SSB Field Day
G4SLB Selsey Lifeboat Week
GB8SL Shoreham Lighthouse Special Event Station Member Profile – Alan Baker G4GNX Jonathan G1EXG’s Short Circuit No. 5 Presidential Profile Chris Smith G3UFS
Construction Contest Report
November - December
Worthing & District Amateur Radio Club Established 1948 Website: www.wadarc.org.uk
E-mail: info@wadarc.org.uk President: Chris Smith G3UFS
Life Vice President: Peter Robinson G8MSQ
WADARC meets every Wednesday at 8pm in the Lancing Parish Hall, South Street, Lancing BN15 8AJ. All who have an interest in radio communications and associate subjects, whether a licensed amateur or not, are invited. WADARC can also arrange training for the radio amateur Foundation, Intermediate and Advanced licences. The Club Officials are: President: Chris Smith G3UFS Chairman: Phil Godbold G4UDU Secretary: Andy Braeman M6RFE Treasurer: Sally Holland SWL The Committee Members are: Peter Head G4LKW Norman Jacobs 2E0RKO Andrew Cheeseman G1VUP Jonathan Hare G1EXG Alastair Weller 2E0IAW Dawn Manning 2E0DSK Pete Penycate 2E0FVL The following Members have volunteered to accept the listed special responsibilities: Ragchew Editor: Roger Hall G4TNT Website: Andrew Cheeseman G1VUP Membership: Pete Penycate 2E0FVL WADARC Club Nets (all times are local): 07.30
Sunday
3.725MHz ± QRM SSB
19.30 11.00
Monday 145.425MHz (V34/S17) Thursday 7.106MHz ± QRM SSB
CONTENTS Presidential Profile .................................................... 4 Editorial .................................................................... 6 Chairman’s Chatter .................................................. 7 SSB Field Day........................................................... 8 Member Profile – Alan Baker G4GNX ....................... 17 G4SLB Selsey Lifeboat Week ................................... 22 Construction Contest................................................. 24 G1EXG’s Short Circuits ............................................ 27 GB8SL Shoreham Lighthouse ................................... 28 Club Diary ................................................................. 30
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PRESIDENTIAL PROFILE n his inaugural Ragchew column, our new President takes a look back at his early life and explains how he first became interested in radio. I came to the notice of my parents on April 6th 1933, probably as a screaming lump of humanity. Nothing much happened until a few years later when during WWII I found myself becoming interested in radio, both listening and trying to build a one valve or a crystal receiver. However, it wasn’t until just after the war had finished that I obtained my first transceiver, the redoubtable Wireless Set 38, a small ex-army pack set that I seem to remember never getting to work properly. I also seem to recall a long time passing by, time which included youth clubs, girls, completing schooling, girls, starting work as an improver at a radio shop in Warwick Street, Worthing and then being called up into the RAF in 1951. It was in the RAF that my future career sort of took shape when I was trained as a Wireless Operator and posted to RAF Uetersen in North Germany as a member of the ‘Y’ Service, listening in to our opposite numbers on the East German/Soviet side. When I was demobbed, I returned to radio repairing, public address work and all things electrical. I didn’t pursue amateur radio until well after getting married and starting a family. In fact I could kick myself today for not obtaining my licence when I was first demobbed because my RAF trade experience would have given me an exemption to both theory and Morse tests. However, I did get my amateur licence in May 1965 and I joined WADARC in July 1965 and I’ve been a member ever since. My serious interest in amateur radio has always been and still is VHF although I did once build the famous Heathkit HW101 from a kit and worked around the world with it. I still have it and it still works.
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My very first QSO was on 4m and it was with my good friend Bob G3PUR. I think we were both using the B44, another very well-known piece of ex-army equipment, of which hundreds must have been sold by GWM Radio. When 6m became available to some UK amateurs, I applied for and obtained a permit in the second tranche, allocated on November 8th 1984. I had in the meantime joined the UK Six Metre Group as member No 85 in March 1984. To date I have only worked 88 countries and some 344 squares, but they were all on SSB phone. I do have the 50MHz Phone WAC, which is Worked All Six Continents, achieved using an Icom IC-575A at 10W into a 6m Discovery linear amplifier feeding 400W into a 6-element Yagi at about 40ft AGL when the tower is raised. I still very actively pursue 4m during the Sporadic E season and I have now worked 29 countries on that band. Lately I’ve been using an Icom IC-735 into a G3WPO transverter that goes to a homebrew QQV06-40 linear amplifier that then feeds into a 5-element Yagi that’s at approximately 30ft AGL. I’ve recently added a kit-built Elecraft K3 to my armoury and erected an inverted trapped L antenna for 40 and 80m and I hope to get some LF work in during the foreseeable future. Referring back now to my joining WADARC, it’s been a very interesting time over the years, in quite a few clubrooms; I think Lancing has been the longest tenancy. During that time the Club has achieved many high places in the numerous contests it has taken part in – long may it continue. And I hope to be a member for a long time yet! Being asked to be the President of our Club is an honour and I will do my very best to be available to all the membership and to the Club in general, including doing the washing up (I know my place!). 73, Chris Smith G3UFS
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EDITORIAL t’s October 31st as I’m writing this and I’ve just about finished this issue, which means I should be able to get it out on time. I’m just waiting for one lot of words to come in and then I’ll be all done. While I’ve been waiting, I’ve idly looked through the statistics for previous issues. The company we use to generate the turning-page version of Ragchew keeps all sorts of figures and it’s sometimes quite surprising what they show. For example, when I looked at the numbers for the May/June issue, I could see that apart from 179 readers in the UK, it was read by four people in America. I’ve no idea who they are or how they found it but they did. I could also see that most people read that issue on their desktop computer (76%) while 21% read it on their tablets and 3% used their smartphones. For the July/August issue, the percentages are 80% desktop, 17% tablet and 3% smartphone. Slightly more interesting is that we had three readers in Russia and one each in Spain, Saudi Arabia and Australia. The September/October issue hasn’t been available for long because it was late coming out but it still managed to pick up 74 UK readers and two readers in America. The figures I get are completely anonymous so I don’t know who the overseas readers are. They could be random people who are just stumbling across Ragchew by accident or we might have regular readers in those countries. If you are one of our overseas readers, perhaps you could get in touch and let me know if you read Ragchew regularly or if you just happened to find yourself on this page.
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Feedback As always, if you have any comments on the content or look of Ragchew, please let me know. My e-mail address is roger@radiouser.co.uk and if you’re reading this on your computer, you should be able to click on the address to open your e-mail program automatically. 73, Roger G4TNT
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CHAIRMAN’S CHATTER t’s the start of another new year with Worthing Radio Club and circumstances have dictated it will be different to last year but we already have a lot planned and it's going to be a very eventful time. We’ve just had a meeting where club members told us what they want from the club for the coming year and we also now have the results of our recent survey so we have a lot of data to work through. If you didn’t take part in the survey, you can find it online at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/TWZTJJP It’s very short and you’ll be able to complete it in just a couple of minutes. One thing it has shown already is that members are interested in home construction, which was also shown by the wide range of quality entries in this year’s Construction Contest. To further that interest, in February March and April next year Ron G3SKI will be giving three talks on the process of ‘build it yourself’ so let’s hope this will lead to lots of projects for next year. Members have also asked for more outside events or trips so please let me know if you have any ideas about where you’d like to go or what you’d like to do and we’ll see what we can arrange. I have some ideas of my own and I’ll let you know more about them once I’ve researched them a bit more.
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SSB Field Day The results are just in for the SSB Field Day – we didn’t win this year but we did achieve third place, which is very good considering the difficulties that come with being in the South of England. We never really get optimum conditions for this particular event but we did come first in our section last time so let's see if we can do it again next year. Club Nets Finally, I’d like to remind everyone once again that there are regular club schedules on 2, 40 and 80m – please do try and get on the radio and join in. The same few stalwarts always take part and it would be nice to add to the numbers. If you have an issue with antennas, there is usually a way to get something working and help is always available at the club to make it happen – just ask. 73, Phil G4UDU
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SSB FIELD DAY 2014 SSB Field Day with the Worthing and District Amateur Radio Club Graham Bubloz G4FNL
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SB Field Day has become a firm outdoor fixture for the Worthing and District Amateur Radio Club. It’s an annual competition where a group representing our club goes out into the wilds of Sussex, operates a radio for 24 hours continuously and competes with other groups and clubs around the UK Norman 2E0RKO, Roger G7VBR and Phil G4UDU setting up the two masts and the HF to see who can be doublet antenna. the best. This year, those involved included Phil G4UDU, Andrew G1VUP, Pete G4LKW, Vic G8MUQ, Norman 2E0RKO, Dawn 2E0DSK, Alastair 2E0IAW, Edmund M0MNG, Graham G4FNL, Bryan G3GVB and Roger G7VBR. We also had two visitors from the Horsham Club, Adrian G4LRP and Steve G4TPO, along to keep us company. I think I speak for everyone when I say that it was quite a challenge this year, both from a propagation perspective and because it was a rather steep learning curve trying to understand and learn how to use the new equipment (we used an Elecraft K3 – thanks to Andrew G1VUP for the loan his radio) and a 40m long doublet at approximately 15m high. We also tried operating in a different way this year and the ‘jury is still out’ on how effective that was. 8
Planning We held the usual planning meeting in July, where various tasks were allocated. This year, we welcomed new member Alastair 2E0IAW who kindly agreed to undertake the catering for everyone because our regular chef Rod M0RDV was unable to join us. As far as strategy goes, I am always keen to try to push the team a little further beyond our normal modus operandi and so in the meeting I made a suggestion that we consider adopting the ‘big knob, little knob’ mode of operating. To explain: this requires two operators to sit alongside each other with each operating a separate VFO/receiver on a single transceiver. The theory is that it should be possible to increase the score with two people actively searching the band, rather than just one as we have done in the past. If we decided to adopt this suggestion, it would need a different radio (than the Club’s Icom IC-756 Pro3) to be used and therefore it would be a more risky strategy. I think that the rest of the team humoured me with this idea and after some robust discussion, it was decided that we should give it a go. In order to make this transition we would somehow need to acquire or borrow a suitably proficient radio in the time between the planning meeting and the contest, which always takes place on the first weekend in September. I am very grateful to Andrew G1VUP, who very kindly agreed to allow his own Elecraft K3 to be used for this purpose, and to Phil G4UDU, who agreed to modify the Auto ATU and the headset switching box to allow this rather complex system to operate. We would also need internet access to the DX Cluster that is used to populate DX spots onto the logging system’s band map but we had achieved this in previous years and so were confident that at least this aspect would be feasible with little effort. We are extremely fortunate that within the membership we have a huge variety of skills. I mention this because whilst the main attention of the event is focused on setting up and operating an HF radio on SSB continuously for 24 hours, there are a large number of non-radio tasks and things to prepare as well. 9
One such item was the service requirements of the Club’s two petrol generators. We acquired these units from the local council a few years ago and have used them on an annual basis ever since. Unfortunately, they have not been fully maintained but, luckily, Norman 2E0RKO is a dab-hand with engines and machinery and he took it upon himself to service these units prior to the contest weekend. The end result was a very impressive dual-powered generator system, which allowed both generators to be available, but with only one running at any one time, which gave us 100% redundancy. We’ve never had that before. An added bonus was a significant reduction in fuel consumption. In the past, the generator would need topping-up with fuel every four hours. Following Norman’s magic touch, this was reduced down to once every six hours or even longer. Last year we achieved first place in the Restricted section category of the competition. Clearly, this time it was going to be a tall order to try to repeat that success. In addition, during the latter part of August we suffered the untimely death of John G8FMJ who was always a keen member of the Field Day team and an excellent operator. Several conversations were had regarding whether we should continue with staging the event after such a significant loss but we determined that John would have expected and wanted us to go ahead, and so it was… Friday We always arrange to have an advanced party to go to the Field Day site on the Friday afternoon before the weekend and this year Phil G4UDU, Andrew G1VUP, Norman 2E0RKO, Pete G4LKW, Roger G7VBR and Vic G8MUQ all met up on site at 3pm. Doing this advanced preparation allows plenty of ‘tinkering time’ on the Saturday morning to resolve any issues that might subsequently arise. The task of establishing the station is quite significant. As can be seen in the opening photograph, there are two 15m high masts to erect with a 40m long doublet suspended between them.
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In addition there are three tents, two generators along with the associated power and lighting cables plus all the radio and IT equipment to be set up. Our thanks go to Vic G8MUQ for installing a CCTV link and television between the operating tent and the catering marquee tent. This facility proved to be an excellent way of keeping anyone who was not operating in touch and involved with how things were going at the ‘sharp end’ of things. Several years ago, we learned that it was advantageous to have two separate environments – one for operating and the other to host the catering/mess tent. This arrangement prevents unnecessary noise and distraction for the radio operators. With the loss of John, we realised that we should look for some additional expertise to help us operate the station. This need was further exacerbated by the fact that we had elected to have two operators at the radio for most of the 24 hours. Our grateful thanks go to Adrian G4LRP and Steve G4TPO, who are members of the Horsham Amateur Radio Club and who kindly stepped up to the mark and agreed to come along to help us out. On Friday evening a few brave souls camped on the site overnight and kept an eye on the equipment. The weather had been good – at least it had not rained and the wind was down to a pleasant light breeze. Fortunately, that weather continued into Saturday and the start of the contest at 1300z. Saturday Early on Saturday morning Alastair arrived. He brought with him a trailer and car filled with large stainless steel cooking vessels and food. He was clearly taking the catering role very seriously, albeit he suffered several comments about the vast quantity of equipment he had The catering marquee and small encampment. provided. The gear took some 11
time to set up but it was not too long before the first cups of tea and coffee were produced. Alastair’s catering was flawless and he managed to feed and water the entire crew for the whole weekend. For the Saturday evening, we actually had a choice of meal; either a Thai green curry (that Andrew G1VUP had made) or a spaghetti Bolognese. This was indeed cordon bleu cooking… CCTV This photo shows the television monitor that was set up on a table in the mess tent by Vic G8MUQ. The video quality was excellent considering the low lighting levels and strange colourings (we operate from an orange tent). Another huge bonus was the addition of hi-fi sound that was also relayed from the operating tent. Due to the prominence of the TV it became a standing joke that from the operating tent all one needed to do was to ‘holler’ for tea (or coffee) and within literally just a few short hours, a cup would magically appear. Once again this year Edmund M0MNG agreed to come along on the Sunday morning, not to operate but to help with the catering chores. What a fine fellow. The video monitor showing Phil G4UDU setting up the radio. 12
As always, SSB Field Day coincided with the All Asian Contest, where your own age is a part of the contest exchange. This year WADARC is 66 years old so that would have to be stated each time we worked a station from Asia. We had several ‘script cards’ placed strategically around the operating tent with examples of typical contest exchanges (for both the All Asian and for SSB Field Day) to provide some support for those operators who are less familiar with the contest exchanges and to use as a prompt if needed. We had plenty of time to assess the radio propagation on the Saturday morning. The Solar Flux Index was at around 130 and consequently conditions were ‘unspectacular’. It seemed that our station, running just 100W to a wire dipole type antenna, was going to find the operating environment for the weekend rather challenging. When 1300z arrived, we were ready to go. Peter G4LKW and I were in position and we kicked off proceedings and stuck mainly to 15m with occasional visits to 20m. Our new ‘big knob, little knob’ technique was being used but how well it worked is for further discussion. We couldn’t make any impact on 10m – the band was dead and continued to be pretty much so throughout the whole contest. After the first hour, we had 29 QSOs logged, which was four down on the previous year. This was not a good endorsement for the new operating regime! Following the roster, we swapped operators with Andrew G1VUP starting but with Pete G4LKW remaining for reasons of continuity. The roster showing operator duties was posted on the side walls of the mess and the operating tents but it really was a guide more than a strictly maintained timetable. After a second hour of operating we were up to QSO number 69, which was 39 below the previous year. This was not looking at all promising. However, it was clear that HF propagation was clearly poorer than during the previous year so we picked ourselves up, dusted ourselves off and decided that we should continue to push ourselves to increase the overall QSO total. We continued with two operators in position. 13
The operating tent and doublet antenna.
In the early evening, Steve G4TPO arrived. He has great experience of taking part in the RSGB 80m club championship contests so was quite comfortable with Field Day. However, he was less familiar with the Elecraft K3 radio and that lack of familiarity similarly affected almost every other operator on our team. Unfortunately, Steve only had a limited amount of time that he could commit to the contest and by the time he left site at 2100z, he along with the other operators got our QSO total up to 241 with bursts of activity on 40m and 80m. Soon after Steve left we were joined by Adrian G4LRP who continued the good work with Andrew, Pete, Norman and Dawn alongside. Adrian also had time constraints but agreed to operate the late shift from 2100z to 0100z and these guys managed to get us to QSO number 383 at this time. We continued through the night when, as expected, the QSO rate dropped like a stone. In fact, in one of the hourly periods (when I was operating) we made just three QSOs! DX was a little hard to come by. We did work three USA stations, two on 40m and one on 80m. We also worked a number of stations in Asia and the Far East but overall most of the QSO traffic was with other European stations. 14
Sunday As the darkness ended, the QSO rate began to pick up once again. Our first HF QSO on the Sunday occurred at 06:10z on 20m where we had a QSO with VK4SJ. We carried on continuously cycling around the bands, trying to find new stations to work, mixed in with a good quantity of CQing. On the Sunday we were joined by Bryan G3GVB. It has been many years since he has taken part in this event and since then things have changed a lot, of course, but I was impressed by the fact that he came along, offered to help and got involved. We kept going throughout the Sunday morning but the QSO rate was low and finding any new ‘multiplier’ contact (i.e. stations in countries that we had not already worked before in the contest) was a struggle. Predominantly, this was because we had made contact with most of the competitors already and hence finding any new ones was much more difficult. Our last QSO in the log was on 40m at 12:58z – just two minutes before the end of the contest. The weather over the weekend had been very good and we managed to get the equipment packed away in the dry, which is always a bonus. Roger G7VBR once again came along to help tear down the station. Roger is someone who is quite happy not getting involved in the operating aspect but who is keen to help and very useful in the outdoor environment if you need to get something done with minimal fuss.
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Results Once the dust had settled and we’d turned off all the equipment, I looked at what we had achieved. We ended up with a total of 702 QSOs, with 106 DXCC countries, which is not at all bad for a weekend with just 100W and a wire dipole on SSB. Here are our claimed score figures from the weekend: BAND 3.5 7 14 21 28 Totals
QSOs 258 298 106 43 1 702
POINTS 1126 1169 388 109 2 2794
MULTS 23 28 35 19 1 106
SCORE
296,164
Table1: our vital statistics.
This score compares reasonably well with last year but the important question is – how well did everyone else do? Looking at the claimed scores that are posted online it is clear that nearly all QSO totals are down on last year and so accuracy and multiplier totals will play a significant factor in the overall results. Currently, going by the claimed QSO totals, we are in third place [the official result came in just after this was written and WADARC’s third place out of 28 entrants in the Restricted section has been confirmed]. We shall have to see whether using two operators using the ‘big knob, little knob’ technique was really better than using just one. My thanks go to those of you who kindly searched, found and worked us on the bands and to all the team who came along, got involved and managed to put on a decent show for the whole weekend, especially Dawn 2E0DSK for taking the photographs that appear in this article. 73, Graham G4FNL 16
MEMBER PROFILE In the first of a two-part feature, we learn about the life and interests of Alan Baker G4GNX. The second part will appear in the next issue.
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pparently I was always 'into' electrics and how things worked ever since I poked my first pair of pliers into the mains socket at the age of three! I first became interested in radio when as a child I built a crystal set from a kit and listened to it on headphones or shared the experience by putting a headphone in a tin bucket to amplify it. In those days it was possible to listen to police transmissions at the top end of the VHF broadcast band and if you were lucky enough to get the right operator, the descriptions were more thrilling than listening to Dick Barton. Two-way DX communication for me then was limited to two tin cans and a piece of string or yelling out of the window! I was also interested in playing music, especially organ/keyboards. Sputnik I guess I first became interested in amateur radio back in the 1950s whilst visiting an uncle who was licensed as G3NDF. I didn't always appreciate what he was doing but one day he introduced me to Sputnik, the newly launched Russian satellite. Every time it passed by on its orbit, its bleeps could be heard on his old Halicrafters communications receiver. In fact when he went silent key, his son was kind enough to donate that receiver to me and I used it for a while. While growing up, studying, getting a job and getting married, the radio interest was always there and I used to listen to short-wave transmissions on a single stage receiver with a BFO, built for me by Ralph G3NDF. Thoughts of transmitting went on the back burner, even through my days as a television engineer, until the mid-1970s. I'd changed jobs and was working for a company that used low band PMR for their mobiles – mostly Pye Westminsters. It then dawned on me that you can speak to other people on these things, albeit to a very limited audience. The bug must have really bitten and I started to seriously look into amateur transmissions for my own use. I'd moved to Newhaven and most of my days were spent on the road so I purchased an old Storno VHF boot-mounted transceiver and
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installed a single crystal to receive on 145MHz, which was the local calling and chat frequency. As crystals were so expensive, I didn't install one for transmitting. Soon after, I joined MSARS, which used to meet at Marle Place in Burgess Hill, because it was the closest amateur radio club to my home. Club members were always eager to impart radio knowledge and I was, of course, introduced to Louis Varney G5RV and we became good friends. In fact, one day Louis actually gave me a Racal RA17 general coverage receiver, which I subsequently used to listen to commercial and amateur slow Morse transmissions. In the meantime, I purchased an old Pye Cambridge (ex-taxi) VHF transceiver to replace the Storno and crystalled it up for four channels transmit and receive in readiness for taking the RAE and acquiring my first ticket. Not content with the Cambridge as it was (initially single channel and a bit deaf), I replaced the receiver front end and installed switches to change channels from the front panel and took steps to rid it of the dreaded alternator whine that many of them suffered from. It was all good experience. Around that time I went on holiday to Blackpool and actually got to play the famous Blackpool Tower Wurlitzer under the auspices of the then resident organist, Ernest Broadbent (Reginald Dixon had retired) – this will become significant later. Whilst in the North West, I slipped across to Liverpool to collect the extra crystals for the Cambridge from my favourite supplier of the day. Alan at the Blackpool Tower organ. RAE Soon after, I attended Richard Canning's City & Guilds RAE classes at Marle Place. They were supposed to last a full year in two six-month stages but I couldn't wait and I decided to take the exam after the first six months, figuring that if I failed, I could always take another exam six months later. The RAE then was in two parts and there was no multiple choice! The questions must have been kind to me that day as I passed both parts, one with a Credit and the other with a Distinction. Patience has never been one of my virtues and the wait for the passslip and subsequent application for a licence seemed interminable.
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However, after a few weeks I was licenced as G8LGQ in 1977 but realising that nobody knows it all, I continued with the RAE classes for the further six months of the rest of the course and gained a lot of useful knowledge. One great pleasure was to actually 'work' Richard Canning on 2m FM – it was Richard on the air and Mr Canning in the classes. I never did figure out why he was known locally as Fred Canning. I also moved on to the ubiquitous ‘Woppo Box’, a 10-channel mobile FM transceiver designed by Tony G3WPO who supplied construction diagrams and instructions. The Queen's Silver Jubilee was also in 1977 and we were granted a licence prefix extension of 'E' (for Elizabeth) so from June 4th to 12th, I was able to operate as GE8LGQ and I had a few QSL cards made by Ern G8BDJ to celebrate the occasion. One of the highlights of the year was VHF National Field Day and we all trooped up to the site at Clayton, loaded up with gear. This was hazardous unless you had a Land Rover because the narrow track up the steep hill was muddy and littered with rocks and, of course, it always rained the night before! A lot of good contesting experience, especially listening in the noise, was gained from those times, as well as knowledge of generator maintenance and how to ward off inquisitive cows. Home Station Of course VHF DX from lofty perches is fun but there was always the desire to do the same from home – well almost. A rotator was duly purchased (I still have the old CDE control box if anyone needs one) and I parked a 4-element cubical quad for 2m on the stub pole with an Antec half-wave ground plane on the top. All this was attached to the side of the house on a couple of hefty brackets, overhanging the street. I bought a Yaesu FT-221 multimode VHF transceiver, which was duly modded with a better front end device and I built a pre-amp that could be switched in for very weak signals. Luckily, even with all of the surrounding buildings, the noise floor was zero in those days. We decided to replace the 100-year-old slate roof with tiles and at the same time, remove the chimney, which was no longer in use, and move the antennas off the side wall to the centre of the roof. That way the
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antennas were entirely over my own property. A local plumber friend made me a lead boot to replace one of the tiles and a longer pole was attached to a 4x2 stud inside the attic. That was one of the best moves I made because that array survived the 1978 hurricane without a murmur. I was never really happy with that 4-element quad so I decided to replace it with a Jaybeam 8-element crossed Yagi with which I worked many countries on VHF, including Yugoslavia and a 'nearby' Russian. The outlook east was fair with one hill about half a mile away and the Wrotham beacon was regularly heard. West was atrocious because I was almost at the bottom of the hill. South was good and I was lucky to look fairly well up the valley to the north. During lift conditions, a few northern repeaters could be heard (useful as beacons) and occasionally stations in Lerwick and Aberdeen were contactable via the Aurora Borealis curtain. I was told by Ron Ham (a local radio astronomer and broadcaster) that during the 1930s, the Northern Lights could regularly be observed with the naked eye in Storrington, mostly because a lack of street lights meant there was almost no glare. Ron Ham wrote a regular column for Practical Wireless and had a regular broadcast slot on BBC local radio, which I was fortunate enough to appear on several times to promote amateur radio. I would sometimes sit in my lofty shack listening for anything unusual and I’d often phone Ron at some ungodly hour to report it. Ron was also the founder of the original radio section at Chalkpits Museum, Amberley and although Ron was never licensed, he and Gerry Brownlow G3WMU set up the original amateur radio station at Amberley. Morse Test Not content with VHF phone, I started to practice for the Morse code test, mentored by my good friend Alf G4DQS. In those days, the test was set at 12 words per minute and it was the only way to gain a full licence, allowing me onto the HF bands. It was never easy and at first it was just a means to an end but later I came to enjoy CW and regularly used it to make regular 20m contacts with VK and other countries as well as many contacts on VHF. The Morse test itself was a nightmare. I travelled to North Foreland (Broadstairs) and took my own straight key with me. The rules then were that you had to use a straight key but you could take your own as long as it had a 1/4 inch jack plug to connect to their equipment. Mine had one but when I got there I found that their equipment didn't! I think it was
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the examiner's personal key that was offered to me as the alternative and I found that it was extremely light and off-putting. I mentioned this to the examiner and as he tried to adjust it for me, its spring suddenly shot out across the floor. The poor guy was embarrassed and I was quaking in my boots. While he went off to get a pair of pliers, I tried using his key without the spring in it, which I actually mastered quite successfully, so when he returned I took a rather shaky test with my left hand applying the necessary upward pressure to my right arm. I made one mistake in the sending, due to the shakes, and was duly passed as fit. I must admit to driving home with a sense of smug satisfaction! About two weeks later I obtained my Class A (Full) licence with the callsign G4GNX, which I have retained ever since. We had to pay for licences in those days. I seem to remember it cost about £12 annually. HF Activity In the meantime, I had purchased a new Yaesu FT101 transceiver for the HF bands. As it could run from a 12V supply, I used it in the car for a while. The antenna was an American Webster Band Spanner, which was attached to the car’s ‘fender’ with a huge, square chain. It had changeable sections for different bands and it was huge, low bridges were definitely to be avoided and enclosed car parks were impossible. Most of my HF activity was carried out from home. My postage stamp garden was so small that there was nowhere to install any kind of efficient antenna, especially for the lower frequencies so I strung up a long wire in a horizontal Vee configuration, out across the street at one angle to a neighbour's barge board, then back to a neighbouring outbuilding at about 45 degrees. With a KW Ezee-Match ATU, that wire served me well until I eventually moved away. I had regular weekly CW skeds with VK and worked many other countries on SSB and CW. I was probably the last UK station to work Iran before the last of the operators was banned after the Shah left the country. [Coincidentally, in the next two issues of Practical Wireless there is an article called EP2SL: The Last Amateur in Tehran. In it Steve Telenius-Lowe PJ4DX, who was working in Tehran in the time leading up to the Iranian revolution and the overthrow of the Shah, tells the story of his time there, the station he operated and the part amateur radio played in the evacuation of the British embassy in Tehran. Ed.] (The concluding part of Alan’s profile will appear in the next issue of Ragchew.)
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G4SLB Selsey Lifeboat Week
A
s we have done for the last few years, Pete G4LKW and I arrived at about 1630 on the Friday to set up our amateur radio station for the weekend. Again we were in the compound next to the inshore boathouse, where we set up our tent and gazebo, our operating centre and home for the weekend. This year we had the benefit of a pneumatic mast to support the antenna at a height of 40ft, with thanks to another member who was away on holiday. This was very helpful as we were a bit short of space owing to the ‘Time Team’ events going on within the compound, prior to the start of rebuilding work for the new station. We had everything set up by about 1900 so it was time for the field kitchen to come into play for our evening meal. That over and done with it was time for radio. We had a good run of contacts before we took a break to watch the fireworks. Then it was back to the radio and they were still calling us when we had to admit at 2345 that it was maybe better if we got some sleep, after all we still had two more full days ahead of us!
Saturday On Saturday morning we got up at 0600, sorted breakfast (ah, the smell of bacon first thing in the morning) and then we were ready for radio at just after 0700. Conditions were not in our favour but being close to the sea helps the signal so we were soon making some contacts. We managed to stay on
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the same frequency for about 11 hours. Saturday evening was a bit slow and we were working hard to make contacts and at 2200 it got the better of us so we gave up for the day. Sunday On Sunday we were up at 0600 to see a lovely day dawning (well weather wise anyway – radio conditions turned out not to be so good) Never mind, at least it gave us the chance to have a proper look at what else was happing on the day for the first time since we started the event four years ago, and very good it was too! We decided to start packing away at 1600 and I was back at home, car unloaded and indoors by 1845, tired but happy. Over the course of the weekend we made a total of 356 contacts covering UK and Europe. On Sunday I was interviewed by Spirit FM and hopefully gave their listeners some idea of what we were doing. Thanks to Selsey Lifeboats for allowing us to play in your back yard again, to those of you who popped in to see us and to the other stations who called on the radio. We hope to see you all again next year, but maybe not in quite the same place! With special thanks to Pete G4LKW, RNLI Selsey and all our visitors who put money in the bucket! 73, Pete 2E0FVL – boathouse attendant and radio amateur.
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CONSTRUCTION CONTEST
O
n Wednesday October 22nd we had our annual construction contest evening. We always hope for variety of projects and this year we certainly had a good selection of entries.
Alan G4GNX - 2m DF antenna with RF mixer interface.
Alan G4GNX - USB rotator control interface.
Chris G3UFS - microphone audio interface.
Ron G3SKI - 40m SSB/CW Transceiver.
Dave G1OCL Long Wire Unun.
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Bryan G0SIU Rotator stub mast adaptor.
Jonathan G1EXG - Nuclear Quadrupole Resonance (NQR) spectrometer.
Jonathan G1EXG High Frequency Audio Blaster.
Jonathan G1EXG - Bat detector
Andy M6RFE 40 CW QRP Transmitter Chris M1BMR 2m DF Antenna
Alastair 2E0IAW KX3 Panoramic adaptor plus USB key control interface
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Scoring this year was a little different to previous construction contests. Each club member present was given a voting slip and asked to allocate three points to the item that they thought should be in first place, two points for second place and one point for third place. When all the points were added up, the results were: 1st (with 48 points)
Ron G3SKI
40m Transceiver
2nd (with 34 points)
Alastair 2E0IAW
KX3 Accessories
3rd (with 28 points)
Jonathan G1EXG
NQR Spectrometer
Many thanks to all of you who put in the effort of both keeping home construction alive and bringing your projects to the club. The standard was exceptionally high this year and many of the projects would have won the contest in previous years. Next year Ron G3SKI will be giving a series of talks on home construction. They will be spread over three months and the aim is to help you with planning, building and completing radio projects. Next year’s competition should be interesting! Phil G4UDU
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G1EXG’S SHORT CIRCUITS
J
onathan Hare G1EXG follows his brief explanation of how diodes work in the last issue with a look at a practical diode rectifier circuit.
Short Circuit No. 5: The Bridge Rectifier
A single diode can be used to turn AC into DC but it will only pass the positive or negative part of the cycle (see Short Circuit 4). If you want to convert both the positive and the negative parts of the AC cycle into DC (for maximum efficiency), then you need to use a bridge rectifier. This is often represented by the diamond shaped symbol (circuit A). The bridge is made up of four diodes as shown in circuit B. Because of the wiring, only two diodes will conduct at any one time. You can see how it works in diagrams C and D: in the positive half of the AC cycle (when the AC voltage is say 1 = + and 2 = -), two diodes conduct feeding the current to the output as shown. In the negative cycle (e.g. 1 = - and 2 = +), the other two diodes conduct, but because of the way they are wired, they swap the current so we still get a positive voltage on the output. Note: if the bridge is feed with 50Hz AC, each half cycle will create a pulse on the output. Thus the full wave rectification creates 100 Hz ‘DC’ pulses on the output so we need a capacitor to smooth this to create DC. In forward bias, a silicon diode will drop about 0.6V so as there are always two diodes that are conducting at any one time, we will thus, unfortunately, get about 2 x 0.6 = 1.2V voltage drop lost in the bridge rectifier itself. 73, Jonathan G1EXG
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GB8SL Shoreham Lighthouse 2014
T
his was a good event with plenty of support from club members. My thanks go to all of you who operated, logged, set up, took down or just visited. Also thanks go to the Shoreham Rowing Club for the use of their facilities and their electricity. The equipment we used was the club’s Icom IC-756 Pro III, the Tokyo Hi-power Linear and the W3DZZ Trapped Dipole, which was centred on Norman 2E0RKO’s hydraulic mast which was holding the centre up at 40ft. The club’s Gala tent had Pete G4LKW’s frame tent pitched inside it to give a bit of definition both to the display of the rig and the computer screens, which were being used for the first time at this event for computer logging based on Log4om. Initially, there were a few teething problems but we are slowly getting more familiar with the technology.
Contacts Notable lighthouses this year included many old friends such as Castle Point lighthouse in North Island, New Zealand, Point Fermin in San Pedro, California USA and Slankop Point in the republic of South Africa. The most exiting QSO of the whole weekend for me was with E51JD Jim on Raratonga in the Cook Islands at 0615z on Sunday on 20m. Another very interesting contact was with HB9DAX/p at a lighthouse (pictured) built on the Oberalp Pass 2046m up near the source of the Rhine.
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Over the weekend we made 425 contacts in 33 countries, including England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, Ireland, France, Belgium, Denmark, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, European Russia, Austria, Switzerland, Croatia, Slovenia, Hungary, Italy, the Czech Republic, Spain, Portugal, South Africa, America, Brazil, Chile, the Cook Islands, New Zealand and Australia. The 51 Lighthouse and Lightship stations we contacted were activating a total of 58 The lighthouse built on the Oberalp Pass Lighthouses and Lightships in 18 countries. The stations were Belgium (1), Denmark (1), England (10), Finland (1), France (1) Germany (5), Ireland (3), Italy (2), the Netherlands (4), New Zealand (1), Northern Ireland (3), Portugal (2), Scotland (8), South Africa (1), Sweden (1), Switzerland (2), United States (1) and Wales (4). Now we’re looking forward to August 2015. Pete G4LKW
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CLUB DIARY NOVEMBER ........... 2nd ......................... Monthly breakfast meeting at the Rainbow Café 12th ........................ 80m CC Sprint SSB Contest 12th ........................ Discussion Evening 19th ........................ Talk by Graham M3ZGS of bhi on New Advancements in Noise Cancellation 26th ........................ GX3WOR On-The-Air evening 27th ........................ 80m CC Sprint CW Contest
DECEMBER........... 3rd .......................... Discussion Evening 7th .......................... Monthly breakfast meeting at the Rainbow Café 10th ........................ What is it? Quiz hosted by Peter G8MSQ 17th ........................ WADARC Christmas Evening at the British Legion Club in Lancing 31st ........................ No Meeting – Hall Closed
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