Saturday the 28th of March 2015 saw several stations in Essex take part in a 2 metre activity afternoon.
The activity was championed by the Thurrock Acorns Amateur Radio Club (TAARC) to encourage Essex to make more use of 2 metres, and to get Essex talking. The 2m activity event ran for three hours from 1pm to 4pm.
Thurrock Acorns GX4HKO
The club station of the Thurrock Acorns Amateur Radio Club GX4HKO manned by Stella G0EKP started operating from 1pm, contacting people from around Essex, London and South England
TAARC Chairman Nicholas Wilkinson said: “I am delighted with the number of people who got involved. Whenever you run a new activity you plan for a successful day but it’s not until after the event you can reflect back and evaluate if the event was and in this case it was a huge success and we are already talking about running a similar event later in the year”.
Essex Ham at Shoebury East Beach
To show support for this 2m initiative, Essex Ham activated 2 metre stations from Shoebury East Beach.
Two 2 metre stations, both Yaesu FT-857s, with Steve 2E0UEH’s 5-element beam on one, and Pete M0PSX’s home-made Slim Jim on the other were set up.
With two 2m stations in close proximity, only one radio was active for transmission at any one time, with the other being used for monitoring.
Several handhelds were in use too, and two HF verticals were deployed by Peter G0DZB and Steve 2E0UEH for HF action, mostly on CW.
Thanks to the 14 people who turned up on the day, including: David G3SVI, Dorothy 2E0NCE, Keith G7FFI (and Mrs FFI), Myra M0MYR, Nick 2E0DVX (and Maj), Pete M0PSX, Peter G0DZB (who traveled down from Colchester), Richard M0CLZ, Rob 2E0LMX, Steve 2E0UEH and Tom M0ABA (plus harmonic)
A very chilly and blustery day on the beach, but good fun, with plenty of time to try a few new things, and help with some mentoring. Given that many of the HF bands were busy with the CQ WPX contest, HF may have been a tricky band – but great to be out making use of 2m.
Highlights of the afternoon in Shoebury included:
- Working Stella and Dave from Thurrock Acorns, who were using their callsign GX4HKO for the event
- Making contact with Paul M0LRE and Edmund M0MNG who took part from Firle Beacon in East Sussex. Essex Ham member Edmund has shown considerable support for us in the past, and it was great to work him first via a repeater in Kent, and then direct using SSB on a homemade Slim Jim.
- Working Tom G0SBW, who was HF Pedestrian Mobile on a beach in St Osyth – Tom attended a recent Skills Night do demonstrate his pedestrian kit
- Plus of course, Maj’s cakes!
Essex Hams at Galleywood Common
Two Essex Hams not able to attend the events in Thurrock or Shoebury set up at Galleywood Common – Thanks to James 2E1GUA, Brian M6UHN (and Preston) for taking part from Chelmsford.
Thanks also to the members of Essex Ham and other amateurs across the area for making contact with the team at Thurrock Acorns and with our stations in Shoebury.
Great also to hear Neil G0RNU from the newly-formed Essex AR DX Group (also running 2m SSTV) and Dave G4AJY from SEARS supporting the event too. Perhaps a little disappointing that a few more of the other clubs didn’t step up to support the Essex 2m Activity event…
Well done to the team at Thurrock Acorns for setting up the event and getting Essex on 2m. Plans are already in progress for a repeat of this – and those of us who braved a chilly Shoebury beach, are hoping for a sunny Summer event!
I’ll be on the air for most of it from Firle Beacon, East Sussex. This is semi-local to my home QTH, it’s 200 meters high (approx), WAB Square is TQ40 and locator is JO00.
I’ll be calling on 145.500MHz or working people a channel or two either side of that frequency. I’ll also have SSB capability so could do some of that but vertically polarised. My antenna will be a 7/8 wavelength whip on top of my car.
I’ll also take my Yaesu FT-817ND and Wonder Wand antenna, so might be on HF as well but with very QRP and weak sigs probably.
Bring it on!
Best 73
Edmund M0MNG/P (Sussex)
Nice one – Hope to work you tomorrow (with luck and a following wind)
So how did everybody do? I was QRV from 1400 to 1630 in the end from Firle Beacon, East Sussex. WAB Square is TQ40 and locator is JO00BU.
I worked 16 stations altogether (18 if you include duplicates), one through the GB3KN repeater, three using verically polarised SSB, and the remainder simplex in FM.
Counties worked were Essex, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex and Hertfordshire.
I’d be very interested to know how other people did, and I am certainly game to do this again if Thurrock Acorns ARS organise another 2m activity day! Maybe if we did a 70cms one then I could take a yagi up Firle Beacon cos it would be physically smaller!
Best 73
Edmund M0MNG/P
Great to work you yesterday Edmund. We last worked at the SOS weekend, if I recall. Another similar event is already being planned… Cheers, Pete
Nice to have a quick chat with you Pete and the other stations.
Keep up the good work, looking forward to the next one, maybe dual band 2/70?
73
Nice to work you Paul, and thanks for taking part!
Well done to the Acorns! Great to see some real activity on 2m. Spoke to Dave at the Acorn station and a real pleasure to get them in the log. I also worked the guys at Shoeburyness.
Essex Ham did a great job of pushing this idea, so a pat on the back to Pete and his team for supporting the Acorns on this.
Shame on the other local clubs. All clubs were told about this, but few bothered to promote it or take part it would appear. A little bit of mutual support and cooperation wouldn’t do amiss once in a while!
Good job to those keen to support the locals and 2m in general :)
Cheers Paul. Great to be able to support this kind of initiative – that’s what we’re here for!
This is how G4HKO sounded atop Firle Beacon in East Sussex:
https://youtu.be/KdNfkzuFPb8
Best 73
Edmund M0MNG/P