VHF National Field Day 2018

Date & time of the field day contest: 1400 UTC Saturday 7th July 2018 until 1400 UTC Sunday 8th July 2018.

Location: Maesbury Castle is an Iron Age hill fort on the Mendip Hills, just north of Shepton Mallet.  The site rises to 292 metres (958 ft) above sea level and enables a view over the surrounding valleys and hills, with views to the north, west and south.

G2BQY - VHF NFD Report by G0GRI and M0GHZ

The club team met for the 9th consecutive year at Maesbury near Shepton Mallet (IO81RF) over the weekend of 7/8 July.

It turned out to be a memorable weekend probably our best yet thanks to the fantastic weather and good company.  The event was well supported and over the weekend 25 people attending the site (see below). Discounting the radio activities catering was outstanding thanks to Dom, M0UAS and Russ, M0WYB.  Friday and Saturday night a few enjoyed planet-gazing with G0VFS who had brought along a reflecting telescope. On Sunday David (G0HEL’s son) visited to take some aerial imagery using a drone.  Other highlights included two passes by the Red Arrows and flight of 4 Osprey aircraft. There was one downside in that Hazel, G7RGI’s car broke down. However, after some frantic toing and froing with AA, and a rescue mission for her ton of equipment, she eventually made it to site.

As in the previous three years an entry was made in the Mix & Match section entering all 5 bands: 1296, 432, 144, 70 and 50MHz.  For 70 and 50MHz entry was to the Open Section with 1296, 144 and 432MHz being in the Restricted Section.  Having won the section last year for 3rd time since 2008 this year was going to be a challenge.  The weather over the weekend was blisteringly hot despite a few reaching for the blankets Friday night when temperatures dropped.  One good point, with hot days, is that it generally triggers temperature inversions; so the possibility of some good DX on VHF/UHF was expected.  Sporadic E and F layer propagation was anticipated on 50 & 70MHz.

For the team, the event started on Friday after at 3pm, 24 hours before the main event starts.  Friday afternoon sees a flurry of activity, of which first importance is the erection of the army frame tent used for the shack along with some of the aerials, catering tent and installation of electrics.  With 5 stations and 5 aerial systems to set up everyone was kept pretty busy and everything was up and ready well before the contest start time. Note that the 50MHz and 70MHz sections are split over the two days, with 50MHz being 8 hours on the Saturday and 70MHz 6 hours on the Sunday. A pump-up mast was used for the main 50MHz antenna which allowed it to be easily lowered, removed and replaced with the 70MHz antenna on the Sunday morning. 

Our claimed scores can be found here: -

https://www.rsgbcc.org/cgi-bin/claim.pl?Contest=VHF%20NFD&year=2018

And final results will be posted here: -

http://www.rsgbcc.org/cgi-bin/vhfresults.pl?Contest=VHF%20NFD&year=2018

Individual Band / QSO count / Overall (Best) DX / Distance

50MHz – 127 ODX 5B4AAB – Sporadic E 3325kms

70MHz – 97 ODX PA4VHF – Tropo’652kms

144MHz – 175 ODX OZ1ALS – Tropo’ 932kms

432MHz – 85 ODX OK2A – Tropo’ 1080kms

1296MHz – 52 ODX DL0LN – Tropo’ 690kms

NB: The adjudicated QSO numbers in results table may vary slightly due to log errors.

Sporadic E was evident in part on 50MHz but non-existent for us on 70MHz.  Tropospheric propagation was enhanced Sunday morning and fair for the rest of the contest.  On Saturday the 144MHz beacon on the Faroe Island was audible (a path of some 750miles). 144MHz had a steady run of contacts and some good DX, but it is difficult to do well on this band from IO81.  432MHz was hard work through Sunday bar some good DX early Sunday morning. For 1296MHz ON4KST Chat was used to arrange scheds, with many of the distant contacts being made by aircraft scatter. 

A rundown of equipment used per band:-

1296MHz - TS2000x, solid state PA (SSPA) running 100W with GaAsFET preamp on RX the antenna 67ele Wimo at 7m

432MHz - IC910, SSPA running 100W with GaAsFET preamp on RX the antenna 19 ele Dk7ZB at 8m

144MHz – IC910 (100W) with GaAsFET preamp on RX the antenna 9ele DK7ZB at 7m

70MHz – IC7300 SSPA running 160W the antenna 8ele YU7EF at 9m

50MHz - IC746 + GS35b (Valve PA) running 400W split into two antennas, a 7ele YU7EF at 5m and a 5 element at 4 m.  A second receiver, an FT-847, was used so that the operator could listen on both aerials.

All equipment besides the generator, 70 and 50MHz beams (club assets) was loaned by club members.  Quite a few members camped on site.

Those attending for all or part of the weekend were: M0GHZ, G0GRI, G0VFS & his wife Pauline, M0UAS, M0WYB, 2E0NEY, G5BBL, G7RGI, G0HEL, G4JQN, G0BKU, M6TEP, G3TKF, G0KCZ, M0IMS, G0HAS, G4YXS, M0MAT, M6ANY, M0IJQ (PE5B), M6OMR, 2E0HBV and his wife.  Visitor’s M0HWP and David Nicholls (Drone). M0IJQ (PE5B) and M6ANY are both new club members. Tea and coffee etc. was provided by Hazel (G7RGI) and Saturday brunch and Sunday breakfast served up by top chefs M0WYB and M0UAS.

All in all a great weekend and great team effort.  We await the results to see if we will be collecting the G5BY Trophy this year.

Please take a look at the images and video on this page.