Biography

At around age 6, I developed an interest in most anything and everything electrical or mechanical. When my oldest sister received a record player (for her 14th birthday) and while she wasn't looking, I decided to take it apart to learn what made it tick. I found that it had an earth-magnet within the speaker and some interesting ball bearings and wiring within its motor.

My dad (an ex-Air force co-pilot and mechanic) immediately recognized that I needed something to keep me busy and out of trouble, so he quickly searched for something that would likely interest me. Within a few days, he recovered an upgraded aircraft receiver that had been hidden away in his stuff for years. It had been fitted with an AC power-supply and so it was ready for use! Dad laid it before me, a tube-type radio receiver with no outer casing (Collins I think). Simply a metallic chassis, with metal tubes and IF cans. He had strung out a piece of wire that he tied to our clothesline as an antenna, plugged the radio it into the A/C, turned it “ON”, and showed me how to tune the dial, while he explained what I might hear come through the speaker.

This got me going! I quickly learned to tune around the different bands and use the BFO/Q-multiplier to tune-in amateur radio communications on 40M and 80M. Obviously, I also listened to many interesting commercial, air, and marine services too. A few years later, I obtained a much better Hammarlund receiver and an ARRL Handbook as a gift from my uncle (Owen). I eventually learned CW using this receiver and alot about electronics from the handbook.

Ham-radio really captured me and drove my interest into building all kinds of radio related projects. By my first year in high school, my career direction was very clear. Of course, electronics education was a must in my future! College and Radio Electonics specializing provided the technical insight!

My first job in the electronics career was working for CNCP Telecommunications for a few years on Broadband and Teletype equipment and the Mid-Canada Line (Microwave) network. Following this, I had an interesting 4-year sejour in the City of Montreal Police Department which permitted me to moonlight and start a small electronics business in the mid 70s.

My passion for radio and electronics encouraged me through these years and got me into the City-wide Radio-Paging and Commercial 2-Way radio fields, working for many years alongside both NEC (Nippon Electric of Japan) and Motorola. I did all kinds of work throughout North America (and the world) on private, commercial, industrial, marine, and airport communication systems, both analog and digital. Put up several paging networks in collaboration with NEC and Motorola, and also assisted Metrocast in San Diego and British Telecom.

I kind of retired from working full-time in 2015 but remained actively involved in select public safety contracts and technical projects that kept me busy until March of 2018. However, I'm now officially retired and able to spend more time getting back into the incredible hobby of Amateur Radio.

Having had three boys, I'm also a Grandfather to nine little ones (6 girls and 3 boys) ranging from 2 to 13 years old as of this writing, so both my wife and I continue to keep reasonably busy spending time with them, spoiling them and enjoying them as much as is possible. Of course the pandemic has slowed things down considerably over the past year!

I have been increasingly active in the past few months, mostly with HF rag chewing, a little CW and some DXing. My station is comprised of a Software Defined Radio (Flex-6400) and a Yaesu FTDX101D transceiver, using a near legal-limit Mercury llls (and previously an Alpha 99 linear amplifier, or Dentron MLA-2500, Marconi BH-30, Drake L4B, Henry 2KD, Heathkit SB220, etc.). My antenna system consisted of a Cush-Craft ATB-34, replaced by a TH11DX, and now a three-element SteppIR (with the 40M option) on a 56 foot self-supporting DMX tower. My rotator, initially a HAM-4, replaced by a Yaesu G-1000DX, finally upgraded to a Yaesu G-2800DXA which is much more robust and able to handle the load. I also operate a small mobile station presently consisting of a Yaesu FT-891 and an Icom 7100 and the “Little Tarheel”screwdriver antenna (as well as various wire antennas which I can sling into trees when operating “fixed” while traveling), as well as operating VHF and UHF using FM, DSTAR, DMR and FUSION modes.

I'm president of a small amateur-radio group in the Montreal region (the VE2RMP Radio Group), and operate and maintain several repeater stations on a respectable site located atop the Mont-Royal here in Montreal (see more information here www.ve2rmp.org).

Hope to meet you On-the-Air again sometime soon. Thanks for dropping by!

73 de

Claude - VE2YI

ceverton2222@gmail.com (this replaces my previous email address ceverton@sympatico.ca).

Worked DXCCs:

Equipment

Yaesu FTDX101D
FLEX RADIO Flex-6400
Icom IC-7610
Icom IC-7300
MERCURY lllS LDMOS 1200Watt Linear Amplifier
STEPPIR 3 Element c/w 40 Meter Element (40M-6M) Beam
TH11DX 11 Element Yagi/Beam
End-Fed Longwire (135' using 49:1 Autotransformer/balun)
Inv. "V"'s 80M and 40M
Multiband Alpha-Delta "DXCC"
PIXEL Technologies Active Magnetic Loop Antenna RF-PRO-1BRF
YAESU G-2800DXA Rotator