The PMR446 DX weekend was a bit quiet, probably due to the scorching weather we have been having here, most people are out enjoying the sun instead of playing with radios. Me, I hate it, give me winter any day! Shame it was so quiet as there was a lot of tropospheric lift aiding long distance contacts, Delboy made a staggering contact a few days later from Northumberland to Amsterdam, a distance of approximately 333 miles!! Read about it here.>In other news I broke my record for longest running server with my webserver (an old HP PA RISC jobbie running Debian Linux) that runs a few services for family & friends going over the 365 day mark (currently at 376 days). Once upon a time I’d have been amazed at something like this but these days it’s usually only ever a hardware failure or relocation that brings one of my servers down. I had word last week that for the month of September my Land Rover is to be featured on the front page of series123.com! Check it out starting 1st September.

Next Saturday and Sunday is the third annual PMR446 DX Weekend where radio enthusiasts from all over the UK (and Europe) march up to the highest point they can find in order to make the best PMR446 contact possible. Have a look at last years report here. So if you’ve got a PMR446 set why not join in, call CQ or just listen in on Channel 8, CTCSS 08, I will be at a local high spot (Hill Cliffe in Appleton, Approx 95 metres ASL) on Sunday morning so listen out for me.

I’ve moved the PMR446 Link up into the loft now with the radio mounted on the end of a 4.5′ long plank of wood so it is right up in the apex of the roof. Range should now be vastly improved. I did some testing whilst I was out this afternoon and can confirm it works from the following locations: Mersey Street, Bridge Foot, Victoria Park entrance, Black Bear Bridge, and Wilderspool Causeway as far as Loushers Lane, by the time I got to Morrisons there was no signal. There was no signal outside Microbitz on Gainsborough Road either but there was outside the shops on Loushers Lane. This seems to indicate a range of a little over half a mile to the South but obviously this will vary from place to place due to obstacles and height from ground level. I’ll have to do some more testing across the North side of town later in the week.

Last night I set up a PMR446 internet gateway which will allow anyone within a 1 to 2 mile range of my house to communicate with people around the world using a PMR446 radio. As an example of what this does, someone within range of my gateway link can talk through my link radio, over the internet, and out through another gateway in, say, Belgium or Australia (on UHF CB). Someone within range of that second repeater gateway can then communicate back and thus establish a conversation.

The gateway (UK095-L) is running 24/7 on Channel 4, CTCSS code 19 and should be available across the Town Centre/Howley/Manchester Road areas of Warrington at least.