Preparation:

Following the success of the VK-EU S2S SOTA event on Saturday October 22nd, a similar one for November 19th. was planned but this time for EU-NA contacts. Having only ever managed one S2S with NA and that on 15m, I decided to build a 15m halfwave, coax fed end-fed vertical (aka J-Pole) antenna. After several attempts to build one using the dimensions given by the same calculator I used to build the 20m one that I tested on Weichberg, I eventually managed to get the antenna resonant by using a frequency 800 KHz lower than the required frequency. After getting this working in the garden, I found out why the calculator appeared to be giving the wrong lengths – my thin coax that I thought was foam insulator RG-174, with a velocity factor of 0.735, was actually RG-179 with a velocity factor of 0.700! As I had got the antenna resonant in any case, my activation of Buchberg, which surprisingly I hadn’t yet activated in 2016 would serve to test the antenna and to see if communications across the Atlantic are even possible with the current propagation conditions.

The best time for EU-NA contacts is between 1330 and 1530 UTC at present. As we have just put our clocks back an hour for Winter, this equates to between 2:30pm and 4:30pm local time, so this would be a nice afternoon outing. In case I wasn’t successful with the new antenna, I also took the trusted linked dipole and the 20 metre vertical (and the unreliable 10 metre pole) along. As it turned out, thankfully, I did not need these.

The Location:

Buchberg is located near to Bad Tölz in southern Bavaria and is a favourite spot for walkers to come out to from the town (as I found out). My new “Navi” in the Chinese car multimedia unit, to which I have loaded the SOA DL & DM summit kml file, did a great job of directing me the correct way to the nearest place to park for the summit. Unlike Google maps which routes you up a private forestry only road (see report on my first activation of this summit).

The Activation:

Photos:

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Equipment:

Yaesu FT817ND.

Modified Ramsey power amplifier ( in circuit but not working ).

CO-AX fed half-wave end-fed 15m vertical.

LamdaHalbe 6 metre fibreglass mast.

Log:

Conclusions:

The antenna worked. I will need to check out what is wrong with the amplifier and sort that out before the 19th. The chaep 6m mast is far, far more reliable than the expensive DX-Wire 10m mini mast. If I have to take 20 metres along, I’ll possibly just take the Inverted-V dipole rather than a vertical. First of all, I need to decide on a summit ….

73 – until (hopefully) the 19th. November 2016 for the SOTA EU-NA S2S activity event.

Preparation:

  With the 10m/6m challenge coming to an end, my score as an activator (only on 10m as 6m portable operation is not allowed in Germany), was looking a little “sad”, so I decided to activate another summit to get some 10m contacts. I had originally intended activating Zwieselberg above Bad Tölz however after my problems on Breitenberg the previous weekend, with the heat over midday, I didn’t want to repeat the same problems, rather chosing an easier summit where I could carry both bags of equipment to cover all needs.

During the previous week, I had been doing some testing using my existing Sotabeams linked dipole, using it set to 30m with some extensions to operate on 10m. Indeed I had tried this configuration out first at a local GMA summit DA/AV-071 Gagl-Berg and later in my garden, to get the extension lengths correct. So my intention was to take this configuration to Buchberg, but also have the Aerial-51 404-UL (OCF) dipole antenna along as a back-up.

I had planned on taking a set of end-fed half wave wire antennas along as well, as these are very light and pack up into a very small space, however I got so many different readings from the antenna analyser, I decided to leave them at home, until I can find what’s going on.

The Location:

Buchberg is also located near to Bad Tölz and hence an over 90 minutes drive from my home QTH. The route I knew from the last time I activated the summit in 2014, however this time rather than taking the shortest route suggested by Google (which required me to travel along a road displaying signs saying access only for forestry and farm vehicles), I decided to take the route that I had previously left the site by – via Bad Tölz, past the golf club. While this route is longer, it is a tarmacced (although only wide enough for one car for much of the route) road.

The Activation:

The activation went well. I found the location easily and managed to park off the (single track) road to avoid any issues with traffic. When I went across to the field, I say a path went directly across the field to the cross. I had expected to have to walk around the edge of the field as one normally does to avoid damaging any crops, however as there was a well worn track in place I took this to the summit cross. I suspect this track has been created by the mountain bikers that the farmer had complained to the previous activator about. Indeed during my activation a mountain biker, came up to the cross using this track. I suspect someone has created a cycling tour route via the cross. I can understand the farmers displeasure at this. At the moment the field is fallow, however when he wishes to grow a crop in it again, what will happen then? I had no visit from the farmer this year, I had met him last year when I activated the summit.

I deliberately started on 10 metres and as I checked my alerted frequency to make sure it wasn’t already in use, back came Karl M3FEH before I had even spotted myself. Karl was a booming signal, conditions on 10m were good. I managed to work 10 stations on 10m, the latter ones with some QSB coming in. Once the contacts on 10 metres ran out, I saw Kostas (SV2HJW/P on SV/MC-076) spotted on 20m, so went there and got a summit-to-summit contact with him and Christos(SV2OXS/P) who was on the same summit. I was just about ready to pack up when I saw that Luc (DL/ON7DQ/P) was up on DM/NW-026 on 40m, so down came the antenna again – in went the links and back up it went for another S2S. One last check on 10m – no more contacts but Jim EI9GLB kindly let me know that my 5w was still getting out well into Ireland, so conditions were still.OK and then I decided to pack up as I had chores to complete at home.

This turned out to be a very pleasant and satisfying activation. Nothing rushed, good conditions and all the equipment working as it should. I was especially happy with how well the 30 metre dipole with extensions worked on 10 metres.

Photos:

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Equipment:

Yaesu FT817ND.

SotaBeams Linked dipole, 30m secton modified for 3rd harmonic use on 10m.

Ramsey QAMP linear amplifier on 20 & 40m.

10 metre squid pole.

Log:

Conclusions:

While this was not a lightweight activation, I still need to sort out the EFHW antennas so that I can use them on future activations where there is a lot of walking involved. In all this was a pleasant activation, with a good set of contacts on 10m and no stress. All went to plan.

73 ’til the next Summit!

Preparation:

Having some time available and a good weather forecast, i wanted to get out and activate a summit again. If it could be close enough to where I live, I might even get some long path contacts back into Australia again..

I decided to take the standard equipment and stick to 20m SSB. So the FT817 (LIPO) battery was charged up, as was the 5Ah 3S LIPO that I use to run my small Ramsey amplifier, which I haven’t started my planned mods to, even though the parts arrived a couple of days before. Better to leave things working as they have been rather than change things with no fall back option!

The hill chosen is about an hours drive away and I had intended doing a “reccie” on the previous Sunday however I was quite ill that day and so I decided I would have to simply go by what I could see from Google maps and its satellite pictures.

The Location:

Buchberg is located not far away from Bad Tölz and across the road almost from the skilift up to the base of Zweisselberg, another SOTA summit that I would like to activate at some point.

The plotted route had me turning off the main B472 road on an unsignposted road and then running along the edge of a forest to the village of Buchberg and then taking one of several walking tracks to the summit. On looking at the layout, my fallback position would be to operate from within a forest just down from the summit as it is still within the AZ.

The Activation:

 The morning started well with sunny weather and not too much traffic. Of course I drove past the un-signposted road off the B472. For others intending to activate this summit, the road is about 200m before the Gastehaus Wiessweber, which is just before the big lake (called Hinterstauau).

The road off the B472 is a single track road but with a proper surface. On getting to the point where I should turn off on the track along the edge of the forest, I was faced with a sign that said access is restricted to farm and forestry vehicles only.. Not wanting to get locked up for trespass, I started to look for an alternative route.

At this point the farmer from the farm across the road came along with his dogs and I decided to ask him if there was another route to Buchberg. He immediately said ignore the sign, everyone uses that road and it’s not private. On that basis I decided that rather than calling off the activation I’d risk it. The track was a little rough however no where near as bad as several tracks I have driven along with my low clearance Peugeot 308 in Australia and now I have a Ford Galaxy family van which has at least twice the road clearance that the Peugeot had.

At the end of the track I came into the village of Buchberg which is actually just a farm. On the other side was the track that runs half way up to the summit but it was clearly marked as no through road and it looked as if I would not be able to turn around when I got to the end of it.

I decided therefore to go to my backup position near the forest which was on the road going out of the other side of Buchberg. This turned out to be a narrow however properly surfaced road that I used when I completed the activation. It ran down the hill into Bad Tölz passing the Golf Course and Buchberg Clinic and the on the way. For future activators this would be the way to get to Buchberg if you don’t want to risk the forestry track. Take directions in Bad Tölz to the Buchberg Clinic and then after the clinic turn left (there is a sign to Buchberg on this junction) go past the golf club and keep on winding up the road for probably about 5 kilometers and you will arrive at Buchberg..

Back to the activation site. I parked up off the road near the forest and looked around for somewhere to set-up. I could not find anywhere that looked like I could fasten the squiddy to and have the antenna clear of the trees without being definitely on a farmers land or right next to the (narrow) road. I then looked up to the summit itself to see a large wooden cross that the squiddy should be able to be strapped to without any great effort. So that was the choice, no secondary option, i would activate from the very summit. Given the cross being there and the footpaths listed to it on  the maps, this “should” be public access. I walked up the side of the field and across the top to the summit (you should never walk directly across a farmers field as you can damage the crop, whereas the edge of a field is often considered waste land). On arriving at the summit I found there was even a bench to sit on – LUXURY!

So I started to set up all the equipment as usual, trying to angle the antenna to allows a NW/SE radiation towards VK long path. Just down from the summit and not visible until you get to the summit is another farm / residence and after a while I got a visit asking what I was doing by a gentleman from this farm. After a few minutes discussion he was happy I wasn’t going to damage or steal the cross and so all was OK.

Now at last, time to start the activation….

I started on 20m trying to call some OE activators who were already on the air but I simply could not get through the pile ups. Even after one chaser kindly told one of the stations that they had a summit-to-summit call, they still could not hear me. With the mixture or QRM and deep QSB that was the story of this activation. I did manage one S2S contact into Spain but most other activators simply could not hear me. Later I found out that they were all running 100W RF while I was down in the noise with my 5-8W.

I called a couple of times specifically for VK chasers with no success however looking at all of the chasers I did work around Europe, I shouldn’t complain. Apart from the S2S into Spain, the other highlights were contacts with The Azores and Denmark, Norway & Sweden. The full log is shown below.

The real success of this activation was getting out in the fresh air and again enjoying some unbelievable  views. I have put together a gallery of some of the best views below.

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Equipment:

FT817ND

Ramsey QAMP amplifier

SOTABeams Linked dipole

Log:

Conclusions:

A good activation. it would have been better if I had managed a long path conrtact back into VK but with the band conditions, that just wasn’t going to happen. I think the next time I try this however I will start earlier which would at least avoid some of the heavy QRM from such a busy band. Perhaps next time I will have a 17m antenna made up so that I can switch to that (quieter) band.Unfortunately many of the VK chasers can’t operate on the WARC bands, so maybe 15m as well would be a good idea.

73 ’til the next Summit!