Biography

If my status shows 'ONLINE', I am in the shack operating the radio station!

WORKED ALL BRITAIN SQUARE = ST63

I am a user of: LOTW, EQSL, CLUBLOG & QRZ.COM

I DO NOT SEND QSL CARDS VIA POST!



My name is Ross and my station is located in the city of Bristol, South West United Kingdom.

My other interests besides radio are motocross racing, keeping exotic reptiles, DJ'ing, producing and playing live 'Techno' music and running an online record label.

I am signed to seven record labels and have DJ'd for over fifteen years earning bookings at various night clubs all over the UK from The Ministry Of Sound in London to events and club nights held in Ibiza for consecutive summer seasons.

I have been monitoring various air ways for twenty five plus years, starting with airband radios as a child, then moving on to AM, SSB and CB radios (AND PROUD)

My current radio set up is pictured and consists of a YAESU FTDX101MP transciever with a 2 element Ultrabeam Yagi which is resonant on all bands from 6 meters to 40 meters without the need for a tuner, the antenna is an active antenna system and uses Two 'Stepper motors' to lengthen and shorten the elements (11 meters long x 2 meters wide)

This antenna acts as a 2 element yagi from 6-20 meters and as a folded dipole on 30 and 40m, this is mounted on a 17 meter electric tiltable mast, attached to the back of my house. (Supplied and fitted by MM0CUG @ CUG Mast Solutions)

I am a keen DX chaser and I like to take part in the DX competitions, I ranked 17th overall in England and 2nd in my licence class during the October 2019 CQ WW Contest then took part in the CQ WPX Contest in March 2020, I ranked 4th overall in England and 1st in my licence class



As amateurs operating in today's modern times, we often face huge problems with 'noise' / QRM... I often hear of operators 'giving up' due to rising noise levels...

I was previously one of these operators plauged with 'noise' and I was not willing to just simply 'give up', that easily...

I must admit, upon further investigation, some of the 'noise' was caused by various devices in my own home that I managed to track down, then filter and choke OR better, throw in the bin !

'Noise' caused from the neighbours using cheap imported electronics devices that were injecting 'noise' in to the mains...not so easy to track down and deal with.

I have managed to lower my noise floor from S7-8 down to S1-2 (on the worse affected bands) using an isolated, filtered mains supply which uses it's own a brand new dedicate earthing system. (Pictured above)

Here is a link to the clean dedicated earth supply system I am operarting with, from my home QTH.- https://getctowned.com/amateur-radio/pme-isolated-filtered-ac-supply/ Big thanks to Tom (M7CT0) and his wealth of knowledge within this field.

Here is a link to the 25amp filter board which I have installed inside my transciever's PSU https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07J1W2DJD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1&fbclid=IwAR3mTesTSLDClu1FQlWuncO-hCJZiobcZZXF4BqshgRcRBA2dEDm2BR1SnA

I can also recommend Ian (GM3SEK) and his website where I discovered his 'Whole Shack Mains Filter' - https://gm3sek.com/2019/10/11/clean-up-your-shack-2019/ (Pictured above)

So, all these individual projects and builds saved my hobby. Hopefully, you may find this information useful. It transformed HF radio for me!



Thanks for visiting my page and good luck in the DX !

73

Equipment

YAESU FTDX101MP

ACOM 2000A AMPLIFIER

METROPWR FX773 DIGITAL STATION MONITOR

ULTRA BEAM 6 - 40M 2 ELEMENT ACTIVE ANTENNA SYSTEM

15 METER MAST

YAESU G-1000DXC ROTATOR

RCU-06 CONTROLLER

SM 50 DESKTOP MICROPHONE

DUAL BEAM PRO (HORIZONTAL DI POLE) ANTENNA

END FED WIRE FOR 80 - 6 METERS

MFJ 993B AUTO TUNER

WATSON W-30AM POWER SUPPLY

BRESSER WEATHER STATION

HAM CLOCK VIA RASPBERRY PI

MACLOGGER DX