Preparation:

Well it’s Ham Radio Friedrichshafen time again – the largest Ham Fest in IARU Region 1. There are two summits within reasonable driving distance from Friedrichshafen and indeed I picked my hotel (and the location of the annual SOTA Dinner) to be near one of them – Hoechsten.

I had to change my planned activation dates based on some storm warnings. In fact the storms never came but I managed to fit both into my 3 day, two night, stay in the area in any case. I had several antennas with me but the plan was always to use the linked dipole at the wooded Gehrenberg and the VP2E at the more open Hoechsten and indeed that’s what I did.

The Activation (Gehrenberg):

I had intended activating this summit on Saturday evening on the way back from Ham Radio to my hotel but as the weather forecast assured me that it was going to pour down for the whole of Saturday, I decided to fit the activation in on the Friday and then still get back to the hotel in time to check-in, get changed and ready for the SOTA dinner which I had organised.

I have activated this summit for the last three years but one year the Navi (GPS) took me to the wrong place so this time I had a printed map of the area with me as well. There was no need however and I found my way to the edge of the woods fine. Although the track goes up almost to the summit, that road is restricted and intented for use only by the forrestry commission (see photo of sign below). Whetehr anyone ever chexcks, I doubt it, but I wanted to do the “right thing” so I unload and walked up the track to the summit with large tripod, 6 metre mast and linked dipole along with the Xiegu X108G rig, microphone, logbook, etc. etc. – i.e. the normal gear. I checked the spots and saw nothing, so as i was setting off from the car, I spotted myself, saying I would be QRV in 20 minutes.

as it turned out, on arriving at the summit I was met by two other SOTA activators who were just coming to the end of their activation and had seen my spot. It was lucky that they were there as after setting up my gear and when they had finished on HF, I was only able to get two contacts for the summit. Appraently there had been a constant flow of activations all day long meaning that the chasers were no longer intere4sted as they do not get points for a duplicate contact within a day. Thomas DL1DVE, seeing my problem, quickly “rustled up” three simplex contacts on 2 metres from his Handy Talkie (one of them an S2S) meaning, I had the needed contacts. Thanks Tom! Tom and his friend (sorry I forgot the name and call sign), then left the summit and I started to pack up as Luc ON7DQ arrived. This is a busy summit indeed! After greeting Luc, who seemed to find contact easily using CW, I left back to the car.

I then set the Navi (GPS) to take me to the hotel by the shortest route and that route took me first to Hoechsten. I was tempted to stop and make my activation there but decided the time was too short and I’d leave it for the next morning.

Arriving backt the Hotel, the weather was still beautiful and it was to stay that way for the complete weekend, despite whet the forecast had said.

There followed a lovely evening with a total of 33 SOTA-ists at the dinner, most who had or were planning to activate the two summits over the weekend.

At the dinner I met Jaan SM0OEK who had managed to activate Hoechsten on his way from Friedrichshafen with Steve G1INK who had given him a lift from the Ham Radio show. Jann was also staying at the hotel like me, so wwe agreed I would give him a lift in on Saturday.

The Activation (Hoechsten):

Saturday started with an early breakfast and then Jaan and I set off for Hoechsten. As Jaan has activated the summit the previous day, he was not worried about activating again but happy to help me set up the equipment.

This time the arcitects tripod and the 10 metre mast along with the 20m/40m VP2E antenna and all the radio gear was taken out of the car.

Hoechsten is a real “drive-up” SOTA summit with us setting up no more than 500 metres away from the car, which was good as it would turn out.

Jaan assisted with the set-up and the (large) antenna was soon up and ready to go. The weather was still nice and the sun had come up, meaning I was back to my normal issue of not being able to read the OLED screen in the X108G. I didn’t want to have to connect up my phone if I could avid it as this was to be a “hit and run” activation so that we could get to the show ASAP. The problems turned out to be even worse that the bad visibility. The wrong filter and mode had been selected and pressing the buttons made no difference. I had to get the rig somewhere where I could read the display, so I disconnected the antenna and took the rig and battery box back to the car, where thankfully I could sort everything out. The problem is one I have had before – the CMOS battery had gone flat and hence no settings were being remembered. The CMOS battery should be recharged from the rig’s supply but that seems not to work in the later X108G models. I do have a spare (solder tab equipped) CMOS battery but not with me in Friedrichshafen, so this would be the laast operation of the rig until I got it repaired after returning home. So with the rig still running I went back out to the field and antenna where Jaan was waiting and thankfully managed to get six quick contacts on 40m before we packed up and headed into the show. It was during driving back that I realised I had not taken any photos for this report but thankfully Jaan had and he sent me the photos, so those you see below for Hoechsten are courtesey of Jaan SM0OEK. Thanks Jaan.

Photos (Gehrenberg):

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Photos (Hoechsten):

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Equipment used:

Gehrenberg:

• Xiegu X108G plus battery box (2 x 5000maH hardcase LIPOs)
• Linked dipole antenna
• 6 metre Lambda-Halbe fibreglass portable mast.
• Surveyors tripod.
• Thick plastic painters sheet.
• Tom DL1DVE’s HT with RH-770 antenna.

Hoechsten:

• Xiegu X108G plus battery box (2 x 5000maH hardcase LIPOs).
• Linked (20/40m) VP2E antenna
• 10 metre DX-Wire fibreglass portable mast.
• Surveyors tripod.
• Thick plastic painters sheet.

Log (Gehrenberg):

Log (Hoechsten):

Conclusions:

Don’t trust that your equipment will continue to work, even if you test it. Previous problems WILL return in the gear – it’s only ever a question of time (OLED display and CMOS battery in the X108G).

Taking a lightweight dual-band HT along would have been good “insurance” in this case where there is known to be a lot of 2m/70cm activity in the area (normally there’s nothing).

73 ’til the next Summit!