With
lockdown over it was exciting to be able to go out portable and actually enter
points in the July SHF UKAC. Unfortunately, I had a work zoom call late with
the USA. I arrived at Britwell Hill (IO91LO) just before 9pm and by the time
I'd set-up, the first 2 hours of the contest had been missed, leaving only 1
hour of operating left!
The car was jam
packed with 4 sets of kit for 9cm, 6cm SSB, 6cm 6cm WBFM and 3cm. On arrival it
was still very windy, so for safety reasons I just put up the 1m Gibertini and
the 60cm Grid Dish at 5m tied to the farm gate. The 6cm Grid Dish was fed with
5m of LFF-450 which seemed to make a difference.
 |
| A Busy Hour at Britwell Hill |
I
called out on Zello (SHF Chat) but no one responded. I'd forgotten to bring 2m
talkback so my only hope was ON4KST chat. Within a few minutes of meeping
various folks, my first QSO completed with Neil G4BRK in Abingdon (IO91HP,
24Km), quickly followed by Anthony G7LRQ in Watford (IO91TQ, 47km). Contacts
flowed surprisingly easy with the Pluto SDR system with Neil G4LDR in Salisbury
(IO91EC, 69km) and then finally David M0GHZ in Chippehham (IO81VK, 83km) for my
ODX. I ran out of time to try and work G4ODA, G4CLA and my 6cm WBFM kit wasn't
working so 2E0MDJ/P and G0LGS/P on Cleeve Hill were missed. I was pleased with
4 contacts and 223km points. On a good evening and operating for the full 3
hours potentially another 395km points (618 total) might be achievable.
On 3cm, tuning
around I was amazed to hear Stewart G0LGS/P calling CQ! His signal from Cleeve
Hill (IO81XW, 79km) was outstanding, end-stop on the bigger dish. I was please
to confirm my offset to be 13KHz - it's always great to test with a local
station first. Next in the log was Dave G4ASR/P near Ross-On Wye (IO82LB,
147km) for my ODX. Dave was much stronger on the 1m dish compared to the 60cm
once peaked. Easy QSO's followed with G4LDR, Matt 2E0MDJ/P and M0GHZ for a
total of 457km QSO points. I could not grab the attention of G4CLA, G4ZTR and
G4ODA so potentially another 374km points (831 total) might have been added,
given more time.
It was very enjoyable and great fun to get out again, even if only for an hour.
I was pleased with 9 QSO's on 2 bands. Mobile data reception was poor, and this
meant ON4KST froze, logging me our several times which did not help. Maybe next
time I will take 2m and call on 144.390MHz, to see if anyone answers!