The September ARRL VHF Contest is coming up this weekend, September 13 - 15.
I'm going to try and take part in it, not sure for how long, but we will give it a try. The Rules can be found
HERE.
The problem we have here in Kingston is that we have very few clear high points that we can operate from, and for a VHF contest, you need some height.
Also this weekend is the annual North American SOTA Weekend. This event is a casual event involving portable battery-powered radios on mountain summits. It is not a contest but is intended to introduce “Summits on the Air” to newcomers with home stations who try to work summit operators during one or two days. There are no rules regarding power levels, modes or number of bands worked, but please be courteous when more than one station is trying to talk to a SOTA operator on a summit.
The SOTA operators can be found on the usual QRP frequencies.
Hopefully the weather and propagation will be on our side for these events.
Hi Bill,
ReplyDeleteI am hoping to play some in the VHF contest this weekend, single band 6m but I may get the FT-817 on the higher bands too but I only have a wee vertical for that.
Old Sol has been very active the past few days, an M class flare two days ago, an X class flare yesterday and two more near M class flares again today. Perhaps there will be some Es or tropo, perhaps some auroral even.
You don't always need height. Digi modes work well on 6m and 2m but you do need some power. There always seems to be a bit of tropo around and nearly always you can make meteor scatter contacts. I have been doing just that lately and working a couple or three new ones every time I get on.
cheers, Graham ve3gtc