SOTA Equipment demo at Suffolk RED

I was invited to Suffolk RED last evening for the opportunity to demonstrate the sort of equipment I take up hills for SOTA purposes.

For those who don’t know, Suffolk RED (Radio and Electronics Development) is a monthly supra-club event, now into its fourth year, which has proved very popular in East Anglia. The premise is simple: rather than a boring talk in a local radio club, once a month people with something to show can take a table, lay out their goods, and people just mill around, talking, and looking at what is on the tables. Visitors come from a range of local radio clubs. It’s a great opportunity to talk and discover new aspects of our fascinating hobby.

And that’s where my table fitted in. I was next to Rob M0VFC, who was showing off the lightweight kit he had taken to Norfolk Island a couple months ago, while my set of gear was slightly different (no Juma amp and more navigation aids!). It should be noted that my equipment list isn’t particularly special, nor is it perfectly weight optimised (I still use RG-8 Mini coax instead of RG-174, for example). The event was a great starting place for introducing some people to SOTA, however.

So here’s what I took:

SOTA gear on the table at Suffolk RED

From left-to-right:

The radio equipment:

10m DX-Wire fibreglass pole
FT-60 handheld
Bungee (useful for attaching the fibreglass pole to trig points, fences, etc.)
30m dipole on kite winder
SOTA Beams guying kit with high visibility cord on kite winder
RG-8 Mini coax
Tent pegs
IC-706Mk2G with sports headphones (which don’t fall out in the wind) in a waterproof bag
Palm Paddle CW key
4.2Ah 4 cell LiFePo4 battery (14.4V fully charged)
Waterproof notebook with pencils for logging
Insulating tape
SOTABeams 3 element 2m yagi