Biography

I have been interested in amateur radio since the early 1970's when I was a member of an amateur radio club at school and became immersed and fascinated in back issues of Practical Wireless, thanks to the school physics teacher, Richard Horton, G3XWH. The main club radio was an Eddystone EC10 and I spent many hours listening across the bands.

​In the late 1970's I became a member of the school Signal Corps and had my first experience of working with teletype systems at the 10th Signals Regiment at Hounslow Barracks. This was also the time when I first used the British Army '88' VHF sets and spent many hours getting lost in woodland trying to get back to base in various excercises we were set for orienteering.

​Being the son of a north Yorkshire clergyman, and being lucky enough to live in large, rambling vicarages, with even larger gardens, there were plenty of opportunities to setup very large antennas so I could indulge myself in shortwave listening.

During the 1980's I continued as a SWL and built my own AMTOR/RTTY/CW/SSTV decoders which I used along with my Commodore Vic 20 and 64 computers.

​Since the mid 1980's my career has been centered on IT and I have worked in software development, service and support and management since then. I have continued to follow all aspects of radio communication as it has developed over the years. As SDR and computer control has evolved I have kept track of the technology.

I gained my M6 (M6JXX), 2E0 (2E0JXX) and then M0 (M0XXJ) callsigns in quick succession. After replying to an advert in Practical Wireless in the Summer of 2015 I went on to join up on the very first course run by Martin Lynch & Sons at their new Training Academy in Staines, England. The tutor on all three courses was Andrew Vine, M0GJH. 43 years after I first decided I wanted to become a licenced radio amateur I achieved my ambition!

Equipment

Yaesu FT-991 (HF/VHF/UHF)
Yaesu FTDX3000 (HF/6m)
Yaesu FTM-100D (mobile 2m/70cms)
​Yaesu FTM-400 (private WIRES-X node)
Yaesu FT-1XD (handheld transceiver)
Yaesu FT-2DE (handheld transceiver)
​Yaesu FT-100 (general receiver)
​Icom R2500 (PCR-2500) (wideband receiver)
​Wouxon KG-UV9D (handheld transceiver)
​Yaesu FRG-7700 (general receiver)
Funcube Dongle PRO
​SDRplay
SharkRF Openspot

HF antenna is an all-band sloping inverted L, highest point is approx. 10.5m (33 ft)  with a total length of 14m horizontal + 8m vertical = 22 m (approx. 72 ft). The antenna is attached to a remote CG-3000 ATU.
VHF/UHF antenna is a Diamond X50, mounted 11.5m (approx. 38 ft)
WIRES-X is accessed via a HRI200/FTM-100 slave in to a dummy load and operated as a private node. Room number = 27743.