“Hi. The name this end is Mark…
Home QTH is Luton…  30 Kilometers north of London. ”

I passed my Amateur Radio licence back in 1982 and was allocated the callsign G6WRB.

That was considered a Class B licence back then and, sadly, I never progressed to a Class A, due to my complete inability to learn Morse.  But, it never really bothered me being restricted to the VHF and UHF bands, as there was always plenty of activity to keep me occupied. That’s not so true nowadays, unfortunately.

I got very interested in the data modes and spent a lot of time on RTTY – even becoming a GB4ATG newsreader each Sunday morning.  The new-fangled AX-25 mode – more commonly known as Packet – also took my fancy and I soon had a node set up at home, courtesy of an AEA PK88 TNC.

And then I got married.

And moved house.

And had kids.

Radio took a big backseat and all my gear got consigned to the loft and was forgotten about.

Till a chance meeting with an old HAM friend rejuvenated my interest some years ago and now – with a FULL licence – I’m back into it and enjoying it just as much – if not more – than I used to.

My current station consists of:

  • A Kenwood TS-590SG for HF, feeding a Hustler 6BTV in the garden and a 10, 12, 17 and 20m fan dipole in the loft There’s also a homebrew active loop connected to it, that works really well.
  • A recently acquired Icom IC-7100, which is fed by the same aerials as the Kenwood, via a couple of switches and also a halfwave 4m dipole in the loft.
  • A Yaesu FTM-100D for V/UHF, feeding a Diamond X-200 dual band colinear on the side of the house.
  • A Kenwood TM-V71A for V/UHF mobile in the car.
  • An SDRplay to make HF work easier.
  • And various 2m and 70cm handhelds

I thoroughly enjoy trying out different homebrew aerials for HF and a while back, I built the VK5JST Antenna Analyser, which makes testing soooo much easier.

And I did some tinkering around with WSPR, a little while ago, seeing how low I could go power-wise and still be spotted.  Just 1mW gave me three spots in Germany on 20m.  Quite pleased with that!

** UPDATED 22.09.2021 **