CRG News

Presentation of CRG Rally Prize to Olly M0OLY (16th June, 2009)

At the May pie and pint we presented Olly M0OLY with a Yaesu FT-60r which was the first prize at this years CRG rally.  Olly thanked the CRG for all the efforts and commitment to amateur radio in Cambridgeshire and hoped to win the first prize next year!  It was fun to note Olly is a die hard Icom fan so presenting him with a Yeasu brought some smiles to those at the pie and pint.

Olly M0OLY receiving the CRG rally first prize of an FT-60r from CRG chairman Rob M0ZPU.

Presentation of APRS Trackers to David G8IDL of Cambridgeshire Raynet (16th June, 2009)

The second and third prizes at the CRG rally were APRS tracker kits complete with GPS receivers to compliment the groups new APRS digi MB7UM.  These were won by Graham, M0GRP and Ben, G6YQJ who both thought they would not utilise them and generously though others would have better use for them.  To that end the CRG decided that Cambridgeshire Raynet would be a good beneficiary from them and as luck would have it David G8IDL the Cambridgeshire Raynet group controller was among the crowd the pie and pint so we stood him up to accept the presentation of both APRS trackers.  David and all other Raynet members in attendance would like to thank Graham, M0GRP and Ben, G6YQJ (Ben was also there on the night) for their generosity.

David G8IDL receiving two APRS trackers with GPS from CRG chairman Rob M0ZPU.

New website for South Anglia Repeater Group (27th May, 2009)

The South Anglia Repeater Group has just launched a new website, www.sargroup.co.uk. This site highlights the work carried out by the repeater group and its supporters. It includes details on the group’s five repeaters which cover Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, Essex and Norfolk. The site also includes contact details for all group members, details on how to donate to the group, pictures of the repeater gear and much more.”

CRG Poloshirts Now Available (27th May, 2009)

New CRG Polo shirts beautifully embroidered with the CRG logo in sizes small to xxxl, go to the products page to order yours now!

Camb-Hams DX’Pedition Ready To Go (15th April, 2009)

With the trailer packed and Friday 17th April fast approaching the long awaited Camb-Hams DX’Pedition to the Island of Harris is about to start.  With activity planned on all bands from 80m to 70cm using GS3PYE/P, the Scottish variant of the CRG clubcall, you should manage to make a QSO!  Follow the groups progress on the Harris diary page here.

SARG AGM – April 21st 2009 (20th March, 2009)

Another year has passed and it is once again time for the AGM of the South Anglia Repeater Group on Tuesday 21st April 2009 at 19:15 for 19:30 start. Location is St John Ambulance (Suffolk) Headquarters, Priory House, Duckamere, Bramford, Ipswich, Suffolk, IP8 4AJ.  Directions and a map can be found here.  More info on the SARG webpage here.

Agenda
1- Welcome and Introductions (inc domestic arrangements  *Keith Hotchkiss )
2- Apologies for absence
3- Minutes from the last AGM
4- Matters arising from those minutes
5- Chairman’s Report
6- Treasurers Report (including any Repeater Group Subs)
7- Auditors Statement
8- Nominations and Election of Officers:
- Chairman
- Secretary
- Treasurer
- Auditor
9-  Repeater News
10- TV Repeater (Jason Flynn and Chris Irish)
11- Web Site Update (Keith Hotchkiss)
12- Any other business
13- Date of Next Meeting

MB7UM Now On-Air (3rd November, 2008)

After a few weeks of effort from lots of CRG members and with various HW issues to overcome the groups APRS digi-peater MB7UM is now on-air and operational.  You can see local users on MB7UM page.

• GB3PV Digital TX Active (29th September, 2008)

On Sunday 29th of September GB3PV was upgraded to include a Digital DVB-S transmitter.  Analogue or digital transmit can be switched by DTMF, plans are already underway to integrate a digital receiver.

• Latest Newsletter Out (19th September, 2008)

The latest newsletter from the CRG is out.  You can Download Newsletter with that link or go directly to the Newsletter Page and find the previous installments available for download.

• D-Star Gateway Now Live – GB7PI (5th September, 2008)

The long awaited gateway for GB7PI became live at 23.15 on Thursday 5th of September.  Don G3YQO was the first to have a QSO over the gateway with Darren G7LWT who also spent his evening commissioning the gateway install with local help from Bob G1SAA.  Information on GB7PI can be found on our GB7PI page here and if you require registration please go to our online registration here and fill out the form.  Thanks go to Darren and all the team at UKIT for their help.

August 2008

• Frequency Change – GB7PI (16th August, 2008)

On Tuesday August 19, 2008 our UHF D-STAR Repeater GB7PI will have it’s input frequency changed per orders from ofcom.  The output frequency of 439.9125 MHz will remain the same, however, the input frequency will change to 430.9125 MHz.  This move is inline with the new 9 MHz split for GMSK repeaters.

• New APRS UI-Digi NoV Issued – MB7UM (8th August, 2008)

The CRG have been issued with an NoV to run a 2m (144.800Mhz) APRS UI-Digi from Madingley under the callsign MB7UM.  We hope to have the UI-Digi operational soon…  More info here.

June 2008

• Donation of a Simoco PRF10 base station (15th June, 2008)

The Cambridgeshire Repeater Group would like to thank Gordon Spicer, G1UPU, for the generous donation of the Simoco PRF10 base station, which is one of small number of commercial units built by Simoco to operate on PMR frequencies just above to the 6m band.  It is hoped that this will be used as a spare for GB3PX subject to a spot of re-programming, the addition of a logic, and a tune-up.

May 2008

• Camb-Hams Mull DX’peditions A Success (9th May, 2008)

The Camb-Hams trip to Mull between April 26th and May 3rd 2008 was a great success! More information with all the updates are available on the Camb-Hams Mull Page

• IC-E91 Presented To George Gunn, G8ACT (7th May, 2008)

At the May 7th Pie and Pint George Gunn, G8ACT was presented with his IC-E91 by the CRG chairman Rob Compton, M0ZPU which George won at the CRG rally.

 

April 2008

• GB7PI Gets CW Ident (13th April, 2008)

As part of the ongoing technical development of the groups repeaters GB7PI has been equipped with a CW ident.  Every 16 minutes "GB7PI IO92XA DSTAR" is sent.  Reports welcome.

• E91 Raffle (6th April, 2008)

The groups Icom IC-E91 radio, initial used for testing GB7PI was raffled at the groups annual rally.  The draw took place at 1.30pm and the first name out the hat was George Gunn, G8ACT from Bishops Stortford.  Well done George!  A presentation will take place on May 7th at the next Pie and Pint.

• CUWS Loan Scheme – Radio Issued! (21st March, 2008)

The first radio as part of the CRG and CUWS loan scheme was presented to Jordan Skittrall on Thursday 20th March at the CUWS meeting in Cambridge.  More information and pictures will be in the next news letter.

• GB7PI Gets CW Ident (13th April, 2008)

As part of the ongoing technical development of the groups repeaters GB7PI has been equipped with a CW ident.  Every 16 minutes "GB7PI IO92XA DSTAR" is sent.  Reports welcome.

• E91 Raffle (6th April, 2008)

The groups Icom IC-E91 radio used for initial testing of GB7PI was raffled at the groups anual rally.  The draw took place at 1.30pm and the first name out the hat was George Gunn, G8ACT from Bishops Stortford.  Well done George!  A presentation will take place on May 7th at the next Pie and Pint.

February 2008

• GB7PI Makes It Onto YouTube!

Watch and listen to a D-Star QSO on GB7PI between G1SAA, 2E0GYZ/M and M1BXF on YouTube.  Thanks Matt!

• RadCom Article (16th February, 2008)

Our very own technical coordinator got his name in print in the March 2008 edition of RadCom, page 26.  Gavin M1BXF wrote a sub article ‘D-Star.. What is it?’ to help enhance the review of Icoms IC-E2820 radio.

January 2008

• Icom D-Star Press Day (31st January, 2008)

Due to the CRG’s continual support and promotion of D-Star, Gavin M1BXF and Daryl G0ANV were invited down to a D-Star Press day at Icom UK’s HQ in Herne Bay.  Besides the main D-Star information lots of interesting developments and topics where presented and discussed by Icom, the RSGB (RadCom), Monitoring Monthly and Practical Wireless.  It was a chance for us to form better ties with the various people and let them know what the CRG are upto.  You will likely see more information about the CRG in coming editions of each magazine.  More information about the visit will be in the next edition of the newsletter.

• Spring Newsletter Out (11th January, 2008)

The latest CRG newsletter is out!! It’s really starting to look like a proper newsletter now folks, there’s stories, information, history… don’t wait any longer, just click to download the CRG Update – Spring 2008. If you know someone that would like to read it but isn’t a member (yeah I know, hard to imagine, get them to join!) or doesn’t have internet access kindly print it off and pass it along to them!

November 2007

• GB3PX – Back On-Air[ish] (26th November, 2007)

GB3PX (6m FM Repeater) is still suffering issue with it’s antenna. It’s intermittent. The logic was now been modified to provide the much asked for courtesy tone. Please submit reports on coverage and the pip to the CRG forum here.

• GB7PI on-air from 11.30am Monday 19th November 2007! (19th November, 2007)

CRG Chairman Rob Compton, M0ZPU and CRG Technical Co-ordinator Gavin Nesbitt, M1BXF installed the group’s new GB7PI D-Star repeater at Barkway today. –More info about the repeater here –

• CRG AGM (16th November, 2007)

The minutes of the AGM will posted to the website as soon as they are prepared after Friday’s meeting. The big news from the meeting is of course the successful vote to approve the go ahead of GB7PI – the CRG’s newest addition – a D-STAR Repeater. Initially the D-STAR repeater will work only in a local mode as currently there is no internet access at the repeater site, this is required for connection to the D-STAR backbone. Besides having to meet the requirements for backbone connection this will also give the local users the chance to figure out how to operate their equipment as well as the repeater requipment. There will also be pleny of testing and experimenting during this time which will include possible interference issues with not only our equipment but that of other unprotected users of the 70cm band. There were issues raised in the AGM from members south of Cambridge that have very strong telemetry signals being heard on and near our allocated frequencies. These will need to be located and identified to determine if operating on our allocated frequencies will be causing any major issues for these users. More about that in the minutes once they are posted.

• GB3PY gets Echolink (10th November, 2007)

GB3PY now has Echolink running on it in a part-time testing mode.   G4HUN will be hosting the attended Echolink connection to PY and it is expected to run most weekday evenings between 1930hrs and 2300hrs.  There may be some daytime service – users should check the On-line status indicator on the CRG homepage.  The long term plan hasn’t been decided yet, it’s really up to how well it’s used and received and if there are interference problems.  The Echolink node assigned has been It is hoped that people will respect one simple rule, local traffic comes first and mobile traffic ahead of all other, this is normal expected code of conduct on repeaters so there should be no problems in this working.   There is a 2 minute time out on the Echolink connections both for RX and TX.

October 2007

• New UK D-STAR Repeater GB7PI (22nd October, 2007)

Back in 1971 GB3PI run by the Cambridge (PYE) Repeater Group from the Barkway Ridge pioneered FM Repeater operation in the UK. Now 36 years later Barkway Ridge will be at the forefront of the Digital Voice revolution with the licensing of the D-STAR repeater GB7PI. — Continue reading this article –

• GB3PX Antenna (October 10, 2007)

The long and much awaited fix to the antenna system for GB3PX is finally finished. PX is back on the air in it’s full glory. Rob, M0ZPU, was on site today with some riggers to get the antenna changed. So far, one report we have on it’s improvement is from Bob, G1SAA, yesterday took a reading from his house in Histon using his horizontal beam and he was only receiving PX at S3. Today after the fix he’s getting PX 10 over 9.