Monday 27 October 2014

Blast from the past

Digging through the old photos, I came across these from 30 years ago of the old QTH.

On the top of the chimney was a 2m co-linear or Rix Stick as they were known locally. On the gable end was a GP type antenna for 27mhz. The tower sported a Emotator azimuth rotator with a Kempro elevation rotator.

The elevation rotator (for working the Oscar satellite) hosted a 70cm Parabeam, and a 2m Parabeam. Above that was a Slot Fed Vertical for 70cm, and at the top a 70cm vertical co-linear.

The full height of the tilt-over tower (which was tied to the house, therefore no planning permission required) was 40 Feet when fully cranked up (plus the height of the scaffolding pole.)

The satellite dish was a 2m Italian job (Irte) on a Polar mount, which could track all the geostationary KU satellites in the Clarke belt allowing us to track from 45° West (PanAm sat) to 68° East (Eutelsat).

In addition to the thousands of TV channels we could watch, we could also pick up raw news feeds (including footage from the First Gulf War), but the family favourite was the more risque RTL gameshow Tutti Frutti (it was always a mystery to us what exactly was going on - answers on a QSL card if you figured it out.)



The tower has lain unused at the old house all these years, but just this week Sean (26AT103) and my son transported the tower to my current QTH, so perhaps one day soon I'll be impressing my neighbours with this beauty.

1 comment: