For 2017, the Camb-Hams are going to the Island of Islay which lies 120Km west of Glasgow and just SW of Jura.
Timings
We plan to travel to the stop-over in Dumbarton on Friday 5th May where we will catch up with friends, get a meal out and get the food first thing the following morning and are then heading to Kennacraig for the ferry to Islay. We won’t be in the cottage till after 3pm so don’t expect too much activity on Saturday 6th.
We will then be QRV through the week before dismantling the stations on Friday 12th.
Stations
Activity wise we plan to have the usual.
- HF bands from 80m and 40m through 10m will be covered with 4 or 5 stations , all capable of running the legal power limit using linear amplifiers
- 6m, 4m and 2m again all at legal limit
- 6m running frequency: 50.285 MHz (for data)
- 4m running frequency: 70.220 MHz (due to QRM centred around 70.280)
- 2m running frequency: 144.365 MHz (for data)
- 2m and 70cm satellites
Equipment wise, here’s a taster:
- HF
- 5 * Elecraft K3 transceivers
- 1 * Icom IC-7300 transceiver
- 6 * Elecraft KPA-500 amplifiers
- 5B4AGN and DuneStar transmitting band-pass filters
- Hexbeam for 20m – 10m
- G4ERO homebrew 20m mono-bander
- 1/4 verticals and horizontal dipoles on 80, 40 and 30m
- Vertical dipoles on 17 and 15m
- VHF 6m
- Icom IC-7300
- Yaesu VL-1000 “Quadra” linear
- 6 element YU7EF wide spaced
- VHF 4m
- Icom IC-7300
- 600W homebrew 6m/4m solid-state linear
- 7 element YU7EF wide spaced
- VHF 2m
- Icom IC-910 transceiver
- M1BXF Homebrew 1.25Kw SSPA
- 17 element Tonna (no elevation control)
- DG8 preamp
- Satellites
- Icom IC-910 transceiver
- Wimo 2m & 70cm X-Quads
- SSB Electronics Preamps
- Yaesu G-5500 computer controlled rotator system (PCSat32)
Location Details
- Maidenhead Square: IO65VS
- IOTA: EU-008 ‘Inner Hebrides’
- WAB: NR36
Takeoff
In the past, especially Arran, we didn’t have the best location for VHF. This year however the opposite is true.
Here is the horizon, as seen from 40ft up at the cottage (note the upper orange line is 1deg);
Using ‘SRTM Path Profile’ this is what the coverage looks like for an HT at 2m above ground, bodes well for beams at 40ft.
