Biography

I was born in a large city called Bloemfontein and moved to Pretoria as a young boy. I went to a technical school in Pretoria and after school received a bursary to study Electronic Engineering from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, CSIR. I started working in the field of analogue electronics and spent my initial years being trained in the USA and Israel on solar system design and installation. I spent a couple of years designing solar systems for local schools and clinics.

I moved onto sonar systems which is typically used onboard naval vessels. I spent many years being trained in Germany and France on sonar systems from design to manufacturing. I am still working in this field for the vessels of the South African navy.

I moved to Cash In Transit protection systems to prevent the loss of cash during heists. I spent many years in Europe and the UK with my team commisioning the CIT systems for armed response customers.

I spend lots of time in my radio shack developing, building and using electronic projects for the amateur radio hobby. Although I have practised nearly all facets of amateur radio since receiving my license in 1982, my current amateur radio focus is on the digital modes and satellite radio. I am responsible for the maintenance of 3 digital-voice repeaters and the XLX655 digital-voice reflector in Pretoria.

I spend as much time as possible sailing catamarans to enjoy the outdoors and clear the head. I also hold a rescue skippers ticket for inland and coastal waters.

I have far too many radios, SDR’s and antennas to list.

Worked DXCCs:

Equipment

Yaesu FT-710AESS (HF & 6m), Yaesu FT8900R (10m - 70cm), Motorola CM-360 (4m), Icom IC-9700 (VHF - SHF), Hytera MD-785 (DMR), ICOM-4100E (D-Star), AD Pluto SDR (QO-100), LibreSDR, SDRPlay RSP-1A (Receive), RTL-SDR Dongle, Baofeng DM-32UV, ICOM ID-52E (D-Star), ICOM IC-F6122D (NXDN), Icom IC-7300, Motorola DM4601E, Lot of antenna's and rotators.