wythall radio club

Wythall Radio Club member Jamie M0SDV is celebrating today. 

He has been crowned the winner of this year’s Lew Williams Shield award.

Each May, we designate the month as our Morse Activity month and members are invited to show evidence of progress in learning and/or using the Code in the Radio hobby.

This year Jamie, (who is still only 16, even though he is tall!) was nominated the winner by the judging panel. This comes hot on the heels of him recently gaining his Full licence callsign a few months ago.

It’s been an exciting few weeks for the young man, who is pictured here at last weekend’s Field Day and BBQ, receiving his awards from judge Lee G0MTN. 

Well done Jamie, from everyone at WRC!

An LF Receive Loop at G3YXM

It’s all happening at Wythall Radio Club this coming Tuesday! 

Loop antennas are something of a mystery to many of us but they are gaining in popularity.

This is partly down to the modern twin scourge for radio hobbyists of both local noise and small gardens!

While small antennas are always a compromise, magnetic loop antennas are particularly popular due to their quiet receive and quite effective transmit capabilities.  

In addition, they can be used close to the ground so they are even useful outdoors too.

So this week, on Tuesday 30th May, Club Member and antenna guru, Dave G3YXM, is giving a talk on Practical Loop Antennas.

Dave is a veteran of many a loop, so to speak, and this, our final presentation before the summer activity season starts, is bound to be a very popular one.

Get your seat early then – the talk is at 20:30 in the club shack at Wythall House, Silver Street. B47 6LZ.

We can’t wait!

Back in January, Bob G3PJT gave Wythall Radio Club a demonstration on remote operating of his radio station over the internet.

This would cost most of us far too much £££, but…

The purpose of his talk was to demonstrate remote operations mainly to young people with the aim of encouraging younger people into the hobby with technology that they understand.

This was quite an expensive setup though and, being radio amateurs, we would always like to do it less expensively!

So tonight Club Member Lee G0MTN, is giving us a demonstration on a much cheaper set-up that will achieve a very similar end. Lee has trialled his remote station operation from Poland back to Wythall, so we know it works!

Come along tonight and find out more.

It kicks off at 2030 in the Club Shack at Wythall House, Silver Street, B47 6LZ.

See you there!

People join clubs for various reasons, but high among the reasons people join Wythall Radio Club is the opportunity afforded them to “play radio” with a group of like-minded colleagues.

So it was yesterday, when the weather in Wythall turned decidedly warm – for once, we were quick off the mark too, to arrange one of our “Plug and Play Days”.

Several members managed to get out on the fields behind Wythall Park for some back-to-basics radio, with a generator providing power and members bringing all kinds of strange antennas and radios to do some RF experimentation.

A great time was had by all, and the sun was caught by a few! Just as well there was an ice-cream van and a refreshing cooling bar nearby!

Perhaps we should change the name of such events to “Plug, Play & Pint Days”…

The May 2017 edition of the Wythall Radio Club newsletter is out today. 

This edition features a report on our fantastically successful recent Hamfest together with articles on Maritime Communications, Sleeve and Coaxial Dipoles & the role of the QSL manager.

There’s also news from both Ofcom and our in-house Training team.

Full details of our Easter Contest and the results are also included.

This bumper edition can be found by clicking on the Newsletter icon to the left or by clicking here.

Enjoy!

Overall winner Simon G4TVR

This evening the winners of the Wythall Radio Club Easter Contest were revealed. 

And it’s a big congratulations to our two winners, Simon G4TVR and Jim 2E0BLP.

For Simon it means two wins on the trot in this event – clearly the lure of a large chocolate egg is too much to resist!

FM winner Jim 2E0BLP

For Jim it marks a return to form – his son Kevin 2E0NCO took the title of Christmas Contest winner and there is nothing like family rivalry to bring out the competitive nature.

Congrats too to Phil 2E0WTH, Chris G7DDN, David G7IBO and Stu M0NYP who also won chocolate eggs for second and third places.

Les M6IOI and Juliet M6RSC also won certificates for highest placed Foundation Licencees.

Most importantly, we all had a lot of fun with RF with entrants and QSO numbers up on last year.

Our thanks to Lee G0MTN and Chris G7DDN as the organising team behind the event. 

See you all in December for the next Christmas Contest!

Thanks to club member Chris G3YHF, Wythall Radio Club has a new resource on this website. 

Chris has put together an index to all the articles available in the many club newsletters archived here.

All you have to do is visit our Newsletters page here and click the link at the top.  

Once in the pdf file, you can simply click on the links to go straight to the relevant newsletter and find the article you are interested in.

Alternatively, just click here to go straight to the file and start playing!

It’s a fantastic resource and we hope you like it.

What a great day! The 2017 Wythall Hamfest was once again a great success.

Thank you to all the traders who came along, to all of our visitors (yes you!) for making the trek to our neck of the woods and of course, to our Hamfest team of volunteers who worked so hard to put the event on.

Thanks too to Wythall House for hosting the event, Burger Bob for his great selection of food and drink and to PC Albutt and the local constabulary for their great support too.

We will soon post photos of the day below – keep checking back over the next few days as we continue to add more!

Empty today, Radioworld tomorrow!

The time has almost come – Wythall Hamfest is upon us. 

Tomorrow from 10am, you can join hundreds of fellow enthusiasts in browsing the many stalls, catching up with friends, eating the tastiest burgers in the Midlands(!) or sampling the real ale in Wythall House’s real ale bar (from noon)

Alternatively you could just buy a new radio! Why not? Radioworld will be there!

And the really great news is that this year, wait for it, there is loads of free parking! 

Traders will be crammed in here in the morning!

Yes, we have secured use of Wythall Park field for on-site parking – so there’s no need to park in the streets nearby, just follow the street signs and the marshals’ instructions and we will park you close to the exhibition halls.

This year’s Hamfest will be the best ever – don’t miss it! 

See you tomorrow!