Site photos

Over the last couple of years, I've used three sites for portable operation: IO93BV, Ilkley Moor; IO93DV, Otley Chevin and IO93EV, near Bramhope.


I started out on DV, it's the local pub car park, good for beer but too busy for Thursday evenings and Sundays.  






































Early low power operations - no rotator, power from car battery, manual rotation, old car



Most of my operation has taken place on Ilkley Moor, BV, but this is rather exposed and permanently breezy or windy -  getting the mast vertical can be a struggle.  
                                                       

IO93BV looking west

Looking east from IO93BV, the ground rises about 10m to the east. The dip to the left of the fence is ESE

For some strange reason, I don't have any pictures on Ilkley Moor looking south or south east

So last summer I found a site close to home in EV - nowhere near as high but usable in all weathers and two minutes drive home.  I'll never win anything from here but it's useful for testing:

Looking southeast from IO93EV

A little bit of history

Most readers will be aware of the VHF/UHF DX Book, put together by Ian GM3SEK and recently made available in PDF format:

http://www.ifwtech.co.uk/g3sek/dx-book/dxbk-new.htm

I contributed the 432MHz transverter section, which worked fine for me but this was probably because I had access to signal generators and spectrum analysers, not readily available in most shacks at the time.  At the time, my qth was suburban Leeds and rather poor, output power was around 10W and noise figure was probably 3-4dB due to cable loss and no mast head preamp.  However, I worked around 60 squares, all tropo and I think we used it a few times with G4ZAP/P during the low powers from Sheffield.  After publication, I swapped a set of boards with Conrad PA5Y, receiving a bright yellow drum kit in return!!  No-one else contacted me about copying the design.

Last year, I decided on an upgrade, pulled out the HGT unit, replacing it with a DB6NT module and a new Mitsubishi PA module