer than the promised one degree and there is a lot of mud about. Our new jackets are too warm and we stop and shed a lower layer. We gain height in brilliant sunshine with stunning views, the ground eventually becomes hard with frost and ice and about 150 feet below the summit there is some four inches of lying snow.
We arrive at the shelter with views all round and the keen photographer who ascended behind us starts to assemble his large tripod. At this point a dark cloud rolls onto the summit reducing visibility to a few yards and produces an instant drop in temperature and this is how things stay for the rest of our visit. We erect the 2m beam hand held on the ten foot mast and manage to work half a dozen regulars on 2FM and just one on 2 SSB and as the weather closes in further we are alone on the summit and the photos look like an arctic expedition We decide enough is enough and on the descent the track is beginning to ice up quite badly. We emerge from the cloud two thirds of the way down into a beautiful red winter sunset surprisingly graced by some flocks of midges. As this is the end of December they are as surprised as us so neglect to do any biting. The new coats stood up well to the whole experience
And that looks to be it for 2014, a year full of strange weather, mostly on Sundays. We hope to get back to some sort of order in the new year, we need 47 points to reach 2500 and a certificate, it seems rather sadistic that there is not one at 2000 
So many thanks to all the chasers, activators, listeners and administrators who have made it all such a pleasure,
A Happy New Year to you All
We look forward to doing it all again in 2015
Take care out there
73
Rob and Audrey
G4RQJ
SOTA ON TOP BAND - Mark G0VOF
Hello everyone & welcome to this month’s edition of SOTA on Top Band.
December was very quiet on the Top Band front with no activators using the band so I thought I’d have a look back over the past 12 months pull together some statistics.
Over the year, ten activators have used 160m from no fewer than 24 separate summits. CW unsurprisingly was the most popular mode with a total of 131 QSO’s made. Phone chasers were not left out however, with 45 QSO’s made using SSB.
In terms of the number of summits activated, John G4YSS usually operating under the Scarborough Special Events Group call of GX0OOO/P offered a total of 10 separate summits over the year. He was followed by Miro OK1DVM who offered 7 summits, & Klaus DF2GN who offered 6 summits.
The number of QSO’s made during activations can vary immensely with the time of day, transmit power, & antenna used all playing a big part. During 2014 one activator took SOTA antenna experimentation to new heights, quite literally, with some remarkable configurations tried during his activations in March & April. This resulted in some incredible QSO numbers for these activations, which has Klaus DF2GN leading the field with the highest number of Top Band QSO’s over the year. He made a stunning total of 81 Top Band QSO’s made up of 57 CW QSO’s & 24 SSB QSO’s. The bulk of these QSO’s were made during Klaus’s activations in March & April during which he assembled some very large wire antennas.
Behind Klaus with 36 QSO’s was John G4YSS (GX0OOO/P) who surprisingly made more QSO’s using SSB than CW (17 CW / 19 SSB). It just goes to show that it is worth calling on SSB for chasers who may have good Top Band stations but may not be able to use Morse. Following John was Miro OK1DVM with 31 QSO’s all of which were made using CW.
Of course, raw numbers don’t tell the whole story & Top Band can be very rewarding, but also very frustrating. It is a band that requires more than average effort, sometimes for little or no reward. Setting up a viable 160m station on a summit is even more demanding & as someone who appreciates the effort involved I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to all who have tried activating on 160m over the course of 2014, some for the first time. For top band chasers the biggest issue is no doubt urban noise levels, which can be incredibly high on the band, so you do need a very good pair of ears to be successful, as well as space for a decent antenna which is not always possible.
As we head into a new year I look forward to continuing to report on your SOTA activities on the band.
Very best wishes to all Activators, Chasers & SWL’s & I hope you all have a happy & healthy 2015.
As always, If you do have any suggestions on things that you think should be included, or if you wish to contribute tips, ideas or anything else that you think may help others on the band please email them to me at mark@brownhill.demon.co.uk
Until next month,
Best 73,
Mark G0VOF
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END OF YEAR STATISTICS - from Tom M1EYP
All-time Activator QSOs:
2014 Activator QSOs:
All-time Activations:
High Activation QSO Totals:
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CHASING IN 2014 - by Brian G8ADD
As 2015 dawns, we can expect the usual statistics celebrating our most prolific activators, who indeed deserve their praise. However, for a change this year I want to turn the spotlight on those hard-working unsung heroes who make the achievements of the activators possible - the chasers.
Firstly, how many of them are there? According to the database there are 4160 chasers that recorded their contacts on the database, a little more than the number of activators, which was 3941 on Boxing Day when I extracted these figures from the database - itself one of the outstanding achievements of SOTA. Incidentally, the database shows that 2549 chasers also activate, leaving 1611 specialist chasers.
The database enables us to find out how well the chasers did in 2014, so here are the top five chasers selecting all bands and all modes, as of Boxing Day, prepare to be astonished:
1…DL3HXX…23,757 points.
2…DJ5AV…23,563
3…DF5WA…22,086
4…SP9AMH…21,789
5…EA2DT…21,395
Just think about those figures for a moment. The Shack Sloth Award is granted for 1,000 points. These guys achieved the equivalent of over twenty Shack Sloth awards in a year, exceeding double supersloth! The highest achiever, DL3HXX, averaged more than 65 points a day during the year, and since that marvellous database gives his average points per activation, a bit of simple arithmetic shows that he worked an average of better than 14 chases a day. Members of the SOTA community, raise your glasses to an outstanding achievement!
Of course, we know that people tend to specialise by mode: some of us don’t own a mike, some of us don’t own a key, so it is natural that the picture changes if we filter by mode. Even the most devout of SSB operators - me, for instance - will admit that CW works somewhat better than phone for SOTA, so let’s compare the top five by mode as of Boxing Day:
On FM:
1…OK8PKM…4,460
2…SQ9TCK…2,387
3…SB9EWA…2,199
4…DO1GER…2,195
5…S56IHX…2,102
On SSB:
1…G0RQL…15,302
2…EA2CKX…14,198
3…G6TUH…12,945
4…EA2DT…10,501
5…M0MDA…10,475
On CW:
1…DL1FU…21,253
2…G4SSH…17,960
3…DL3HXX…17,784
4…DJ5AV…15,712
5…DF5WA…15,590
FM, of course comes out badly in such a comparison, it is used mostly on V/UHF (though a small allocation on the 10-metre band can be very lively) and the range is thus restricted, but despite this the leading operator, OK8PKM, bettered four times Shack Sloth in one year with an average of over 12 points per day.
The conclusion from comparing CW and SSB is that yes, CW does do better than SSB, but not by as much as you might expect, with top CW chaser DL1FU earning 21,253 points and top SSB chaser G0RQL earning 15,302 points, and beyond any shadow of doubt those points are indeed earned!
Think about it, an activator is rewarded with an exhilarating expedition and perhaps an hour of running a pile-up from the top whilst enjoying an expansive view*. Meanwhile the chaser will be stuck in a stuffy shack, probably warm and comfortable but instead of an expansive view will be gazing at SOTAwatch and the rig for hours, waiting for new spots to chase and hoping that his restless tuning will reveal an activation just starting up so that he can Spot it, ready at any time to plunge into an alligator-infested pile-up and give the activator a brief encounter with another familiar friendly voice.
Believe me, such people are heroes, too. Celebrate them!
Brian G8ADD
*As any activator knows, this is a code expression for being immersed in cloud with the wind blowing a hoolie and the rain skimming past like stair rods!
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CHASING WORLD-WIDE
END OF YEAR, ALL ASSOCIATIONS, ALL TIME, HONOUR ROLL.
As of 0001 UTC 31st December 2014.
CHASERS
CW……G4SSH…… 111111
SSB……G0RQL……59706
FM…….S56IHX…21417
END OF YEAR TOP CHASER SCORES BY MODE FOR THE LAST 5 YEARS
.………2010……….2011………2012…2013…2014
CW…10359…….14463.….18797…20685…20769
SSB….4618 ……6139…….9025 …12610…14616
FM……3992….……6114…3909…3742…4468
On behalf of the 4000+ chasers listed in the SOTA data base (3450 last year) I would like to thank all activators for their contribution to the programme. The foremost aim of these tables is to recognise the effort and dedication that all activators have put into the SOTA programme. The abandonment of many attempted activations in blizzard and snowdrift conditions during December served to highlight the difficulties that can be encountered by activators. (Ed - G4SSH)
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***Continued in Part 3