News Update
News of AR events, rallies, kit news, competitions and social gatherings.
Club Call Sign and RSGB Affiliation
In March 2010 the Club gained the callsign MØMSA and as of 1st October 2010 the club is affiliated to the RSGB. A proud moment!
Rampisham Down Visit
In March 2011 ten club members were treated to an extended behind the scenes tour of the Rampisham Down Transmitter station in Dorset.
The station is currently operated by Babcock International Group and provides short-wave transmission facilities for broadcasters such as Deutsche Welle and BBC World Service.
At the time of the visit the station was not radiating any signals, so members were able to climb inside some of the Marconi 500 kW senders and see the components of these incredible transmitters at very close range.
Here's Robin G3TKF tempting fate with 33 kV!
After our visit we repaired to the Wynard's Gap Inn for a pie and a pint. A great day out!
Thanks to Station Engineer Tim Bandy for his time and hospitality.
Mills On The Air - GB3BM
On the weekend of 14th and 15th May 2011, several midSARC members took part in the annual Mills on The Air special event station. Here is a report from Club Chairman Terry Thompson M0ALZ:
Early in 2011 the Mid Somerset Amateur Radio Club decided to participate in this event and the owner of Burcott Mill on the outskirts of the village of Wooky, near Wells was contacted and kindly agreed we could set up and operate a station from an out-building in the car park adjacent to the mill. The licence to operate was then duly obtained: GB3BM.
Burcott Mill is one of two watermills still operating in Somerset and is the sole watermill in the county grinding organic wholemeal Flour for sale to the general public. Its origins date back to Roman times and is mentioned in the Domesday book. The current machinery dates back to Victorian times.
Time was rapidly running out and not much progress seemed to have been made to source equipment and set the station up. Terry M0ALZ and Brian G0FZI resurrected a half-size G5RV, cut another dipole with 300 ohm twin feeder, an ancient HF rig (TS520SE), an equally ancient ATU, a dummy load. For the backup 80m station we collected the Club Tx/Rx from Jeff M6GLH. Prior to all of this various cables were made up from RG513 coax.
The next stage in the whole process was the most frustrating! We had to haul the antennae into position. The method finally adopted consisted of a heavyish claw hammer hurled as high as possible into the branches of a tree. With great difficulty, helped by unprintable language, the antennae were raised into position. To our great joy the TS520SE loaded up and worked after having spent ten years languishing in Terry's attic. The Standby/80m installation didn't perform very well and was anbandoned. Various reasons were suggested but nothing conclusive could be found. Maybe the antenna was too low and/or too short. Comments from other stations were heard on how poor the 80m conditions were, so maybe our problem was a combination of factors.
During the two days of operation a good number of club members came to visit and help.
Conditions were good especially on the Saturday, although not quite as good on the Sunday. There was a fair degree of noise on both days and considerable interference on the Sunday due to a contest (we had to work hard most times to get through). Surprisingly two very local stations were copied - one about one mile away and the other ten miles distant. Both were quite weak.
We worked approximately 125 stations around the UK and Europe. Our QSL manager (Brian G0FZI) is going to be very busy over the next few days as we had promised to QSL 100% (through The Bureau)!
It's our intention, in due course, to submit a more comprehensive report and include a digest of the stations worked, their locations and whether they were fellow 'Mills On The Air' stations.
With the good weather, albeit sometimes quite chilly, we had a successful and enjoyable weekend aided by the hospitality afforded us from the owners of Burcott Mill. We hope they will benefit from the weekend as much as we have and will invite us back next year. We left the antennae halyards in the trees in anticipation that we will be going back!