N1NCI/R Schofield Mtn -- Winchester/Hinsdale NH

146.865 -  100.0Hz PL

The newest 2m repeater in Cheshire County is now on the air as of just about noon on Saturday, December 22, 2007.  Thanks Dale, Good job!!  Which now means that I'm writing yet another web page to document the events of the day.

The story began quite a while ago at the club meetings and discussing attempting to fill in some serious holes in coverage from the K1TQY 146.805 Keene repeater down in the Winchester and Hinsdale areas.  I really hadn't realized just how far "down" Hinsdale was from Keene.  Yeah, it's in a hole!  Big one!!  

Schofield Mtn had been abandoned for the most part from Mutual Aid dispatch.  They used to have a 33.78 transmitter there, and more recently a 154.43 radio there, but re-located onto another tower that became available.  I had "heard" that the Schofield site was sort of a hidden place, but I had never been to it before today.  Trust me, it is...

Anyway, back to the story, at the last club meeting, this past Wednesday, (12/19/07) Dale had brought the repeater to the meeting for a little show and tell.  When he was asked when he thought he was going to install it, he said something to the extent of "Joel and I are going down this Saturday - Oh yeah, I was going to ask you (Joel) if you were available then....."  I was so, that wasn't a problem.

So the repeater was connected at the club and everybody checked it out and oooohhh'ed and Ahhhhh'ed and Dale told what it was constructed of.  All commercial equipment, all Motorola, and all mobiles.  3 GM300's - the main repeater receiver, on 146.265, the link receiver on 146.805, and a UHF one used to transmit on the satellite receiver frequency for the 805, Keene machine.  Oh, and the primary repeater transmitter, a 100watt Spectra!  Yes, yes, it has been turned down.  The primary goal is full-time linking of the 805 Keene repeater to this one, so there will be decent coverage back to Keene.

A set of commercial duplexers, a CAT250 controller and a Diamond X200? 2000?  Something like that.. and a huge deep cell battery with a smart charger.  Emergency power at it's finest!

Here's the theory of how it's going to work...  Obviously, the primary repeater on 265/865.  The link receiver will be listening to 146.805 on the link VHF receiver, so that anything that comes out of 805 will be re-broadcast on 865.  The 865 repeater will transmit back to 805 on the UHF link, same as the original cross band Schofield link did.  Pretty ingenious if I do say so myself!!

Saturday rolls around, we do the usual thing, meet at the shop, load up the stuff and head off to parts unknown...well, unknown to me.  The first order of business is to shovel out the snow covered enclosure that it's going to be mounted in.  (Can't really call that thing a building.)  We even carve out some steps in the snow bank.  You see, we seem to have a hard time in putting up repeaters in warm weather - hihi..

That all goes pretty much without incident.  I'm digging snow, Dale's setting up the ladder to switch antennas around on the Utility pole -- What?  No tower?

And, the rest is history - well, pretty much.  Now for the testing and fine tuning.  Just a little inside joke here, Cliff now believes in Santa Clause again!!

Below are a few pictures to capture the moment..

Enjoy!! de Joel - WA1ZYX

Back of the truck all loaded with the stuff...

Truck in the shop with antenna strapped on the roof, ready to head out.

And there it is... "The Site"

And yes, it "is" hidden pretty well.

Dale - N1NCI with the cans.

The repeater cabinet inside the box.

Left to Right, Top Shelf: UHF Link transmitter, 805 receiver, 265 main receiver, below the two VHF GM's is the controller, and below that, the control head for the Spectra.

Duplexers sitting on top of the repeater.

Dale taking down the old "415" stick

Stairway to Heaven.  See?  I told you we carved steps into the snowbank!

Joel - WA1ZYX assembling antenna mounts.

Dale installing the new antenna

Closer look at the new antenna

It's FIRST ID, Officially "On The Air"!!

And there it is....  In use...

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