Tag Archives: Yorkshire wildlife trust

Cold Nights and Going Green M0KVK Style

Well, last weekend saw Kevin M0KVK testing out the new Club winter uniform, this was suggested by Jason M0MGF the club’s treasure, As he informed the membership of rising costs running the 3KW heaters all the time, and suggested warmer clothes.

Kevin set the standard with his list below

Thermal Hat, Gloves, and Scarf

and fleece lined Slippers of course to keep your feet warm

and for really cold DX nights a hot water bottle is a must.

Now Kevin found operating the Radio a little hard with the Big Gloves on, he has asked for a bigger VFO knob to be fitted on all radios as this could be the way forward he thinks.

The biggest problem was when operating the keyboard four keys would be pressed at once, this resulting in some funny callsign being entered into the logbook, Kevin has asked if we can look into the bigger keyboards with bigger keys on them.

 

 

  Kevin feels the first run out was a success and looks forwarded to other Members coming forwarded with more warm Ideas.

 

P.S

I think I will just stick to the 3KW Heaters :).

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GB2SL Report

This Years Team

Top Left Dave Wilkinson from YWT, Phil M0VEY, Kevin M0KVK, Andy G7LRR, Paul 2E0WPW Dave 2E0TKO, Andy M0TTL, Jason M0MGF, Ian M1DHJ, and not in the picture Marcin M0GLV

Well, what a great weekend’s event as always at spurn point lighthouse.
Big thank you to the Yorkshire wildlife trust @ spurn, Andrew Mason, Adam Stoyle, and the team, for making us all feel very welcome and helping us make this yearly event possible.
Was good to be back on Spurn point after not being able to get down for the last two years and talking to the team down there again was good to have a catch-up.
We tried our best to put on a good station and get the public involved in what we do.
We spoke and worked many other lighthouses and lightships around the globe, as we could also this year work a digimode called FT8.
Not sure about the numbers we worked on as I write this, but will post once done I do know it was in the three hundred range.
Apart from operating radio which is why we were there, it’s great to also relax at spurn point taking a nice walk around and taking in the wildlife, one of the highlights was Binks and Basil coming to pay us a visit and feeding them by hand, these are some of spurn points foxes which over the years the RLNI lifeboat crews have made friends with along with the teams that work with and for the YWT.

All in all a great event looking forward to going back next year.
I know there’s talk of BBQ next year as well that will beat my pot noodles this year hi hi.
Some pictures to highlight the event

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GB2SL International Lighthouse Lightship Weekend – ILLW 21st 22nd August 2021

Once again, the Humber Fortress ARC club working alongside Yorkshire Wildlife Trust will be putting a live HF Radio Station on the amateur radio bands from Spurn Point Lighthouse. From 21st August and running until 1500 hr 22nd August. The club members are really looking forward to this event. With the move of the radio Club in 2019 and Covid restrictions in 2020, we missed out on our annual trip to the lighthouse.

There are two lighthouses situated close to each other at the southern end of the point. There have been lighthouses on Spurn since 1427 due to the dangerous currents and sandbanks that lie beneath the Humber’s surface.

There is little record of what Spurn’s earlier lighthouses looked like, but we know they have been built in pairs since 1674 and at least eight have been swept away in storms. They were built in twos (called high and low lights) to help sailors navigate in the Humber estuary. In 1852 the last, and still standing, low light was built. However, when the present lighthouse was built the low light was no longer needed as three additional lamps were placed in the body of the lighthouse instead. It has since been used as an explosive store and a water tower. Now it stands deserted.

Thomas Matthews designed the present lighthouse in 1893-5 when the previous one was discovered to be cracking. It stands on an artificial rock foundation that goes down 22 feet (7m) and took nearly two years to build.

Later the oil lamp was converted to electricity (1941) and gas (1957) on which ran until 1985 when it was last used.

First Lighthouse built: 1427
Current lighthouse built: 1893-5
Height: 128ft (39m)
Steps: 145
Made of: 300,000 Staffordshire bricks
Designed by: Thomas Matthews
Built by: Stratten’s of Edinburgh
Last day of use: 31st October 1985
Location: End of Spurn Point.

 

We will head down to the lighthouse on Saturday morning at 7 am. The trip starts with a ride in the YWT Unimog as the road has been breached over the years and the Unimog makes easy work of getting across the difficult terrain.

Once down at the lighthouse, the equipment will be unloaded from the Unimog, then we will start to set up the station.

 

One job is to climb the 145 steps to the top of the lighthouse, then lower a 300-meter rope over the side which we run out along the beach. Then we will put halyards along this rope to run 160m 80m 40m dipoles and verticals from.

Once we have set up the station we will be on the air! Please call in into the event if you hear us on the air using callsign GB2SL.

If you fancy a walk down to the lighthouse, please come along but remember to check tide times before travelling.

Please see the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust website for more info.

 

  

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GB2SL this year has been something a bit special

GB2SL this year has been something a bit special, this is because of Spurn high lighthouse the tallest lighthouse in Northern England! is now owned by the (YWT) Yorkshire Wildlife Trust. 

 

Which has just been renovated in 2016 to a sum £470,500 made possible by the national heritage Lottery Fund and additional support from the Coastal Communities Fund and the Big Lottery Fund and is now open to the public for viewing.

This meant after a few talks and email with YWT we were able to operate for the first time from inside the lighthouse and promote it in style from a radio operating point.

for International lighthouses and light ships on the air https://illw.net/

 

The Team

Saturday morning saw 10 members turn up to Spurn point to set out on what was to become a great weekends event.

 Once all the Equipment and the team were loaded on the YWT Unimog we were ready for the trip down the Spurn peninsula to the Lighthouse,  Adam Stoyle from the YWT who had helped make this all possible was our driver and guide to get down to the lighthouse.

The break point 

The team that went down was 10 and we must say thanks to Jon Falconer 2E0ZRO, Elliot SWL Jon’s Son and John Cunliffe G6LNV who just came along on Saturday to help set up the station.

 Seven members stayed over on Saturday night.

These were Pat Walsh M0PKE, Kevin Sim M0KVK, Sean Lyon M0SLY, Paul Williams M6XPW, Charlie Storr 2E0CIK, Andy Dickinson M0TTL, Andy Nielsen G7LRR  birthday boy we will come to that later. The drive down along the peninsula is part road and part beach after the road washed out in 2013 the Unimog makes easy work of getting over the beach.

Once down at the Lighthouse, it was time to unload all our Equipment and setup the station, all this had to be carried up to the 3rd floor our operating room for the weekend. 

view of the 3rd floor from 4th-floor landing

I think we are all a few pounds lighter after running up and down the stairs, there are 86 steps up to the third floor from where we had the station.

The team formed 3 groups, one for the inside set up, one outside doing the antennas and the topside putting the rope from the top of the lighthouse to the ground 200m in all, for antenna support, that was 145 steps as well to the top this task was undertaken by Jon 2E0ZRO the youngest of the team

Well done for getting up there in one go, even though you were out of breath for 5 after.

To start, we set up a 40 meter Delta Loop manufactured by Kevin.

Once setup we asked where’s the loo which we was told 1/4 mile down the road at the point, this did not hold us back at all as once again the YWT had helped us out and let us use a pushbike as Kevin M0KVK is modelling  ( be quick Kevin there 6 more want to use that bike).

 We made many contacts on this antenna on Saturday, including an excellent happy birthday rendition sung by Trevor G1TDN for Andy G7LRR. I cannot tell you how old he is there is not enough space on the page.

We took this down in the early evening and put up a good old G5RV, this gave us a few more bands overnight so we would not have to alter antenna in the dark and it gets dark down there no light at all outside.

 On Sunday morning we changed over to a 40-meter dedicated dipole also built by Kevin, all the equipment worked well.

 Kevin and Andy also demonstrated DMR from downstairs to members of the public in the lighthouse, this is a digital mode best explained by Andy, but it is an excellent mode.

Andy M0TTL also deserves a mention at this point for bringing a full kitchen with him, and yes the kitchen sink came as well.

Sunday also saw some local amateurs turn up and had a go on the radio Mike G4VHM walked the full 3 1/2 miles to do a little CW it was great to see him.

Mike also brought along Bernard G0SWO who was lucky to get a lift from the YWT in their land rover there and back to the lighthouse.

Bernard is well into this 80s could not make the 3 1/2 mile walk but did make the 86 steps to work the radio well done Bernard.

 During the two days, many of the lighthouses visitors stopped on our floor for a welcome break on their way up to the top, some of the younger ones making guest calls on the radio. We also had some Duke of Edinburgh’s Award Students pay us a visit.

One of the best parts for all of the team was been able to sleep over the lighthouse, and given the keys to the Lighthouse for the night, Kevin Enjoyed locking it up and Paul was the keeper of the keys for the night.

We were also lucky that the wind got up in the night to around 40 mph in gusts and at the top where a few members stopped you could the feel the lighthouse move a little this rocked you to sleep.

The morning sunrise is not one to be missed at Spurn this was looking from the 4th-floor windows.

The lighthouse at Spurn is a great place to operate from radio aspect, but not only that, it is a place of interest, offering some spectacular views over the Spurn peninsula river and sea, this  is a must to visit for all the family.

please visit the Yorkshire Wild trust site for more information and plan a visit.

http://www.ywt.org.uk/visit-spurn-lighthouse

A big thank you to Sean Lyon M0SLY, and John Cunliffe G6LNV who put in a lot of hard work into the setting up of the event so the club could actually activate the lighthouse from inside for the first time.

The full Club would like to say a big thank you to Adam Stoyle Spurn Gateway Development Officer and Andrew Mason Heritage Officer with their great team down at Spurn point. for making it possible and giving us a warm welcome.

We can say after talking to Adam and Andrew we will be going back, this is the start of what we all hope are many events that can be held at the lighthouse working with and alongside the YWT.

Here is a shot of the full operating team with Ben and Rob from the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust

here is a rundown of what we did on GB2SL

467 QSO’s made

45 DXCC Countries Worked

18 light house

Written by Charlie Storr and Andy Nielsen

 

Here a slideshow of the full weekend 

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