so i finally picked a summit to activate for the first time, its W4T/SU-067 which is about a 3 mile hike from the trailhead, not too bad. ive been chasing for maybe 6 months now and figured its time to actually get out there and do one myself instead of just sitting at home logging other peoples spots.

my question is mostly about the summit reference and logging - do i need to pre-register the activation on sotawatch or whatever the site is called now, or can i just go up there, make my contacts, and log it after? i read something about alerting beforehand but i wasnt sure if thats mandatory or just kind of a courtesy thing. also is 4 QSOs really all you need or is that just the minimum, like is there some kind of grace period if you only get 3 because conditions were rough?

taking my ft-818 and a linked dipole i built last month, tested it in the backyard and it seemed fine. fingers crossed the weather holds, its been weird lately

congrats on going for it, first activation is always a little nerve wracking but youll do fine. to answer your question - alerting on SOTAwatch is definitely not mandatory, its just really helpful for chasers who are watching for spots. if you alert a day or two ahead, people will be looking for you and you'll get your 4 contacts way faster. that said plenty of people just show up, self-spot when they get signal, and work a pile pretty quick especially on 40 or 20 meters.

the 4 QSOs is the hard minimum, no grace, no partial credit unfortunately. so if you only get 3 the activation doesnt count for points. but honestly on a summit thats somewhat accessible and if you throw out a CQ on 7.032 or around there youll usually get a response within a few minutes, chasers are always listening. bring a backup band if 40 is dead, sometimes 2m FM saves the day if theres anyone local. good luck tomorrow, let us know how it went

yeah what he said about the 4 contacts. I did my first one last spring and was so paranoid about not getting enough QSOs that I ended up staying on the summit for like two hours and worked 22 stations lol. the linked dipole should serve you well, thats basically what most of us use. just make sure you can get it up high enough, i made the mistake on my first one of stringing mine too low between some scrubby trees and SWR was a mess. have fun with it