80m NVIS Excerise

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We tried something different this weekend and took advantage of traveling to another county. This was something we as a club wanted to try for a while. 

Could we communicate effectively between Skerries and Rathangan, Co Kildare on 80m utilising NVIS?

The weekends spent building and fine tuning our portable 80m linked dipoles was about to be put to the test

Tom travelled Rathangan, Co Kildare and met up with John EI1762. They setup a portable station using a FT857D a custom built 15Ah LifePO4 battery pack, and 80m homebrew linked dipole at the local Men Shed in time to call in to the 80m IRTS News. 

Meanwhile Frank was operating portable from Badlungon and both Ben and Dom where operating from their home locations in Skerries.

After the news all stations moved to a free frequency and got a net going. Signal reports of 59 were exchanged between Tom and John in Rathangan with Frank in Badlungon. Ben, operating from home also gave a 59 report to the guys in Rathangan. Dom was monitoring 80m via a SDR station in the UK and relayed a 59 report to the group from the SDR station via WhatsApp. Tom and John also returned a 59 signal report to all other stations in the new. 

After a brief net Tom and John dropped the power down to 5 Wats and signal report where exchanged between them and Frank. A report of 56 /57 was received for both parties.

This turned out to be a very successful test show how effective NVIS on 80m can be at low power for inter-county communications.

Location: Rathangan Demesne, Co. Kildare, Ireland

Comments

  1. MackJanuary 3, 2021 at 11:23 PM

    It's great when you can put the theory from a study guide into practice, cheers Tom for travelling.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Frank EI8HIBApril 2, 2021 at 11:46 PM

    Great day on the radio lads.

    ReplyDelete
  3. SteveJune 6, 2021 at 10:51 AM

    What time of day? How did you eliminate the possibility of Ground Wave over the short distance?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. East Leinster Amateur Radio ClubJune 9, 2021 at 11:22 AM

      Hi Steve,
      Thanks for getting in touch. You've asked some good questions.
      We eliminated the possibility of ground wave by looking at terrain maps which show a number of hill overs 100m between the two locations. In addition we were able to make contact with a station in Clare and in Cork, both of which would not have been possible on ground wave.

      Two weeks ago a member of the club travelled to a valley in Wicklow where he setup an 80m dipole about 1-2m off the ground. He was successful in making contact with stations in Dublin, Cork and Waterford. This would only have been possible via NVIS. We'll have a write up on this exercise on the site soon

      Thanks again for the questions.

      73's
      Tom EI5IEB

      Delete

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