UKFM Group (Western)

Following the failure of the original (28 years old) colinear aerial and after
that of a 20 month delay, last November 2010 the order for the replacement GB3VT
aerial was placed with Jaybeam and some six weeks later the new aerial was duly
delivered.

Waiting for a suitable break in the recent harsh weather conditions has proven a
bit of a problem.
However, I am now able to confirm the installation of the replacement aerial at
the repeater site has been fully completed and is in use by the repeater
equipment.

73,
Geoff, G8DZJ.

In making the most of this weekends dry weather, the annual pre-winter engineering examination of the Staffordshire Moorlands aerial
installation for the GB3SM and GB3SX repeaters has been completed.

With the repeater site located at 1140 feet above sea level, it's not the type of engineering work easily carried out in the middle of winter
with gale force winds and four feet of snow on the ground.

My thanks go to Paul 2E1EUB and Phil G4SCY for all the ladder work involved, these days I prefer (whenever possible) to keep my feet firmly on the ground.

Further to my message NUMBER 1893: >>> I also intend to design and build a suitable interface to enable full Remote Control of the repeaters output power to hopefully make testing of the current problem and situation a little easier. Once the interface (yet to be designed, built and installed) is on site, the repeaters transmitter output power will be reduced as required <<<.

The news is I've now completed the design work involved plus fully built and bench tested the said mentioned interface and I'm currently
attempting to set aside a suitable day to install the interface on site.

In the meantime ferrite beads etc have been fitted where appropriate to the CCTV system and as I type (I hope I don't speak to soon) the
background noise is greatly reduced.

73,
Geoff, G8DZJ.

Latest info I have about GB3MR.

The receiver and the logic have been removed from site and are currently under test, but because it's an intermittent fault, it's not proving that easy to pin point the problem.

I hope to have some more news in a day or so.

Please bear with us - we hope to have MR back soon.

In the meantime there are 16 other repeaters to go at, 1 on 6M, 4 on 2M, 10 on 70cms and 1 on 23cms.

Best 73

Dave, M0OBW

Chairman, UKFM Group (Western)

To all concerned,

During the earlier part of today, I was informed that not only was the paging system causing a problem with GB3SM's receiver, but it was also causing some grief to GB3CB in Birmingham.
However and much worse than that came the news that it was also transmitting a further RF carrier on 473.325 MHz and the situation was about to turn critical.

At about 1445 Hrs I had a discussion with the Technical Director at the company that's supplied the paging equipment, at long last a proper technical discussion that actually made some sense, for starters the TX frequency is controlled by a PIC and not as I was previously informed crystal controlled.
After discussing the various issues involved, plus the implication that other systems may also be suffering, he dispatched an engineer to site.

At approximately 1710 Hrs the interference problem on GB3SM stopped and I decided to text the Technical Director to explain the new situation, to this he text back stating: "Thanks, the engineers will also be returning to site tomorrow".

Fingers crossed we can now confine this one to the history books and a site visit by Ofcom Field Ops will not be required.

My thanks go to Rod Wilkinson at Ofcom London.

73,
Geoff G8DZJ.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

GB3SM RB13, Staffordshire Moorlands.

Hello all,

I can advise that the location of the rouge pager transmitter has now been found, it's located at the New Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham.

A new Hospital that's just opened at a cost over £600 million, it employs 6900 people and they manage to commission a Paging System on the wrong frequency, I suppose that says it all really. 

Still, it could have been worse, had they have chosen a different frequency and being close to Birmingham International Airport they could have caused a major disaster, perhaps a novel way of bringing in new patients.

First to track down the exact location (others were very close) proved to be a team effort between Paul 2E1EUB and Phil G4SCY.
They win the fully exclusive all expenses paid two week Holiday for 2 in the Bahamas courtesy of our sponsor "G & G Plastic Buckets of Bursley"
Thanks to the many others that also took part (unfortunately we only have the one prize), and to those that failed to turn up (well, bet you wished you'd had a go now).

So with that it's now over to Ofcom and we await to see what happens next.

73,
Geoff, G8DZJ.

_______________________________________________________________________________

The Date for the next UKFM Group (Western) AGM is 6th September 2010 at 8pm.

Location: Grappenhall Community Centre, Bellhouse Lane, Grappenhall, Warrington.

_______________________________________________________________________________

GB3SX and GB3SM, Ipstones Edge, North Staffordshire.

Due to important maintenance work taking place on the overhead electricity power lines, both this Monday and next Monday (21-06-2010)from 0800 to 1600 hrs, the GB3SX and GB3SM repeater site will have no electricity supply.

The GB3SX Repeater: Will continue to function powered by a UPS, however the ERP will be at a much reduced level, this will continue until the UPS becomes exhausted and automatically powers down.
The GB3SM Repeater: Will be off-air.

73, Geoff, G8DZJ. 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

GB3LL is back on air today as promised. 

Still more work to be done over the next couple of weeks or so, to get to full performance but still working quite well. 

Line gain is set a little high, which makes through audio sound a little over processed, also a bit of work required to get that extra db or two out of the receiver. Rest assured it will soon be up to full spec.

Regards
John - Callsign G8LZO

GB3VT, GB3ST and GB3SE.

The recent ongoing aerial work at the Stoke-on-Trent repeater site is (apart from perhaps a few minor adjustments), now completed.
Thanks go to Phil G4SCY and Paul 2E1EUB for all the ladder work etc.

Also following a full equipment refurbishment, from the 17-04-2010 at 1500 Hrs the Stoke-on-Trent GB3SE 23cm Beacon and Repeater is now back on-air and fully operational.

All reports are most welcome.

73, Geoff, G8DZJ.

The latest issue of Talkthrough Newsletter has just been published. Copies were available for members at the Blackpool Rally.

The Talkthrough is available as a Paper copy or we can now sent an Electronic copy to members, in PDF format.

If you wish to receive the Electronic version and are a paid up member of the group, then please email Dave Wilson dwilson@btinternet.com