Summits On The Air

As many (OK, all) of my friends know, I'm an Amateur Radio Operator, callsign KD7KUJ.  It's actually a pretty big deal to me, and anyone who faithfully follows my blog can expect to see quite a few posts about radio in the near future.

Recently, in my Geography Field Methods class, we took a 4 day field trip to Yosemite, the Alabama Hills, and the White Mountain Range.  I took my radio, and programmed the CARLA Repeater System (http://www.carlaradio.net/), hoping to stay in contact with some of my friends back in Reno when my cell phone wasn't working.  All in all, it was a fun trip.  I learned a lot about geography, saw some really cool geology, and even spent some time in the Alabama Hills, where a great many movies were filmed (In fact, we camped in that place between Germania and Spain where Russel Crow found renewed spirit to get home in Gladiator).  On the last day of the trip, we hiked to the peak of White Mountain, east of Bishop, CA.  From that peak, I talked to people throughout California via a repeater in Tonapah.  They mentioned that if they tracked such things, I would win the award for "Highest checkin to the system."  Well, that is certainly a pretty cool distinction, and I wanted to get more involved in that aspect of the radio art.


Summits On The Air (SOTA) is an achievment program where you earn points for "Activating" mountain tops on the radio.  The basic premise is that you hike to the top of a mountain with a radio and an antenna, and you talk to people from that peak.  More information about the program can be found at http://www.sota.org.uk/.  I have known about this program for quite some time now, but my experience on White Mountain really drove me to research it a bit more.  I think I'm addicted...

I know it's late in the year for this, but I want to start "Activating" summits every weekend that I can do so safely.  I wanted to do Mt. Rose last weekend, but timing didn't work out.  I guess Rose is out now that it's covered in snow (I'm not snowshoing up to the peak... I'm crazy, but not THAT crazy).  But there are plenty of other peaks in the area that won't be impossible to achieve year round;  I guess I should start coordinating with my friends ;)

Pacificon 2012

This weekend, Amber and I had the wonderful opportunity to go to Pacificon 2012, and the ARRL National Convention in Santa Clara, CA.  We were there primarily for pleasure, but we also took care of some business.

I recently developed a script that uses GDAL 1.9 to convert USGS Topo Quad DRGs to a format compatible with Google Earth and the AvMap G6.  There were some problems with my download process, and so some quads are missing accross the country, but I have posted to my website (kd7kuj.us) quads for the vast majority of the country.

Because of these map contributions, AvMap added me to the Beta testing team for their APRS model of the G6.  They also generously donated a G6, Kenwood TM-D710, and a Byonics TinyTrak4 so that I can become proficient with them and help provide support to the community.

The G6 and the TM-D710 arrived in the mail just in time for me to mount them in the car and program them to work with each other on the trip down to Pacificon.  I was extremely impressed with the combination;  Once configured, they work seamlessly together, and make a very strong in-vehicle navigation and communications system.

A few quirks about them:  Because I have recently been playing with CARLA, and because CARLA uses a dual tone system, I was disappointing to find that the TM-D710 doesn't support encoding and decoding 2 different tones.   The manual suggests that you can program an Odd Split, and that MAY support two tones... But I haven't tried it yet.  Also, the G6APRS beeps with every exit, with a popup notification saying to stay on the freeway...  I think the beep is excessive and can get annoying.  If anything, it has a tendency to cause one to tune it out; So that if something important DOES come up, your likely to miss it due to inattentiveness.  For what it's worth, while many people complain about the messaging features between the G6 and the Kenwood not working, I would argue that messaging isn't a feature most people use, and so it's not the end a big deal.

When down at the conference  Amber and I had the opportunity to put some faces with the names and callsigns we had been talking to on the air. It was a fabulous opportunity to socialize and learn some stuff...   Particularly, we rather enjoyed meeting the ARRL's education team;  Amber is a secondary education major, so the opportunity to see how Ham Radio can interface with a classroom was a fun experience.

We also got to spend some time together, and went over the hill into Santa Cruz for several hours of playing on the beach.   Really, I loved the trip, and look forward to going back next year!