wythall radio club

Many thanks to Neil G1TZC , the prime mover behind the whole project , for this account

“A year ago we attended this event but the weather was so poor that day two was cancelled. This year was a big improvement. Yes there was a bit of rain from time to time on day one but nothing that lasted very long.

We got to site on Friday (19th) and put the three shelters up and transferred the lower value hardware, like tables and chairs in to position. Absolutely idea weather, not to cold and perfectly dry. So this was it, a year of planning was starting to take shape. John (M6KET), Phil (2E0WTH), Simon (G4TVR) and I made fairly short work of the prep work and headed off.

Saturday morning arrived and the high value items were put in the car. Arriving at site, Phil was already there. Second coffee of the day and then on to the task at hand. 

We planned to run three stations this year. Two on HF and another on the QO-100 satellite. The DATV station had been a bit of a challenge as the LNB arm for the 90cm dish was not in the store room. So a piece of aluminium box section was aquired and fashioned in to something that worked. Three plastic wedges had been printed, ahead of the event, to get the arm to exactly the right position.All the equipment was set up ready for the two day event. It can be strange with public facing events like this. You set up all of the equipment but end up having very few contacts, due to the fact you have so many visitors that want to know all about the hobby. We covered from CW on HF to DATV via satellite, with a few lapsed amateurs visiting and showing an interest in getting back in to the hobby again.

         Neil’s satellite operating station

John, Phil and myself were the three main operators for the event, but many other club members came along to help at various stages of the evening.

Day one closed and I had only had four contacts on the radio. Much of my time was spent explaining satellite operation and getting members of the public to tune around on the satellite equipment.

Phil takes a well deserved rest from the catering

Over night there were winds gusting up to around 35mph which the gazebo didn’t take to kindly to, but armed with some cable ties it was possible to fix the side walls so they didn’t come loose again.

Day two arrived. Phil and I had stayed on site over night, rather than pack all the gear aways again. With Phil on coffee and egg sandwich duty it was time to have a relax in absolutely idea weather. With the sunny weather many more visitors to the event arrived. With keen support from other members of the club we were able to greet members of the public and answer many questions.”

We also were also delighted to welcome  FISTS editor Robert M0BPT and I was pleased to show him the HI-Mound  HK-708 I had been using through the weekend in harness with the Club’s TS590- many contacts on 30m and 40m CW (writes M6KET!!)

“My personal favourite was a teenager who showed a passing interest in the TV operation. His first question was about the speed of the internet connection I was running to live stream the video. The fact there was no internet really interested him and many questions followed, including how many conversations could you have on the satellite at once and could you only have one TV picture and you had to wait your turn. By the end he thanked me very much and went away with the realisation that amateur radio  has a place in modern day communications.

At 4pm on day two, without having had the chance to operate the satellite station at all, we started to pack away. It took about an hour to get everything in to the waiting vehicles and back to the club.

These events are vital in showing the wider world just what our hobby has to offer.

Roll on Stoke Prior Steam Rally 2026.

If you are about, come and visit us again”

This Happy Band ….and many thanks to all who helped and supported through the 3 days (Friday- Sunday)

AS A BUSY YEAR COMES TO CONCLUSION A REMINDER OF….

1. WYTHALL RADIO CLUB PRE AGM MEETING IN THE BAR OF WYTHALL HOUSE ON TUESDAY 7TH OCTOBER,

2. THE FRIDAY MORNING CLUB AT WYTHALL HOUSE  FROM 9.45 A.M. ON FRIDAY 17TH OCTOBER AND

3.THE AGM: TUESDAY 28TH OCTOBER . 8.00 P.M THE DARTS ROOM 

August is a quiet month ….

Stuck somewhere between the Summer doldrums and the slow awakening of the HF Bands those not familiar with the great outdoors and the challenges of SOTA/POTA/GOTA etc would take refuge in moaning about conditions and twiddling their thumbs.

BUT…..

Thanks to Lee G0MTN who set up the DXCC logging page  those green minded, energy saving operators at Wythall Radio Club invoked the spirit of January 2025 and the ‘How Low Can You Go’  campaign,  and for the month of August reduced power to as low 0.5 watts (500 milliwatts?) to see what could be worked.

Is this the ideal QRPP CW Radio? 2004 issue but still one of the best?? Discuss!

CW (of course) proved very effective and Chris G3YHF averaged an amazing 1597 miles per watt with his mostly 500 milliwatts whilst working 11 DXCC countries.

His most successful QSO’s were with Madeira (3158 miles) and Finland (2298 miles).

Meanwhile QRP obsessed John could not match the number of 0.5 watt successes of Chris but did manage one QSO with EA8URU on 500 milliwatts to give him 3635 miles per watt. He also boasted a 5dB spot from TI7W on 20m with 0.5 watts RBN (but we can all claim one way successes like that!!)

And so to digital where down on the south coast Kev G4XLO really set the pace with 37 separate DXCC worked on 2.5/5.0 watts FT8; the pick of his contacts were USA east coast and Kazakhstan with an overall average of 338 miles per watt for his 37 QSO’s

Martin , M0XFI used his 5 watts and 2.5 watts of FT8 to work 13 DX entities including the USA.

Well done to all who gave this a go and proof of the satisfaction to be gained from genuine QRPP contacts- and the continued potency of CW in reaching those parts of the globe that others can not reach…. well ok the potency of FT8 as well !!

There were no reported QRP voice contacts during this month.

AND SO TO THE COMING WEEKEND WHEN WYTHALL RADIO CLUB WILL BE REPRESENTED AT THE STOKE PRIOR STEAM RALLY OVER SATURDAY 20TH AND SUNDAY 21ST SEPTEMBER.

AT THE MOMENT TWO OPERATORS , NEIL G1TZC AND PHIL 2E0WTH WILL BE IN ACTION BUT MEMBERS AND INTERESTED PARTIES ARE INVITED TO POP IN , SAY HELLO AND EVEN OPERATE ONE OF OUR SPECIAL CALL SIGNS.

FIND US IN THE CORNER OF THE SITE NEXT TO THE RAILWAY LINE  (AND ALL OFFERINGS OF GOODIES WILL BE GRATEFULLY ACCEPTED BY PHIL AND NEIL!!)

www.shakespearesrally.com/stoke_prior.html

Neil, a great supporter of these events reports as follows:

“In 2023 the weather for the plug and play event was baking hot, last year it was rained off, so we all hoped that the weather would be kind to us this year. Everyone arrived at the park for set up at around 9.30am (08.30UTC).

The idea was to run multiple stations on HF and a satellite station on QO-100. In about an hour we had three shelters up and station running.

THE THREE WISE MEN CONTEMPLATE THE CHALLENGE OF PHIL’S LOOP

MARTIN ASSEMBLES THE ANTENNA .. JOHN LOOKS ON IN ADMIRATION

IAN SETS OPERATES THE DIGITAL STATION- THE ANTENNA ? AND END FED LONG WIRE SLUNG OVER A HANDY TREE

The day was not about how many contacts could be listed but more about experimenting and making sure that we could offer emergency communication if needed. The satellite station was operating under the club call of GX4WAC/P from IO92bj square. Several longer and enjoyable conversations were had during the activation. From a total of 19 contacts, 16 countries were contacted. These included Brazil and India showing the size of the footprint for QO-100. 

One thing I did realise was that I have worked from this location enough to not even need to align the dish, as it was unpacked and pointed. On checking the signal and without any trimming a 5/9 signal was received back from the satellite.

In total nine licensed amateurs and one new club member, who is currently training for his foundation, were on site during the day. The planned finish time was 3pm (14.00UTC) but this over ran by about an hour. Proof that the day was enjoyed by all concerned. “

Neil’s impressive log sheet for the satellite operation.

Stations were also operated by Ian M0LQY, Phil 2E0WTH, Martin M0XFI and Warwick G4WMH.

Many many thanks to Gary G5RGS and Derek  G1INC  who were there from the start to help set up and to new member Ross for his sterling work to help us break camp at 4.00 p.m.

THE NEXT EVENT? THE BIG ONE 

THE STOKE PRIOR STEAM FESTIVAL.

SETTING UP FRIDAY 19TH SEPTEMBER

OPERATION SATURDAY 20TH SEPTEMBER AND SUNDAY 21ST SEPTEMBER.

ALSO ONE WEEK LEFT FOR THE AUGUST QRPP CONTEST WITH KEV G4XLO AND CHRIS G3YHF LEADING THE WAY WITH SOME REMARKABLE LOW POWER QSO’S

“It was so good of Wythall Radio Club members to rally round and help me with the little problem of taking down my father’s ancient monopole, which was straining against its ropes. Fortunately, with some engineering brains in the group, the whole thing went off without a hitch, though my Geraniums are for the Chelsea chop. Not to worry, they’ll recover. Just need to find a gardener now !  Thanks again, much appreciated. Penny “

Happy to help and also pleased to help John G3OIC remove a mast in his Garden in Wythall.

Wythall Radio Club are offering these 3 beams for sale.

InnoVAntennas 13 element 2m LFA

InnoVAntennas 19 element 70cms LFA

InnoVAntennas 6 +6 element 50Mhz/70Mhz

They were used on our tower for 2-3 years and dismantled and put in store in 2022.

They are complete, in good condition and all elements etc are straight and undamaged.   

Selling individually or as package.  Collection only.   Sensible offers please. 

They can be inspected by arrangement at Wythall Radio Club, near j 3 M42 south of Birmingham. 

Contact info. and photos, click here.

This time last year we had strong winds and lashing rain for Wythall Radio Club’s annual activation at the  Transport Museum Wythall.   The weather was so bad that two of the gazebos on site were damaged by strong gusts. 

So as you can imagine, when last Saturday’s forecast was for storms we weren’t impressed.  Fortunately we only had over-night rain and a day of sunshine and breezes!

All the prep work was done on the Friday.  Simon G4TVR kindly supplied his van to move all the gear the mile from our club room. 

Dave G3YXM – who usually catapults a halyard over a tree branch – was in GM-land, but luckily Simon has an arboreal catapult (photo below).  This monster lauched a line attached to our OCFD over the top of 15m high trees.  This ended up with it being even higher than last year.

Ian decided to try locating the HF vertical on the other side of the trees and directly at the end of the wire antenna.  We lashed it firmly to a wooden fence with bungy cord. 

On the previous visit there had been huge issues with the HF stations interfering with each other.  The new positions seemed to resolve this issue.

We all turned up on the Saturday, from 8.30am to put the radio equipment in position, for the general public to start arriving at 10.30am for the Transport Museum open day where there was a visiting fleet of green London Transport buses.

As usual there were one or two snags.  We had tested the 2 HF antennas on the Friday, but on Saturday the OCFD antenna had very high SWR indicating open circuit. 

Swapping coax feeder didn’t solve the problem.  Using Phil 2E0WTH’s RigExpert analyser and Ian M0LQY’s homebrew dummy load, we checked the rig and cables.  Finally we traced the fault to the short piece of coax supplied with the antenna and containing several ferrites. 

Removing this and connecting our coax feeder direct to the antenna solved the problem – and didn’t cause any new ones with RF on the feeder.

So all was well.

In total, five stations were run on the day.  These were split between HF, VHF and satellite. 

On HF, we had separate FT8 and CW/SSB stations.  Conditions were very poor and the CW/SSB station struggled to make contacts. 

But by early afternoon 40m was open for inter-G and we had a couple of pile-ups on SSB.  Many thanks to all the stations who called in.  

The audio from the CW/SSB station was piped through a small PA, and attracted a number of visitors – including some current and prospective radio amateurs.  It competed well against the noise of passing buses and the model steam train whistle! 

Some visitors tried our CW demo kit, and were awarded certificates for sending their names.

Neil G1TZC brought his portable, solar-powered QO100 satellite station.  A highlight was working Garry ZD7GWM – a DX member of our Club – via QO100.  Several members took the opportunity to have a chat.  

The team comprised: John 2E0XET, Phil 2E0WTH, Winston 2E0EGP, Simon G4TVR, David G7IBO, Gary G5RGS, Ian M0LQY, Neil G1TZC and Chris G3YHF. 

Come 3.30pm, we quickly dismanted the stations and everything was back in the Club room by 4.30.

The great thing about these days out is that you get to experiment in the real world to see if your station does what you want it to do.

 We were approached by two very polite youngsters after our Foxhunt in the Park; they asked the question on the minds of many in the park that evening,dog walkers, footballers, children , walkers  and many more!

“Excuse me but what exactly are you doing” We tried to explain.. they weren’t convinced  “We thought you were looking for Aliens,” they said and left.

Neil’s report follows but it was another happy and enjoyable event in the park for Wythall Radio Club members and a really good  buzz (not radio related) in the bar afterwards.

Neil the organiser reports as follow

Ian, M0LQY holds his DIY antenna aloft.. “is there anyone out there?”

“Having put the equipment in storage after the last event, there wasn’t too much to do. Debra did all the repairs and testing to the aerials that had been made last year. All I had to do was charge the beacon, load the car and we were ready.

At 18.30 BST the beacon was hidden in the grounds of the Wythall Community Centre, ready for the eager competitors. Club members started to congregate in the car park from about 19.30 BST.

There was much comparing of  antenna designs! (see pictures!!) I had my antenna analyser available to check the home-made kit.

 At a given signal the  gang dispersed but unlike last year they mainly moved in the same direction!

It took about 20 minutes for David G7IBO and Ian M0LQY to locate the  tree where  the beacon was  concealed, with David  being the first to seize the Fox!

                    The magnificent Four

And the winner is… Clutching the transmitter and his extremely sophisticated Home brew antenna G7IBO: a difficult act to follow!

From feedback, it was a popular event and I have been asked to organise another one, maybe at the Lickey Hills. We can chat through this at the next committee meeting.

Thanks to everyone that took part in this club activity.” and welcome too to Ian and Nigel .

UPCOMING EVENTS AT THE CLUB

GB0BUS ACTIVATION AT WYTHALL TRANSPORT MUSEUM SATURDAY 14TH JUNE -A FULL REPORT TO FOLLOW

FRIDAY MORNING CLUB AT WYTHALL HOUSE  9.45-11.45 FRIDAY JUNE 20TH

OPEN COMMITTEE MEETING TUESDAY JULY  1ST.

Saturday June 14th – that’s the date for Wythall RC’s annual demonstration station at Transport Museum Wythall.

It’s a chance to see our satellite station in operation, as well as digital, voice and Morse Code on short-wave and VHF radios.

And you can also experience a ride on the Museum’s fleet of buses and their visiting iconic London ‘green’ buses.

We’ll be talking to radio amateurs around the world.

Watch as our signals travel 22,000 miles up to the QO100 satellite, which will retransmit them the 22,000 miles back to earth – so we can talk to other radio operators across much of the world.

You can try your hand at sending Morse Code – it’s great fun!

We welcome visitors – come and chat to us. 

We’ll be there during the Museum’s normal opening hours.