Mike has a love of all things outdoors – in particular hiking, biking, backpacking and cross-country skiing.  It is no wonder then that he earned the title of 4X Mountain goat at the end of May on Waterman Mountain (W6/CT-012), one of his favorite peaks.  He began his first SOTA activation in the summer of 2021 and became a 1X Mountain Goat in a record-breaking year.  This intensity has been maintained to the present date.  Mike is one of a few “Ham Couples” in that nearly all his SOTA hikes are done with his XYL, Lorene W6LOR.   If there is snow in the Mammoth area, they can be found alternately cross-country skiing and doing SOTA summits.  As soon as the snow melts, however, they switch gears and focus on higher SOTA summits.  Mike and Lorene have been known to do some taller peaks, such as W6/CD-001 White Mountain, a 10-point summit at 14,235 ft.  Mike’s favorite summits, however, are those that offer a quiet serene setting.  Mt. Throop and Waterman Mtn. in the San Gabriel range, and the taller peaks in the Inyo range are some of his favorites. 

When not SOTA hiking, Mike enjoys building and testing specialized equipment for SOTA.  In recent months he purchased and packaged a transverter board to convert his KX2 into a VHF-capable rig ready to tackle the SOTA 2026 weak signal challenge.  Often, when you speak with him, he has just built and is now testing out a new antenna.  This could be a linked dipole, delta loop, or one of the many others he has tried.  He has built a 40m cw radio from scratch, and most recently worked with N6ARA on a 2m QRP filter, now available on Ara’s on-line web store.  He has recently started a blog, and you can find some of his projects there, at soldertosummit.com

We congratulate Mike on his 4X and we look forward to continued stories of his home-brewed radio gear and hikes.

Preview image: Home brew Yagi