I passed the Armature Radio Foundation Licence Exam on 18th April 04
and my call sign was allocated on 27th April 04.

The Foundation Licence is the first rung on the three tier ladder to a Full Licence

My next target is to take the Intermediate Licence exam towards the end of the year
this will give me a 2E0 call sign and allow me to use more power. It also allows
access to the 10m band which the Foundation Licence prohibits.

I have now passed the Intermediate Examination and my new call sign is
2E0GMX on QRZ.com

Following our recent trip to Florida I have a new radio

A Yaesu FT857D which covers
all of the HF bands and 6m, 2m & 70cm.

My Radio is a Yaesu FT530 HT covering 2m & 70cm bands.
I mainly use the 70cm band through the GB3PZ Internet Linked Repeater.
There are a great bunch of people that use GB3PZ which is owned and operated
by Ian G4ZPZ.
For a UHF Repeater GB3PZ has a surprisingly vast coverage area. The repeater site is
in Dukinfield Tameside but is heard as far away as Liverpool in fact Roy G6NFR
the PZ Quiz Master is based in Liverpool. Mobile stations often call in from
Southport.
The repeater is linked to the internet via 2 systems, IRLP and Echolink.
IRLP operates from around 6:30am until 00:02am when it automatically closes.
Echolink is manually enabled by Ian G4ZPZ and is online less often.

A wide variety of stations call into GB3PZ from all over the globe via
IRLP on a regular basis. Some are ex-pats living overseas who call in to keep
up with events in the Manchester area, but many are now firm friends through
radio.

A number of international users have come to Manchester for vacation with the
explicit aim to meet the users of PZ.

GB3PZ users meet on the last Saturday of every month at the Hunters Tavern, Staylybridge
for the "GB3PZ Big Breakfast", an informal breakfast meeting where users can
meet face to face to chat and enjoy good food.