VI10SOTA - Celebrating 10 years of SOTA in VK1.

Awards Celebrations
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Yesterday I activated Isaacs Ridge VK1/AC-041 for the purpose of promoting VI10SOTA to EU and other Dx chasers.

A big thanks to the chasers who stuck with me and waited patiently while I navigated my way around high powered stations who clearly didn’t hear me. I was pleased to hear one or two EU SOTA chasers backing me up by stating ‘frequency is in use’. In one case a QRO UK station moved 3kHz down only to bleed 5kHz wide :roll_eyes: . I changed frequency three times, 14.330, 14.343, 14.320 and finally took refuge close to the band upper limit at 14.345 MHz. I am wondering if I should try a couple of week day activations?

Great to work a handful of VK chasers, John VK6NU, Ian VK5IS, Nigel VK5NIG and John VK4TJ. :grinning:

23 SSB QSOs at 10 watts using an Icom IC-705 into a halfwave inverted V dipole at 7 metres above ground level. Isaacs Ridge doesn’t lend itself to a 20m 1/4 wave ground plane. See photos above.

Countries worked: France, Finland, Switzerland, New Zealand, Czech Republic, Poland, Austria, UK, and Germany. Although the current solar cycle is improving each month, the results indicate similarities to 2014 and 2015 where VK activators were working EU chasers at 5 watts.

VI10SOTA log from Isaacs Ridge VK1/AC-041. If you are not listed in the below log, I didn’t hear you!

Edit: I have checked the SOTA data ‘Show Who Chased Me’ records. There is one so-called chaser who did not work me given I went QRT at 0905 UTC and the chaser claims to have worked me at 0916 UTC. Hello!!!

Time Callsign Band Mode Notes
07:39 F4HZR 14MHz SSB Micke s58 r53
07:41 OH1MM 14MHz SSB Pasi s58 r55
07:45 SA4BLM 14MHz SSB Lars s59 r52
07:47 ZL1SKL 14MHz SSB Soren s58 r54
07:51 ZL4NVW 14MHz SSB Matt s58 r53
07:51 ZL3MR 14MHz SSB John s59 r55
07:53 OK2PDT 14MHz SSB Jan s58 r33
07:54 VK6NU 14MHz SSB John s55 r55
07:58 OE5HWN 14MHz SSB Helmut s55 r33
08:00 GW4BML 14MHz SSB Ben s56 r33
08:03 VK5IS 14MHz SSB Ian s59 r56
08:09 F4WBN 14MHz SSB Chris s59 r56
08:13 SP9JKL 14MHz SSB Jerzy s58 r33
08:14 DL6MST 14MHz SSB Klaus s58 r51
08:16 HB9MKV 14MHz SSB Rudi s58 r51
08:17 DJ2MX 14MHz SSB Mario s58 r44
08:19 SM5LNE 14MHz SSB Jan s58 r52
08:24 OE6RCD 14MHz SSB Roland s58 r31
08:26 VK4TJ 14MHz SSB John s56 r51
08:29 VK5NIG 14MHz SSB Nigel s58 r55
08:34 G4OBK 14MHz SSB Phil s58 r33
08:38 SM5LNE 14MHz SSB Jan s55 r44
08:54 2EOVRX 14MHz SSB Craig s55 r31

Screen Shot 2023-02-06 at 05.15.22
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Map courtesy of SOTA Maps

My next outing with VI10SOTA is next Sunday, 12 February from Mt Taylor VK1/AC-037. FYI, I am planning an activation of Mt Ginini VK1/AC-008 (8 points), at 1700m ASL. I will park that activation for March/April 2023.

I look forward to promoting VI10SOTA to EU chasers throughout 2023.

73, Andrew VK1AD

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Was great to work you this morning @VK1AD Andrew. You were stronger to me on 14.330, about a 4/4, but I know why you QSY’d. I’m looking forward to another VK/ZL early morning S2S again soon :grinning: keep up the good work :+1:

Take care and 73, GW4BML. Ben

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23

Hi there,

looking forward to working this special callsign in the next weeks. Hopefully spring will come early this year (we had -10°C this morning), so we can do a S2S QSO from one of my local hills.

Just wanted to check VI10SOTA on QRZ.com but the callsign is not listed. You should probably put some information there also …

73 Martin, OE5REO

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24

Why? The target audience is here at the SOTA reflector.

Regards,

Andrew VK1AD

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Not everyone who does SOTA reads the reflector but qrz.com is the usual place to look up a callsign.

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I have changed summits to one that offers shade. The temperature at 0730 UTC will be 30 degrees C and 33 C during the ascent :cold_sweat:

UV Index will be extreme at 11.

Regards

Andrew VK1AD

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The VK1 Association Manager has listed VI10SOTA at QRZ.com. Thanks Wade :slightly_smiling_face:

Andrew VK1AD

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VI10SOTA - Last calls on 14.327, sunset in VK1.

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Andrew VK1AD

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Hi Andrew

FELT so lucky to reach you this morning UTC after you dropped 3khz down allowing me to hear your weak signal.

Also felt paths were via LP as many a op was calling and working you reported facing westwards via Long Path via there beams from Europe.

Reminds me when I was up Kitt hill for first time G/DC003 and put out me first Sota call to be answered by an VK station and following later date worked me first Sota to Sota UK to VK on a stupid bit of wire and 10w. Was M3FEH/p at time

Now got a bigger stupid bit of wire and 50w LOL, as using an HB FW 40m Vertical wire delta loop with Q stub.

Happy 10th AV for Aussie Sota

2E0FEH KERNOW 73S

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VI10SOTA report for Mt Stromlo VK1/AC-043 12 February 2023 operating LP on 20m

39 QSOs, 36 on 20m and 3 VK locals on 40m including a S2S with @VK5CZ at Illawarra Hill VK5/SE-014 and a 20m S2S with Andrew @VK1DA at Mt Mundoonen VK2/ST-053.

Countries worked: New Zealand, Sweden, Germany, France, Austria, Czechia, Italy, Finland, Croatia, England, Belgium, Switzerland and Poland. As you can see 20m LP propagation was open to the vast majority of continental Europe. VK regions worked: VK1, VK2, VK3, VK4 and VK5.

I was very surprised to hear Armin @DL6GCA operating DL20SOTA and his S2S call around 08:12 UTC. I had to reach for my headphones which took a minute or two. Thanks for your patience Armin :slightly_smiling_face:

My observation on 20m LP propagation conditions were IMHO the best so far this year. 20m opened around 0735 UTC and later closed ~0850 UTC. Sunset at my location was at 0900 UTC. The majority of EU chasers were reporting my signal @ RST 5-5 to 5-6, not bad for 25 watts.

I did listen for Lorenzo @EA6KB on EA6/MA-042, unfortunately Lorenzo you were in the noise of a strong nearby station, otherwise I think I could have worked you. Next time!

20m wasn’t as crowded as it was last Sunday, I did move frequency twice due to competing stations who had setup within 2kHz of my operating frequency. A big thank you to the chasers who followed my spots and subsequent frequency changes :wink:

Finally, at around 0833 to 0835 UTC there were two EU chasers calling over the top of each other (one may have been a ‘I’ callsign) and whilst I made repeated requests for one caller at a time, both callsigns continued. Question, did you actually hear me or were you calling blind? If you are not recorded in my activator log (uploaded under callsign VK1AD) then I didn’t work you.

73, Andrew VK1AD, on behalf of VI10SOTA

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How exactly are the chasers supposed to achieve this feat, given that they are not in communication with each other?

Well they would, unless you can give them some indication of which of them you want.

I have quite often heard people running a pile up appealing for “one at a time please”, but with the best will in the world, callers operating independently have no way to form themselves into an orderly queue.

Martyn

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Hi Martyn

Thanks for the feedback.

I couldn’t clearly make out either of the two callsigns else I would have said ‘XXXXX callsign only please’, which I did on other occasions during the 1.5 hr activation.

Regards

Andrew VK1AD

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By applying Prisoner’s Dilemma ideas.

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Indeed, but in this case the prisoners don’t even know how many other prisoners there are.

Clearly shouting every time guarantees failure, as does remaining silent every time. If there are exactly two callers, the optimum strategy is for each to toss a coin to decide whether to call after each QRZ. There is then a 50% chance that one of them will get in each attempt.

But if there are many more callers, then the coin toss strategy is almost as bad as calling every time. If there are N callers, it looks like the best strategy is for each to call with probability 1/N. As N increases, the overall probability of success with this strategy remains pretty good, but it becomes very sensitive to the correct choice of calling probability.

Given that nobody knows how many callers there actually are, it remains hard for even the most public spirited chaser to know what to do when requested to call “one at a time”. The best we can say really is “don’t call every time”.

If all of the callers do follow the theoretical optimum strategy, there is of course a significant chance that nobody will answer a call and the activator will close down…

Martyn

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Indeed :slight_smile:

It is an interesting dilemma. Far too many people will take the selfish path and always call.

In fact there are many who call even against a directed CQ. I recall calling “EA4? only” once and every time a non-EA station replied louder than the EA4. Many times I tried and the same station ignored the EA4 only request. I emailed the guy later and asked him to explain why he did this. His reply “I didn’t know you were asking for EA4 only because I couldn’t really hear you properely. I had seen the spot on SOTAwatch so knew where to call. Sorry.” What a dumb-bottom!

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This is the activators dilemma…

But you can still try to stay persistent and determine the calls with the callsign fragments… In my experience, you always get more fragments together. They still don’t have to result in a callsign, but you can use them to determine a negative selection and specifically hide the wrong chasers (or even address them and thus silence them).

If you are not (properly) heard as an activator, it is of course tedious. You are not immune to that. And then, of course, there are very “special” chasers.

Nevertheless, if the activators become a bit more consistent, we might be able to educate the chasers.

73 Armin

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Armin, please give warnings before you type phrases like this… I had to wipe the tea off my screen and keyboard.

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Warning this thread is on the threshold of being hijacked. :roll_eyes:

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image

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I was equally surprised to hear dl20sota and pleased to log a contact from vk2/st-053 on cw.

The next day’s solar events seemed to torpedo the 20m band so I didn’t hear any EU activators at all.

I’ll hopefully be able to activate vi20sota again soon.

73 Andrew VK1DA/VK2DA

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