Farewell Gavin MM1BXF

Monday the 6th February 2023, at Clydebank Crematorium, saw a large gathering of family, friends and amateurs (inc a good turnout of WoSARS Members) paying farewell to WoSARS (and CAMHAMS ) Member – Gavin MM1BXF.

Although the wx was a bit grey outside, the proceedings within the Chapel brighten up the winter day with recollections of Gavin’s short but full life.

Celebration Booklet

Led by celebrant Pamela Clocherty, with reflections from Bex – Gavin’s XYL, a ‘timeline’ covering Gavin’s early years at Dumbarton & Aberdeenshire, through his work years in the telcoms cellular industry, the Czech Republic (OK), returning to Cambridgeshire, then finally along with Bex’s, back to Scotland. His early introduction to radio and the mischievous side of it along with his ‘well-kent’ buddy, accomplice and Best Man – Allan MM1BJP. His fascination with the hobby and the ‘amassing’ of kit which never seemed to diminish, to Bex’s exasperation.

The celebration also included a eclectic selection of music which  again reflected Gavin’s (and to a certain extent Bex’s) varied tastes.

Farewell Gavin, there was so much to look forward to, but it wasn’t to be.

Checkout more photos of Gavin on the WoSARS Gallery – HERE.

And a short video of Gavin operating from WoSARS Shack, 144 SSB, September 2021 – HERE Courtesy of Ray GM4CXM.

FT-470 Repair – Colin GM6AWC

My experience with a faulty Yaesu FT-470 which was kindly gifted to me by another amateur may help someone else who owns an FT-470 2m/70cm dual band talkie that develops a similar problem.

When I initially tried out the talkie, I heard my TX on another radio, so it sounded like it was working, but in fact nobody else could hear me, not even a station just a couple of miles away.

I also noticed that RX was terrible as well and I could only hear very powerful signals, but even at that, it was with noise.

It transpired that the deaf RX and TX not getting out symptoms had something in common…

Once I got the top board separated and out of the cabinet, I noticed a very crusty looking solder joint below a stand off pin, which in turn was soldered, via solid core wire, to the centre pin of the BNC socket.

BNC Standoff Pin – CLICK To View

Things were a bit worse on the other side of the PCB once that had been removed from the rear cabinet.

Capacitor Separates – CLICK To View

A loose antenna socket had flexed the solid core wire soldered from the BNC socket to the stand off pin on the PCB, and in turn stressing the delicate print below.

Stranded flexible wire between BNC and stand off pin might have been better for preventing this from occurring.

I would add that the socket was not loose when the radio was given to me, otherwise that might have led me to the fault sooner, but looking at the scrape marks on the threaded, slotted circular BNC securing ring, it became obvious that the ring had been tightened with pliers at some point.

The PCB track leading to the stand off pin, that feeds the BNC, had separated from the board and from C2001 (470pF) which is in series with the antenna socket.

If you look closely at the photo (above), the fracture between cap and print can be seen.

When a 0.6mm soldering bit on a temperature controlled solder station was placed on this track, it fell off never to be seen again!

Oh well, not to worry, I’ll just solder to the end of the SMD cap then, I thought, given that it appeared to be ok in the photo.

Alas, no go – the capacitor had suffered from being pulled about too much by the flexing, and ultimately, broken print with the result that the antenna side contact of the capacitor disintegrated as soon as any heat was applied.

So a 470pf cap was now needed.

Doesn’t have to be SMD as it’s possible to solder one end of a “normal” cap to the board and the other end direct to the BNC at a push, although SMD caps are likely to be less inductive.

I managed to find a replacement 470pF cap on eBay which restored normal operation.

Effectively, I’d been TXing into no antenna!

Fortunately no other damage was done – I was initially fearful that the now rare and expensive Mitsubishi 2m and 70cm PA ICs might have failed.

One to watch out for, and the moral of the story is to make sure that the BNC socket on your FT-470 remains tightly secured otherwise this repair will become necessary at some point.

I trust of some interest and help if you experience a similar problem.

73

Colin

Farewell Tommy GM3VBT (SK)

Tommy GM3VBT was a long time member of both WoSARS and it’s forerunner, The Radio Club of Scotland (RCS). Although operating from his Glasgow QTH, Tommy was always keen to help out in the many amateur contests and especially some of the SPECIAL EVENT stations that the Club took part in.

QSL Cards – CLICK To View

On a Club Night, Tommy was usually found behind the serving counter dispensing tea, coffee and biscuits. Always up for a chat as to who was working whom, new members, equipment and developments in the hobby.

Farewell Tommy ………

………………. you’ll be sadly missed by us all.

CLICK To Read

GB2RS – New Sunday Evening Broadcast For Glasgow by Michael 2M0GUI

From Michael 2M0GUI………….

“Beginning this Sunday, there is to be a new GB2RS News Broadcast, complementing the current Broadcasts in the locality. This broadcast will take place at 1830hrs local time on 145.525MHz, covering the Glasgow area, meaning those who are unable to tune in on a Sunday morning may find this a more convenient time. The broadcast will come from the station 2M0GUI in Newton Mearns, and will be followed by an opportunity to call in on an ad-hoc net.”

Good luck Michael with the new Broadcast!

Jack(;>J

Reflections From An Old WoSARS Young-Yin!

By Hugh Cummings GM0HSC (WoSARS Past Member)

Dragging up some old memories:

Along with a number of the other younger amateurs around Glasgow, we set up a group specifically aimed at younger folks, and people new to the hobby, called YAGIS – the Young Amateurs Group In Scotland. One area of interest saw us partake in conversion of assorted PMR sets, to get cheap access to the bands, where commercial kit wasn’t available, including a batch of Pye Cambridges on 4m AM, then converting them (badly) to FM. We ended  with D3E – pretty much!

PYE Cambridge – Hybrid Mobile Tx/Rx (Valve Tx Transistor Rx)

A lesson was learned about shorting out valve grids with a screwdriver I remember, and simultaneously, that electric current flows from a person to another touching person – ouch!

I used to use aircraft scatter to make a 4m qso between David – then GM7BPA (who was a runner up in the young amateur of the year contest I think?) in Croftamie and myself in Mansewood Glasgow. 2m was fine but 4m needed an aircraft approaching the airport over Duntocher for the path to work 🙂

We also ran fox hunts, and many hill-top operations, with all sorts or mobile trips up hills in Ayrshire and the southern Highlands. I also remember a VHF field day above East Kilbride and special event station GB0BUS using a double decker bus I had at the time.

Hugh’s Current Bus – Fares Please! (COX)

I went on to become the senior novice licence instructor for Strathclyde and along with Tommy GM3VBT and Susan GM4SGB, we trained somewhere in the region of 30 mainly young people at novice level, with many going on to get Class B and Class A licences – including young folk from the High School of Glasgow and St Aloysius’ College – one of whom went on to be the lead guitarist in Indy band  MOGWAI  (Almost a callsign – COX).

Another memorable adventure was a mini dxpedition to ACHILL ISLAND in Co Mayo in Ireland IO43………..

View of Achill Island using NASA’s technology overhead

…………..where we got special permission from the Ministry to operate as EJ4VNX on 50MHz as well as on 70MHz, and the other bands. We picked a great week for it (as we had researched the likelihood) and from day 2, had almost constant day time E openings to mainland Europe.

Great times.

Best regards to all at WoSARS for your forthcoming 50th Celebrations.

Shug GM0HSC – a Old Young Yin!

Bartek – MM7AJI Wins WoSARS Construction Competition

Friday the 22nd November saw the annual Construction Competition take place, and it was gratifying to see so many good ‘technical’ entries:

  • BARTEK – MM7AJI – Homebrew High Capacity, used Li-Po, Power and Management Pack – 1st with 167 Points
  • CONG . SWL – Homebrew Capacitor Health Checker – 2nd with 155 Points
  • STUART – MM1ESW – Homebrew Remote HF Loop – 3rd with 146 Points
  • PAT – 2M1CKE – Homebrew Portable Desktop Stand
  • JACK – GM4COX – Homebrew 13cms 24 Element Yagi
  • JACK – GM4COX – Homwbrew 8GHz RF Probe

With a new Club member, Bartek the overall winner.

MM7AJI

Well done Bartek !

This year the Scoring regime slightly changed – HERE. Although the Categories remained the same, the Points awarded to each was changed to give a possible maximum of 100 Points/Judge.

And to this end, our two Judges on the night were ERNIE – GM0EZP and JOHN – GM0XFK. Thanks ‘lads’!

The Top Three – Cong, Bartek & Stuart

This year’s standard of construction was high, but as has been said on other Construction related POSTS , it’s not the most technically complex, beautifully built gizzo that will win, as you can see other factors are taken into consideration. So next year please have a go.

Also, there are some more pictures within our PROGRAMME FORUM’s, the CONSTRUCTION COMPETITION Photo Folder.

Finally, it was good to see Paul – MM7AJE (through the generous help of Bartek popping out to Paul’s QTH) able to attend the meeting following his recent ACCIDENT with a Police van. Well done Paul (and Bartek).

Jack(;>J

Andy – MM0FMF & Jack – GM4COX Awarded The Jock Kyle Award For 2019

Copied from a Post off the GM13 Site.

It was surprise for both of us to receive a letter from the Board of the RSGB to the effect that we were to be awarded the trophy at the April GMDX CONVENTION for our work in promoting the use of 13cms in Scotland.

It is a great honour (and humbling) to be nominated by your peers for such a prestigious award. Thanks everybody.

And we are both looking forward to even more activity on 13 (and up) this year. (If the old bones can stand it – in my case (;>)

Andy & Jack(:>J

Andy – MM0FMF, Robert – GM3YTS (Chair GMDX) & Jack – GM4COX

RSGB Citation – Jock Kyle Memorial Trophy

Prompted by a talk about the 13cm band at the GM Microwave Round Table in November 2016, Andy Sinclair MM0FMF and Jack Hood GM4COX have been working successfully together to promote 13cm activity throughout Scotland.  They started by organising a discount order for ready-built transverters for members of the Lothians Radio Society and beyond, and then encouraged and supported the buyers to get on the air.  They have shared their enthusiasm for 13cm by giving their own  talks at the GM Microwave Round Tables in 2017 and 2018, and to other radio clubs in Scotland, and have stimulated others to become active both from home and out portable.

In January 2017 Andy and Jack set up the Scottish Amateur Radio 13cms Microwave Group at gm13@groups.io, which has now grown to 54 members.  Although initially intended to publicise and coordinate their SOTA expeditions, the group now helps to drive 13cm activity more generally in Scotland and neighbouring areas, and is open to all radio amateurs wherever they are.

For demonstrating how two people taking the initiative can make a real change, Andy Sinclair MM0FMF and Jack Hood GM4COX are deserving recipients of the Jock Kyle Trophy for 2019.

Proposers Rob Ferguson GM3YTS, Gavin Taylor GM0GAV, Mike Eccles GM3PPE, Ian White GM3SEK, Martin Hall GM8IEM, Geoff Crowley MM5AHO and Malcolm Hamilton GM3TAL

Joe GM3HOM A SK (:>(

The 26th of January 2019 saw the sad passing of Joseph (Joe) Reilly, GM3HOM.

He was a continuous member of the Radio Society of Great Britain from November 1948 until his death. His 70th anniversary of Membership was marked in the November 2018 edition of RadCom.

Following his service in the RAF, Joe was hired by Decca. Working within their Navigation section, he was involved in the UK’s Blue Streak ballistic missile project in testing ranges in remote parts of Australia. Closer to home, and still with Decca, found him working in the Middle East and, latterly, remote parts of Scandinavia. Following his world sojourns, Joe was employed locally by Strathclyde Police, finishing his working career within their Radio Workshops.

Joe was an active member of local amateur radio clubs. He was associated with the RSGB (Glasgow) Club in the 1950s, the Radio Club of Scotland (RCS) in the 60s and, from 1970 up until his passing, the West of Scotland Amateur Radio Society (WoSARS).

Primarily an HF CW operator, Joe was also to be found on 2 metre FM chatting to fellow members of WoSARS and the local Glasgow amateur fraternity. And whenever he was home, he would give a club talk about some exotic location where he had been ‘posted’, or a piece of ‘kit’ that he had built or was building. Joe always finished his projects specifically in Hammerite Blue, because he reckoned it made the electrons within flow better. He also took the opportunity to take part in CW NFD with other club members on every occasion that it was possible.

Joe is sadly missed by his family and friends around the world, whether they be radio amateurs or not.

Tribute by Jack Hood, GM4COX
Secretary, WoSARS

RSGB Notification – HERE .

Alasdair Mackintosh Fraser – GM3AXX – Obituary

 Alasdair was born in Darlington, England, in 1923 but it wasn’t long before the one who in years to come would wear a tartan tie at every opportunity and be a strong supporter of the SNP, moved north to his beloved Scotland. In fact, it was just 4 months, a move to Inverness with his family. They moved to Glasgow before Alasdair started primary school. Alasdair was the eldest in a family of four with Gillian, Helen and Farquhar born between 1925 and 1929. In the West End of Glasgow Alasdair attended Willowbank Primary and then Woodside Secondary. It was at Woodside where Alasdair’s love of radio started. His report card in fourth year spoke of his “considerable enthusiasm” for the topic and his “dexterity” in the construction of radio apparatus.

This love and these skills continued in jobs in a radio shop and then with Clydesdale Electrical, the radio and TV engineers, in 1941-43. Alasdair joined the navy in 1943 as a radio repair technician. He advanced to Petty Officer and radio mechanic in his three years’ service. His spell of duty took him to Gibraltar, Malta, Ceylon, Australia, Hong Kong and Japan. He visited Hiroshima only a couple of months after the bomb dropped there and took pictures to show the devastation that he saw. Alasdair applied his great intelligence in various ways in the navy including knowing the quickest way to the side of the boat. I’ll let you decide whether that was for safety or just in case of sea-sickness. After the war Alasdair worked for Philips as a radio and TV engineer. It was during this time that he met Margaret. In 1949 she was in a pram shop and he came in to the shop to do what Alasdair loved doing: to fix something. Instead he fixed his eyes (sorry!) on Margaret! They were married on 2nd February 1951 and stayed with Margaret’s Mum in Lambhill. Kim was born in 1955 and then Kennedy and Lindsay. They moved to Rigghead in Stewarton in 1968. Family holidays were often spent at a cottage in Glen Urquhart where time was always given over to catching up with friends and family, and to fixing things, of course, such as the 200 yard pipe he’d set up to bring water from a well to the cottage.

Alasdair loved exercise. He was a participator, not a spectator, fanatical about fitness: running, cycling, ice-skating, swimming, table tennis and more. He encouraged the family to join in, especially cycling and swimming whether the water was warm or cold! He won trophies at Stewarton table tennis club. Come the Spring, Alasdair would have the purple meths out to put on his feet to harden them up for hill walking so he could enjoy the outdoors to the full. This love extended to canoeing too. The first canoe he bought but the second he made at Stewarton night school. It still survives today – a credit to his workmanship! He even ran a 10k in his late 60s! Alasdair loved to be outside and active. Some families hand down jewellery as family heir looms, for the Frasers it was camping primus stoves.

From 1964 Alasdair’s work concentrated on scientific instruments when he started work with Pye Unicam, still part of Phillips. His job was to service and install analytical x-ray machines for research in university geology department and in large manufacturing plants, such as Ravenscraig, Blue Circle cement in Dunbar and Dounreay. As you can imagine, this job involved a lot of travel. Alasdair took his hobbies with him. Packed away in his guitar case, along with his guitar, were his swimming trunks, his ice-skates and his table tennis bat! Always prepared for exercise was Alasdair! These were precious items to him and he put a yellow radioactive sticker on his guitar case to ward off potential thieves. This proved very successful the time his car was stolen. When the police found the car and saw the sticker they put a cordon round the car. The guitar case and its precious content remained intact!

Another of Alasdair’s hobbies was motorbikes. He bought his first in 1952. In fact, he could drive a motorbike before he could drive a car. This was not for the sake of a solitary life. He had a side car and often took passengers pillion. He must’ve been a good driver as his grand-daughter, Helen, fell asleep riding pillion and his niece, Margaret, spoke of trips on the bike as “really cool”.

Alasdair’s favourite hobby was radio. The family showed me a framed certificate of his Honorary Life Membership of the Mid Lanark Amateur Radio Society, awarded to him for his “outstanding contribution to and furtherance of amateur radio”. He introduced 100s, if not 1000s, to this hobby. He taught at night school to help people pass their radio amateur exams and became well-known in radio amateur circles in Scotland. He was one of the earliest radio amateurs and indeed invented a particular aerial which is named after his call-sign GM3 AXX. Often at night Alasdair would be up trying to communicate internationally by radio. He would help Scouts and Guides with their communications badge work and at one point successfully contacted the space shuttle. It was a very sociable hobby too: the Friday social night at the radio club was incredibly important to him.

Alasdair was always a willing volunteer at John Knox church. He used his musical talents to help with the concert party, entertainment for old folks’ homes. He also read the Bible in church services but Alasdair preferred a behind the scenes role. Rather than be an office bearer in the church this humble man would be up a ladder fixing something! He set up and maintained the first sound system in John Knox, the first outside lights and the PA system in the hall at Christmas in case the high attendance meant people had to overflow into the hall. Even if the hall was not used I imagine Alasdair didn’t need much excuse to set it up.

Alasdair was a people person. He was always the first to put the kettle on when people visited. He loved a good story and was a great teller of jokes. He loved TV comedies: “Last of the Summer Wine” being his favourite. At his annual x-ray to check his health because of his frequent use of radio, he hid a tinfoil heart under his shirt to cheer up the technicians, such was his sense of fun.

Alasdair was an enabler, making things happen for other people. He received a certificate of appreciation for his work in delivering audio-books for the RNIB (Royal National Institute for Blind People). It is fitting of the man that he wanted Glasgow University Department of Anatomy to use his body for medical research, to help other people. Alasdair always wanted to fix things. Indeed, he never threw anything out if Araldite would fix it. Even as his mind failed and he was in the care home at Hallhouse he wanted to help. He was devoted to Margaret, especially in her ill health, never losing the desire to be doing things for her. This extended to the family. He asked Kim how he could help her when her husband Alasdair was in Africa on a recent charity bike trip.

Let me read some words his son, Kennedy, wrote in preparation for today: “We gather today to say farewell, to say goodbye to Alasdair, but in reality we have been saying goodbye to him for several years.  His dementia and mobility problems had gradually taken him from us bit by bit.  Occasionally there would be flashes of his old humour and charm but the clever, funny, active, resourceful man that he was, had been slipping into the shadows for some time and now that process is complete.  The tragedy of dementia is that it steals a person away in small steps and we are left holding on to our memories.  We are told that there will be no tears in heaven – they will all be wiped away.  Well, perhaps some tears will need to be wiped away – but they will be tears of laughter as Alasdair tells his latest joke or story.”

When I asked the family to sum Alasdair up, they said he was a people person, who lived life to the full, a loyal, devoted man who thought the world of his family, a wonderful Grandpa who will be sadly missed.

Written by Rev Gavin Niven

John Knox Church, Stewarton

June 2011

Checkout Alasdair’s WoSARS GALLERY Pictures – HERE .

© 2019-2023 WoSARS.Club