ACØPR, ham radio blog: Summits on the Air ATNO Granite Mt., rough one, still problems on 40m

This is yet another unactivated summit that I have left until now--mostly because I knew it was going to be tough. There's not an easy approach. I have scouted it a couple of times and finally felt ready to tackle it. From my last troubles with the QCX Mini on 40m, I did some testing at home and all was well, but not so much when on the summit. Focus on using the UMPP-1 key (from GM0EUL).

In the area:

This is W7U/WS-025, Granite Mountain, very close to the town of New Harmony. It's just barely in Dixie National Forest to the north of the town. From my previous scouting of the mountain, I knew I would be going up the northeastern face (far right side of photo above). I had considered for a long time going up the south (left side) and getting up to the saddle between the lower peak and the summit, but with eyes on I decided not to go that route.

There is a wide trail (used to be an ATV trail at some point) up through the lower portion to get to the

base. Once at the base though, there is no trail. It is rocky with lots of dead trees, bush and desert plants among the few trees and lots of scrub oak. It was about 1,400' vertical feet, while not a lot for a mountain, it is in the upper end of hikes that I normally take. That combined with the roughness, steepness of the hike, made it a challenge. As I tend to do, I had the general route that I wanted to follow in mind, but I also break it down piece by piece as I proceed, and even step by step to make sure I'm careful and safe on the way up (and down, which is very often more challenging and risky). I had the choice of more rocky and steep, or a little more gentle but bushwhacky. I took the rocky and steep route up, and the other on the way down. If I were to ever do it again (which I won't), I think I would do the same again.

There were a few sketchy parts with scrambling requiring hands and feet climbing. Little by little, I made my way up the face and knew that the high, rocky point I was using to guide me was not the summit, but rather a false summit that would point me to the right way once I reached it. I didn't have the actual summit in view until I was within 100' vertical feet of it, but it was exciting to reach that point. I reached the top earlier than planned and got setup. There was a geocache on the top, but it wasn't completely closed and had lots of water, so the document inside was close to ruined.

On the air:

I used my 20m dipole with 40m "extenders" made of 30 gauge wire for the antenna this time. The full

30 gauge linked dipole works well, but it's a pain since it acts a lot like fishing line and can easily get twisted and tangled. The same happened with the extenders I made. Today was the 10-point madness in AZ (activators there go to 10-point summits and get lots of high point summit-to-summit contacts), so lots everywhere want to get in on the action as well.

Because of that, I planned on starting on 40m to get them and then go to 20m for farther parts of the

US. Once I finally got setup and took a few pictures, I was at the time I had put in my alert (15:30 UTC or 9:30am local time). My 40m radio had the exact problems as before. I would start to send, then just beep, then nothing at all. Very frustrating! I worked great at home. I tried a few things, and couldn't get it. I missed a summit-to-summit while messing with it. I started getting worried I wasn't going to activate, so I moved to the 20m radio, changed the antenna for 20m and got on. Luckily in just a couple of minutes I had the summit activated and even got two summit-to-summit contacts (Georgia and Virginia). I got as far as North Carolina.

After getting eight contacts and then no answer to my CQ, I moved back to 40m and decided to chase to

go to those on summits. Even if I had to do it by straight key, at least I would get contacts. I saw George, KX0R, a regular, was on summit. I gave him a call, he replied and gave me a 579. As I was answering, the keying stopped again. One thought was to unplug and replug and at least send a report. I did that, but didn't noticed the frequency reset. So I was able to send the report before it stopped again, but I wasn't on the right frequency so he didn't get it. Annoyed, ticked off, I decided to just take the activation as is and leave it at that. I knew it was going to take a long time to get back down and the sun was up and getting warm. I did a bit more video/picture taking, ate a granola bar, and carefully worked my way back down the mountain. As mentioned, I took the brushy route instead of the steep one. Good idea for going down. It took a while, and I was getting hot, but I made it safely and saw the pickup. Tough!

Video of the activation

Time	Callsign	Band	Mode	Notes
15:37	W9VNE	14MHz	CW
15:37	WA5OBV	14MHz	CW
15:38	N4EX	14MHz	CW
15:38	NJ0Q	14MHz	CW
15:39	W5GDW	14MHz	CW
15:40	N1RBD	14MHz	CW	S2S W4G/HC-005
15:42	AC1Z	14MHz	CW	S2S W4V/BR-009
15:43	AC7P	14MHz	CW