Estimated reading time: 7 minutes
Hello everyone! My name is Alexander Entinger and I’m holder of the ham radio call signs OE5LXR and OE3LXR (rarely used). I’ve gotten licensed in 10/2016 after exhibiting at the Maker Fair Bodensee with my company LXRobotics with the booth next to us being operated by the DARC. After speaking and getting to know the german ham radio operators I’ve decided to give the whole ham radio business a try myself …
My favourite ham radio activities are participating in the SOTA award program (mostly as an activator setting up HF and VHF radio stations on the top of mountains) or having a good old rag-chew on the local repeaters while driving. Due to antenna constraints I do not operate a station from home, so you’ll be hearing me either /portable or /mobile. The content on this website is therefore tailored towards portable ham radio.
Ham radio comes in many flavours and has many aspects which can be pursued. However, I personally love to participate in the Summits-on-the-Air (SOTA) award program. The SOTA award program consists of ham radio operators climbing on top of summits and establishing portable ham radio connections from there. Therefore this website contains pictures of many successful SOTA activations. I kindly invite you to take a look at them (all time, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024). Additionally, I’m maintaining a ever expanding and searchable SOTA tour database for most of the SOTA summits I’ve activated so far.
Upon reaching 1000 activation points you are entitled to a trophy and the honorific title of „Mountain Goat“. Although I’m not there yet my aspirations to ultimately achieve „Mountain Goat“ status are reflected in the logo and mascot of this website.
I am a member of the Austrian Military Radio Society (AMRS) subsection ADL-055 „Wels“. The current chairman of ADL-055 is Christian OE5HCE. He’s regularly publishing videos about his SOTA activations on his Youtube channel. Our shared passion for portable ham radio I ultimately led to my joining the AMRS subsection ADL-055.
The ADL-055 subsection has set its focus on providing emergency communication in the event of a crisis. As a result, our club station OE5XCL is provided with 6 solar panels and multiple rechargeable battery packs. This configuration allows for HF/VHF/UHF communication even in the event of a blackout. Furthermore our club station is configured as a Winlink gateway. Winlink is a ham radio provided service which allows sending and receiving digital communication (e.g. Email) worldwide via shortwave radio communication.
The G-QRP Club was formed in 1974 by Rev. George Dobbs G3RJV (SK). It is a a non-profit organisation run entirely by volunteers to promote low power radio. I learned about it by reading about it on the Bill Meara’s Soldersmoke blog. Since I am a QRP operator by necessity (no permanent antennas at home, mostly operating portable doing SOTA activations) and my interest in G-QRPs quarterly homebrew-centric SPRAT magazine it was pretty clear that I had to sign up.
My first QSL card which displays various versions of the featherweight class combat robot ‚Schnauzer‘ with which I’ve participated in various robot combat shows, placing 1st at Mad-Metal-Machines Vol. 19 as well as placing 3rd at Mad-Metal-Machines Vol. 20 and winning the European Robot Combat Cup 2015. Although I love both sending and receiving QSL cards at times I’ve found myself sitting on a large backlog of unwritten cards – until I learned how to automate my QSL card workflow.
In 2023 my initial stack of QSL cards showing the Featherweight „Schnauzer“ finally came to an end and I had to order a new stack of cards. I used the opportunity to revamp the QSL card design and it shows now the six-legged electric/hydraulic hexapod robot L3X-Z in it’s design and configuration how it participated at ELROB 2022.
Apart from SOTA I love to receive SSTV images from the ISS. The gallery below contains a collection of all ham radio awards which I’ve been able to aquire so far.
Since every ham radio amateur is investing considerable time and care into designing his or her QSL card every single QSL card that I receive is special and unique. The QSL cards I’m presenting here are therefore not in any way superior to other QSL cards but are precious to me for personal reasons (e.g. a QSL card from the International Space Station since I love anything space related).
Entinger, A. (2021), How to receive and decode images from the International Space Station, Arduino Functional Team Hardware/Firmware Workshop (Slides)
Entinger, A. (2021), Es’hail 2 / QO-100 – The first ham radio transponder in geostationary orbit, Arduino Functional Team Hardware/Firmware Workshop (Slides)
I’m looking forward to meeting you on the bands! vy 73 de OE5LXR!
6 comments
Franz Sonnleitner 21/07/2020
Danke für SOTA QSO vom Smrcina 73 OE5FSL Franz
Alexander Entinger 22/07/2020
Hallo Franz ;) Vielen Dank für deine Antwort auf meinen CQ SOTA Anruf! Bitte entschuldige die "Leere" auf dieser Homepage, sie ist derzeit noch im Aufbau befindlich ;) Liebe Grüße, vy 73 de Alex OE5LXR
Max Wagner 24/02/2021
Servus Alex, vielen Dank für das SOTA QSO am 23/02/2021 11:05 UTC. leider hatte ich Dir die falsche Referenz übermittelt. Da der Braunberg 912m ja ein GMA Berg geworden ist hat er auch eine GMA Referenz Nummer, OE0/OO-1208. Wünsche Dir alles Gute und viele Verbindungen bei SOTA. 73 de Max, OE5EIN
Alexander Entinger (OE5LXR) 24/02/2021
Servus Max, vielen Dank für die Korrektur - ich werde mein Log aktualisieren. Akustisch hatte ich zwar Braunberg verstanden, habe mich dann aber an die von dir durchgegebene Referenz gehalten (Breitenstein beginnt halt auch mit "Br" ;) ). vy 73 de Alex, OE5LXR
Franz 28/02/2021
Hallo Alex, freue mich schon auf den nächsten Mühlviertler über den QO100. Viel Erfolg beim Aufbau der Station und auf ein baldiges QSO über den Satellit. Findest ebenfalls Bilder von meiner Station in QRZ.com. 73&55 de Franz OE5HDM
Alexander Entinger (OE5LXR) 28/02/2021
Servus Franz, ich freue mich, dass du über meine Website gestolpert bist und einen Kommentar hinterlassen hast ;) Während ich beabsichtige ab nächster Woche auf dem QO-100 QRV zu sein so liegt der Sendebetrieb noch in etwas weiterer Ferne (Der von mir ins Auge gefasste AMSAT-DL UpCon6W UpConverter ist leider derzeit nicht lieferbar :( ). Die Bilder deiner QO-100 Station auf QRZ sehen hervorragend aus, mir gefällt wie du mit Liebe fürs Detail alles sauber aufgebaut und verbaut hast. Ich melde werde mich auf jeden Fall melden, sobald meine Station komplett ist ;) Liebe Grüße, vy 73 de Alex, OE5LXR