SOTA Expedition to Tinto Hill and Hill of Stake
May 2004
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| During early May 2004 we did a 3-day SOTA expedition which included Tinto Hill GM/SS-064, followed by a visit to the Magnum Rally at Irvine, and rounded off with an activation of Hill of Stake GM/SS-155. | ||||
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| Tinto Hill: It was close to freezing with low cloud and drizzle. We made the contacts and got out of there as quick as we could. In case you are wondering, that's me in the picture, using the fishing half-dome shelter to keep the rig and myself out of the wet! The highlight of the activation was that on the way down from the hill we worked GM7PKT/P who was on GM/WS-037, and that contact brought me to over 1000 SOTA Chaser Points and Shack Sloth status! | ||||
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On the following day we attended the
Magnum Rally in Irvine. It was great to see the
rally back after an absence of several years. The
best part of the event was, as usual, the
opportunity to put faces to the names and
callsigns that we had spoken to many times. This
included the famous 3 SOTA-teers of Scotland: , and here they are on the SOTA stand:- |
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The the following day we headed north
and found ourselves in Muirshiel Country Park
which includes another SOTA hill, namely Hill
of Stake GM/SS-155, which we managed to
activate after a long slog across peat bogs and
open ditches. In case you are wondering about the
mast leaning over. It is DJ9SQ fibreglass
telescopic mast which extends to some 7.5 metres.
It supports a 2x10 metres doublet at about 4 or 5
metres in the centre which is fed with 300 ohm
ribbon cable. The 2 ends of the doublet are tied
to nylon cords acting as insulators, which in
turn are then pegged to the ground or fenceposts;
whatever is conveniently to hand. By allowing the
wind to hold the mast against the guy'ing effect
of the 2 legs of the doublet the whole thing
stays in the air; unless of course there is a
sudden total change of wind direction. This set-up
is fed through an MFJ971 matching device, and it
works on all bands from 80 to 10 metres including
the 5 MHz channels. |
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Page updated 5th of July 2010 |
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© GM0AXY |
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