Welcome

Welcome to my amateur radio and electronics Blog. My name is Carl and I live between Northwood and Rickmansworth on the Greater London / Hertfordshire border. This new blog was started 26th December 2020 although I am in the process of transferring some of the more interesting posts from my old Blogspot pages. My main radio interests are:

* VHF to SHF DXing and contesting
* HF Dxing, digital modes and contesting (particularly RTTY contesting)
* Equipment and antenna construction, including homebrew and kits

My personal contest callsign is G2K. When contesting with ‘The Rats’ you may hear me using either our club call G3RAT or our club contest call G2D, we also have the club call M0HRF but that is used somewhat less now that we have been issued G3RAT.

I am proud to be a founding member of the Drowned Rats Radio Group, if you want to know more about the Rats check out our webpage at About Us | Drowned Rats Radio Group (g3rat.com). We are VHF and above enthusiasts (although we also do some HF!), we do contesting and more. Recruiting now!

Drowned Rats:
Back to Front: In the operating tent – Gene M0ZRG, Anthony G7LRQ, Stuart M1SMH

Rats on tour – Walbury Hill – NFD

We are always looking for new members to join the team

We welcome newcomers and old-hands alike, full training is given and we have a lot of fun! If you are in the UK and would like more information including how to get involved in the weekly VHF-SHF activity contests and/or to come out with us on one of our field events please contact us on the link above or feel free to email me direct. If you’re new to VHF and above contesting in the UK check out my beginners guide here.

Single 6m Yagi at NFD
2m stack of 4 x 9 ele Yagi
2m stack of 4 x 9 ele Yagi
Anthony G7LRQ inspects the 2m stack before it’s about to be raised. Walbury Hill 2017

Extreme weather – wow that’s hot!

“London is set to be one of the hottest places in the world on Monday, with temperatures soaring above the Western Sahara and the Caribbean.
The capital is forecast to be hotter than Dakhla in Western Sahara (24C), Nassau in the Bahamas (32C), Kingston in Jamaica (33C), Malaga in Spain (28C) and Athens in Greece (35C).”

McMichael Rally – Sunday 17th July 2022

A pleasant Sunday morning at the McMichael Rally today. A bit of a heatwave today at c.32C (and expected to get to 40C tomorrow!!!). Perhaps it was the weather but the number of sellers and buyers seemed to be somewhat lower than previous years. The RSGB bookstall was notable for its’ absence (pity as I was hoping the buy the new Nano VNA book).

Delighted to meet a few Drowned Rats (Anthony G7LRQ with Debbie his XYL accompanying him and keeping him in check), David G0CAG and Don G0ACK. Also good to see fellow VHF contesters Charlie G0SKAC, Pete G1DFL and Peter G4YPC.

Not too many purchases today but I did pick up a bargain bundle of a Sotabeams (Funkamateur) DYC 3.0 speech compressor for the FT817 (I lost my original long ago!), a Morserino 32 morse trainer, and a Chinese copy of the N7DDC 7×7 ATU-100. I also picked up a very clean Yaesu G-650C rotator controller (with the very fine ERC rotator controller board fitted for PC control over USB) and finally a bunch of quality N and UHF Connectors.

http://www.carnut.info/ATU_N7DDC/ATU_N7DDC.html

http://www.morserino.info/

https://www.sotabeams.co.uk/speech-compressor-for-ft-817-818/