Hi All, I am sure a few folk have heard that GB3IW the Isle of Wight UHF local repeater is now back on the air, it is repositioned to the center of the island on Arreton Down 134m asl, about half as high as it was at Stenbury!, so all coverage reports are of great interest, same frequency and initial access tone as before, 433.225mhz Tx and 433.825mhz Rx, 71.9hz (25khz channel spacing +-5khz max dev. keep the tone dev. down, less than 500hz, as no de-tone filter on rx!) the system uses a 250 watt solar panel to trickle charge 2x 110ah lead acids, there is no possibility of mains power, and trying to make a couple of amps in the middle of no-where has been/is the biggest challenge, I am no fan of green power, good old hydrocarbon burning is the only way to go, sorry green folk, but if you can do better?........... and I am building a small auto start/stop gen voltage sensed for the darker winter months the transmitter is a Motorola compact running 5 watts straight into a 5.5dbd colinear, the receiver has its own 6dbd colinear about 10feet above, no filters at the moment, there is more tweeking to be done, but with the temporary aerial system wobbling in the wind and low battery volts, I've been a bit pre-occupied !, I have the Electra 2000 repeater controller with a professional female voice over announcement for the ident, seems to work very nicely! Its now been on the air since the beginning of May, activity has dropped off now, so we all need to make the effort and at least answer people who call through, even if you don't call cq yourself, Its a bit boring for any listeners to hear me G4IKI answering everyone!!, LOL., there is a little misunderstanding, that repeaters are for mobiles!, this is not true, any fixed station has just the same "rights of use", as there is a built in half second delay before the K, so any mobile or other station can jump in,- make sense? please tune this channel into a dedicated rig and monitor it 24/7, -thanks for using GB3IW the iconic Isle of Wight Repeater, 73 Paul G4IKI
I read this and thought I'd give you a call via EchoLink, but I could not find a node listed...anyway, congratulations getting your repeater back on the air. 73 Geoff WA7GWT Everett, WA, USA
Hi Geoff thanks for that!, I am just in the process of setting up a simple echolink tx/rx link so will keep you posted 73 Paul G4IKI
Surprisingly I can just about hear it in the middle of Salisbury with a small co linear into an FT-8800. If you know the area you'll know that Pepperbox ill is in the way. Rgds Andy - G7MJV
Just getting back into Radio and have now got a FTM-400 - Located near Bordon, I can work the repeater from a white stick Omni and using 20 watts, so good path in this direction ( approx North ) although usually use a beam pointing approx South, or at the box. Thanks Paul for maintaining the kit. Rgds Nick G0HLX
