EI/G0AFH/P in IO52.

Over the Christmas / New Year holiday period Pauline (my YL) and I travelled to the West of Ireland for a holiday. I also took some equipment for 6M and 2M just in case it rained :-)

We set out from Kent (JO01EI) on Christmas Eve catching the last ferry before Christmas from Hollyhead to Dun Laoghaire. From Dun Laogharie the drive to Inch took around 5 hours making a total of 14 hours travelling. We had booked two cottages, one at Inch IO52AD, and the other at Carrigaholt IO52DO. I hoped to be able to get on air from at least one of these but it was not possible to obtain permission to install antennae prior to arrival at either site.

The cottage at Inch (IO52AD) was set on the slopes of the hill overlooking Inch Strand providing an excellent take off to the East, however anything less than 080 degrees was blocked by the hill. Space for the antennae was limited - the garden was long, narrow, and set on a steep slope. On Christmas morning (after opening prezzies) I checked GPRS coverage using the laptop which would be used for KST and cluster access. The afternoon of Christmas day was spent assembling the M Squared 5WL 2M yagi and a 3 element yagi for 6M. Just before dusk (between main course and dessert) Pauline joined me in the garden to help raise the mast. With the antennae up the station was built in the dining room of the cottage. After a brief listen on the band all appeared to be working as expected. The beacon GB3SSS was audiable all the time and GB3VHF could be heard occasionally. However, the site was quite noisy with many low level birdies across the band.

Boxing Day.

With the station built I got up at 06:30 and logged onto the ON4KST 2M chat room to try to find someone to test the system. F6BEG was the first MS QSO in the log, shortly followed by G4ZTR on tropo. The station clearly worked! See the log below for more details of what else was worked on 2M. The 6M band was checked fairly frequently but I heard and worked nothing from IO52AD. With hindsight a larger antenna system may have helped.

Friday 30th December.

After a sucessful period of operation from Inch it was time to take the antennae down and move North to Carrigaholt. Below is a map of squares worked from IO52AD. Images of the station and surrounding area can be found here.

New Years Eve.

We arrived at the house in Carrigaholt late in the afternoon to gale force winds and driving rain. It was late on New Years day before the weather improved sufficiently to allow work on the antenna system to begin. During this time I was able to confirm that GPRS coverage was good but unfortunately the GPRS PCMCIA card was starting to fail. The garden of the house in Carrigaholt was large and level. Unfortunately it was also waterlogged and quickly became muddy. Given the strength of the wind and the fact that I had worked nothing on 6M from Inch I decided not to bother assembling the 6M yagi. If anyone asked for 6M it wouldn't take long to drop the mast and add the 6M yagi.

Having already lost time due to the weather, when I eventually got the antenna up I found a problem with high VSWR. This was traced to the feeder which was probably damaged in the move between sites. The 6M feeder was moved to 2M. Soon after building the station I worked Charles EI5FK to confirm the station was working. This site was a lot quieter than Inch and had a better take off to the North than Inch. I could hear GB3SSS at about 55 and GB3VHF above the noise most of the time. GB3NGI was also audiable from time to time. Although this site was in many respects better than Inch I worked less primarily because I did not have access to KST chat and the cluster. Calling CQ on 370 frequently resulted in no takers. Fortunately Charles EI5FK spotted me whenever he heard me which helped. I also phoned Paul G4DCV who posted my mobile number to the KST chat room which resulted in a number of skeds. Once spotted I found no shortage of stations to work.

I was QRV for the peak of the Quadrantids. I think the peak was around 17:00 on the 3rd; reflections seemed good around that time.

Below is a map of locator squares worked from Carrigaholt IO52DO. Images of the station and surrounding area can be found here.

Equipment.

• FT847.

• Mirage 3016 Amplifier.

• M2 5WL 2M Yagi.

• 3 Element 6M Yagi.

• Westflex 103 feeder.

As space was limited the FT847 was purchased specially for this trip. It's far more compact that the FT1000 and transverter that I usually use from home and on NFD. The system was essentially untested prior to the trip. Overall it performed reasonably well. However before using the system again I will modify the FT847 so that it has separate TX and RX connections. This will allow me to use the same masthead preamp / relay system as used at home. I have yet to work out a method of correctly sequencing the FT847.

During the two weeks that we were in Ireland I had just over 100 QSO's and worked 48 locator squares. Best DX was OE3DXA in JN88 at 1922KM. Below is a map of all locator squares worked during the trip.

Below is an extract from my log covering the period of operation from IO52. I have included links to audio files where I have them.

Thanks to everyone who called me, sorry I couldn't work all of you. Watch this space for next year!