My name is Philip and since 1985 I have held a UK Government license for experimental Radio Communications, having qualified by passing City & Guilds technical/theory examinations and taking a, then mandatory, 12 WPM  morse code transmitting and receiving test. I hold the Advanced Full license Amateur Radio callsign: G0ISW spoken phonetically as 'Golf Zero India Sierra Whisky' and shown below in Morse Code.

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If you cannot see the full index shown on the left edge of your screen, please go to my main page at http://www.qsl.net/g0isw

 

During the late 1960's as a young boy I was fascinated and influenced by watching the television series 'The Man from UNCLE' and seeing them use their pen radio communicators, opening 'Channel D'.

   

I decided that I wanted to have a cool way of communicating using radio like them, and eventually I followed the path to my current amateur radio licence as shown below:

 

I now live in Penrith, Cumbria next to the beautiful 'Lake District National Park' in NW England, close to the border with Scotland. My work takes me around the UK, with regular monthly trips to London, and overseas too.

 

My Maidenhead locator is IO84OQ. I also enjoy climbing the Lake District fells with my family. The summit shown on my QSL card above is 'Hallin Fell' SOTA reference G/LD-043, overlooking Ullswater Lake, near Penrith. We were the very first to SOTA activate this particular summit on the 2nd May 2004. Just visible in the rucksack external pocket, shown above, is my Yaesu FT-817 multiband, multimode transceiver, which is light enough not to notice. With me is my daughter and my son, who was born coincidentally on 18th April, which is......

 

 

Between 1988-2008 I specialised in VHF/UHF long distance (DX) communications on 50 MHz and 144 MHz with Tropo, Aurora and Sporadic Es being my favourite propagation modes, but having so many mountains surrounding my QTH made it difficult for VHF/UHF radio communications.

Shown below is a 3D aerial image of my home location (QTH) at Penrith, Cumbria, England (Locator IO84oq), indicated by the white arrow, at 140m above sea level, with higher ground surrounding all sides. Despite the terrain I have been able to work stations thousands of km away and have regularly been mentioned in both 'RadCom' and 'Practical Wireless' magazines for my achievements in this field.

The map below was created using Geog UK software by G4JNT.

Click here for aerial photo of Penrith with ordnance survey interactive overlay

       

The topographic map below of my QTH (Centre white dot at 140m asl) was created using the fantastic Mobile Radio software by VE2DBE and downloading from the Internet the latest Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) data. The elevation contours are at 100m intervals and show the high ground rising over 100m, immediately to the North-East of my QTH at a distance of less than 2km away, obstructing line of sight signals between 30-90 degrees. At 20km distance to the East (Coloured RED) is very high ground formed by Cross Fell (893m / 2930ft), Little Dun Fell (842m) and Great Dunn Fell (848m /2782ft), all obstructing my line of sight signals between 70-90 degrees.

Below is a diagram which shows the antenna elevations required for my aerials to pass obstructions caused by hills around me. You can see that the best direction for me is 130 degrees and the worst is between 20-80 degrees.

I consider my Amateur Station to be average in capabilities, but I have still managed to work on VHF very long distances to North Africa and the Black Sea coast on 144 MHz SSB, via Sporadic Es, without a huge antenna system or any linear amplifier. Just 25 watts from a Yaesu FT-736R and a Create Log Periodic 5130-1N aerial, which at 144 MHz only has about 5dbi of gain and is equivalent to only a 4 element yagi!

 

My favourite VHF propagation mode was without doubt Meteor Scatter.

Station A      Station B

From my IO84 Maidenhead locator square on 50 MHz and 144 MHz via Meteor Scatter, I used the fantastic WSJT  software and the high speed FSK441 digital data mode. The maximum practical range for Meteor Scatter QSOs is considered to be around 2300km, with my best distance being 1796km to Estonia.

I have severe obstructions to my signals when beaming between 20-80 degrees due to nearby mountains. Despite this almost impossible direction for working anything at VHF/UHF I have managed to work stations via Meteor Scatter as far afield as Estonia on 144MHz! To get over both hills my horizontal radiation lobe pattern needs to be at least 23 degrees above the horizontal.

Interestingly experiments in 2007 with SM7CMV on 50MHz where my radio signals were heard by him via Meteor Scatter many times, but I couldn't hear his signals despite my station being much weaker in comparison, has resulted in me suggesting that perhaps Knife Edge Diffraction followed by Meteor Scatter allowed this apparent one-way flow? I know Knife Edge Diffraction occurs in that direction as I can work G stations in IO94 square despite a clear mountain obstruction of the Pennines.

The date and time shown on the captured screen above are not correct, as after the event I reran the recorded audio data so that I could grab this image to present on this page.

Below is a map of Stations I have worked on 144MHz Meteor Scatter. The maximum practical range for Meteor Scatter QSOs is considered to be around 2200 km, with my best distance so far being 1796 km. I have managed to work stations via Meteor Scatter in Iceland, France, Germany, Poland, Estonia, Czech Republic, Italy, Switzerland, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, Slovenia, Norway, England, Holland, Denmark & Spain.

           

In early 2006 I became interested in working the International Space Station, Low Earth Orbiting Amateur Radio Satellites (using AX25 APRS Packet mode or voice) and trying Earth-Moon-Earth (EME) (using the JT65B digital mode). This has come about because band conditions are so poor on HF at present and realistically I have worked as much as I can via the normal VHF/UHF propagation modes. I am however finding it a very steep learning curve.

 

I use Nova for Windows software to give me audible alerts in the shack, when the Satellites are coming into range. I use SATPC32 software to CAT control my Kenwood TS-2000 radio and correct my 144 MHz and 432 MHz speech signals for doppler shift.

I use AGW packet engine software to give me the ability to transmit and receive packet without a TNC and only using my computer soundcard. The UISS software works in tandem with AGW and is a very useful tool for working the ISS or digipeating through it. Within a day of downloading the software (on Saturday 17th March 2006 at 1145UTC), and on my first attempt, I managed to have my 145.990 MHz FM packet signal digipeated by the ISS (RS0ISS-3) as it flew overhead at 345km altitude, this was achieved using my normal VHF horizontal beam and using 25 watts.

See the image below, showing my QTH and those of other successful Hams, displayed in real-time, as heard by the ISS. The ISS position is shown and where it will be in 5 minutes later (ISS-5).

Please note that in September 2007, the International Space Station now uses a frequency of 145.825 MHz simplex for APRS Packet digipeating, using the callsign RS0ISS-4 or ARISS

I realise that for consistent and reliable space communications I should have upgraded my antenna system, but I did not have the space for a high performance multiple stacked 4x4 array, so it would have to be based upon a much simpler system. I noticed on the GB4FUN amateur radio demonstration vehicle that they have full satellite capability.

  

Looking at the setup detail for their mobile system Setting up the satellite tracking software & satellite system I became familiar with the WIMO X-Quad antennas for 144 MHz and 432 MHz, which I had not heard of before.

These aerials have a short boom length less than 1.5m and can be mounted on the front of the mast, which is particularly good for me as they would not catch on my HF beam mounted lower on my mast. The quoted gain for the 2m X-Quad is 10.5dBd and for the 70cm X-Quad is 12.8dBd, which compare very favourably with both a Tonna 9 element 144 MHz yagi at 13.1dBi and a Tonna 19 element 432 MHz yagi at 16.2dBi, but being only horizontally polarised, about 3m long and not able to be mounted on the front of the mast boom. Converting dBD to dBi suggests that the gain is almost the same.

Interestingly these antennas can be configured for horizontal, vertical, Left or Right hand circular polarisation (RHCP) the latter being the preferred setup for satellite use and also EME. Using a WIMO phasing harness for each antenna, further simplifies setup.

 

                               

 

 

In 2006 I finally achieved the SOTA Chaser ultimate award, the 'Shack Sloth', for collecting 1000 points entirely from my shack on 144 MHz FM. This took me 4 years of continuous effort.