The Dawn of Amateur Radio in the U.K. and Greece Part 4

YV5ZZ/6 - LU1DAU 145.9 29/10/77 02.00 5,000~ World record distance on 144 MHz. First Western hemisphere contact.

JH6TEW - VK8WJ 144.1 10/02/78 11.50 5,060~ First Pacific area contact.

KP4EOR - LU5DJZ 145.1 12/02/78 00.12 6,340 New world distance record on 144 MHz.

YV5ZZ - LU3AAT 432.1 13/02/78 01.10 5,100 First reception of 432 MHz signals in Western hemisphere.

5B4WR - ZE2JV 144.1 10/04/78 17.40 5,800 First T.E.P. contact between Europe and Africa.

SV1AB - ZE2JV 144.1 12/04/78 18.00 6,260 First Greek distance record on 144 MHz.

SV1DH - ZS6DN 144.1 13/02/79 18.15 7,120 New world distance record on 144 MHz.

SV1DH - ZE2JV 432.3 20/03/79 18.20 6,250 First reception of 432 MHz signals between Europe and Africa.

I4EAT - ZS3B 144.1 31/03/79 18.50 7,890 World distance record (reception) on 144 MHz.

3. George Vernardakis SV1AB. (V.H.F.)

In March 1988 I visited George Vernardakis SV1AB (formerly F9QN of Ma.r.s.eilles, France) who spoke to me about his contribution to the transequatorial tests and his other experiments in connection with Moonbounce, Meteor Scatter and Sporadic E propagation.

"In 1965" George told me, "I was the only SV station equipped for contacts via meteor scatter so it was easy for me to make contacts with many European stations. The longest distance I achieved was with UA1DZ a Physics Professor at the University of Leningrad in the Soviet Union."

Norman: "Forgive me for interrupting you, but please explain in simple terms what you mean by meteor scatter."

George: "Meteor scatter is a way of making contacts on 2 metres by reflection from meteorites--'shooting stars' as they are called colloquially--which we see on clear nights during the summer. Of course they are not falling stars at all--they are meteorites which burn up when they hit the earth's atmosphere, leaving the trail that we see. We take advantage of this phenomenon for bouncing our signals off the trail but unfortunately it is a very short-lived event. Once when there were a lot of meteorites I was able to maintain contact with LX1SI of Luxembourg for a whole three minutes on SSB. It was during the period of the Persides which usually occur for a week in August when the earth's...o...b..t takes it through this cloud of s.p.a.ce debris. Millions of meteorites can be as small as a grain of sand and of course leave no visible trail when they strike the earth's atmosphere. The earth goes through other major cl.u.s.ters in April and in December. The phenomenon can also affect signals on lower frequencies. One can be in QSO on 20 metres via ground wave with a station a couple of hundred miles away with signals around s2 to s3.

Suddenly one or two words are heard at s9 which indicates a momentary reflection off a meteorite trail."

George also explained that in order to defeat the brevity of the time when communication was possible it was customary to record a message on a tape recorder and transmit it at high speed. The other station would also record at high speed and then play back at normal speed to hear the message normally.

I asked SV1AB to tell me about Sporadic E propagation.

"In this form of contact the signals are reflected from an ionised area 90 to 120 kilometres above the surface of the earth. I have been having contacts by this method for about 18 years now even before the advent of SSB on two metres. I have had contacts with England and with Moscow to the north-east of Athens. The phenomenon occurs for three or four months during the summer, and never during the winter.

The ionisation moves very rapidly sometimes--you may be talking to a station in Malta and he suddenly disappears and a station in Yugoslavia comes up on the same frequency."

"Every summer" George continued, "we get Troposcatter which allows communication on all frequencies from VHF to 10 GHz even. This type of propagation occurs during certain special meteorological conditions, like high barometric pressure and extreme heat. We sometimes hear stations in Malta and Sicily with very loud signals."

"In 1966 I built an aerial array consisting of 8 nine-element Yagis for 2 metres with the axis of rotation pointing to the North Star enabling me to track the Moon automatically. I was hoping to make some Moonbounce contacts, but at that time it was very difficult to construct low noise preamplifiers. After many days and hours of trying I managed a single brief contact with F8DO in France. Some time later I heard that Mike Staal K6MYC had heard me in California.

"The funny thing about this aerial array was that it enabled me to receive television signals from Nigeria on Channel 3 but only when I raised it up to an elevation of nearly 90 degrees."

Norman: "I understand that Costas Georgiou SV1OE is the only Greek amateur who has had successful QSOs via Moonbounce."

George: "Yes indeed. But it was many years later, using a low noise GASFET preamplifier. K1WHS in the U.S.A. has an array consisting of 48 Yagis which enable him to contact stations with more modest installations.

"In 1970 a technician from Stanford University came to Athens because the tracking station they had set up on Mount Pendeli could not pick the University's satellite, whereas they were getting good signals from it in Spain. One of the a.s.sistants at the station told the American that he knew an amateur who could pick up signals from satellites, meaning me. The American, who happened to be an amateur himself, immediately asked to see me. When he saw my 8 antenna array he suggested we should use it to try and pick up the University satellite. I pointed out to him that my array was for 144 MHz whereas the satellite beacon was transmitting on 136 MHz. He gave me the coordinates for the next pa.s.s and I rotated and raised my array in antic.i.p.ation. When the exact time arrived my modest receiver picked up the satellite beacon loud and clear. The American got so excited he asked me if he could use my telephone to call the University in the U.S.A. He told them the satellite had been heard at last in Athens, and by an amateur no less. Later I received a letter from NASA thanking me for the a.s.sistance I had given. When the American left he gave me that 50 MHz converter you can see there on the shelf."

Norman: "Tell me about your contribution to the transequatorial tests of 1979."

SV1AB: "I had been in regular contact with ZS6LN on ten metres long before Costas SV1DH appeared on the scene. I remember asking ZS6LN why we should not receive South African stations on 2 metres when we could hear them so well on 50 MHz. He had replied that the two frequencies behaved in a very different manner, but there was no harm in trying. He got ZS6PW and ZS6DN interested in the idea, particularly ZS6DN who had much better aerials and a very good QTH.

He was the one who stood the better chance of being heard in Greece.

We arranged a schedule of transmitting and listening every evening.

First they transmitted and we listened, and then we transmitted and they listened, and contact was maintained on ten metres."

Norman: "You said 'every evening'--do you mean that the Sun has something to do with this type of propagation?"

George: "Most certainly. All the contacts that were made subsequently were at least one hour after the relevant part of the ionosphere was in darkness."

George then described how the first signals were heard via transequatorial propagation.

George: "First we heard the beacon on 144.160 MHz set up by Ray Cracknell ZE2JV in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). The date was April 12th 1978 at 18.00 G.M.T. Ten months later I heard ZS6DN's automatic beacon with a colossal signal, but he was not at home! I went to 20 metres and put out a frantic CQ for any station in South Africa but got no reply. I returned to the cross-band frequency on 10 metres which we used regularly for 28/50 MHz QSOs and managed to contact a station in South Africa who was very far away from ZS6DN but who kindly offered to QSP a message by telephone. He was told that ZS6DN had gone out but would be back soon. I was terrified that the opening would not last long enough. But in a few minutes I heard him calling me slowly on CW and we exchanged reports at 17.20 G.M.T on February 16th 1979. This was a new world record for the longest distance on 2 metres.

"Three days earlier, however, when I was not at home, Costas SV1DH had established the first TEP contact between Greece and South Africa when he contacted ZS6DN. As you know, my location is a mere 10 kilometres north of SV1DH's. I have a tape recording of my QSO with ZS6DN as well as with ZS6PW whose signals came through a few minutes later at 17.34 G.M.T. on that historic evening.(The local time in Athens was 7.34 p.m.).Of course the distance record was broken again on September 17th 1981 when I contacted ZS4BU who is 110 kilometres further south than ZS6DN."

Norman: "Were all these contacts only on the key?"

George: "Yes, all the contacts were on CW. On several occasions we tried SSB but there was so much distortion that not a single word could be identified. TEP has a lot of flutter and fading and as you can hear on the tapes even the morse comes through like a breathing noise, not a clear tone. This applies to contacts between Greece and South Africa. Contacts between j.a.pan and Australia where the distances involved are smaller, have been made on SSB."

Norman: "What about cycle 22?"

George: "see how things go. If anything is achieved it should be in 1990 or later. With modern equipment we shall be able to hear signals that were buried in the noise in 1979."

4. Dr Spyros Tsaltas SV1AT & George Delikaris SV1AM. (Mobile).

The first two licensed amateurs to make contact on 2 metres in Greece were Dr Spyros Tsaltas SV1AT and George Delikaris SV1AM. They had put together the famous Heathkit 'TWOER'. Crystals were plentiful on the surplus market, but it was not easy to find two of the same frequency. SV1AT transmitted on 144.720 and SV1AM on 145.135 MHz. The first contact took place at 13.30 local time on the 21st of December 1963.

A few days later SV1AT had a cross-band QSO with George Vernardakis SV1AB who was transmitting in the 20 metre band on 14.250 MHz A.M. as he had not completed his TWOER yet.

At that time SV1AT was the Secretary of the Radio Amateur a.s.sociation of Greece. He suggested to the Committee that the Club should apply for a temporary licence to be granted to SV1AM enabling him to transmit from his vehicle while in motion. The licensing authority gave the licence "for experimental purposes only, and for a period not exceeding one month".

And so it was that the first 'mobile' QSO took place on 2 metres between licensed Greek amateurs on the 27th of January 1965 at 19.25 local time. SV1AM was travelling in his car and SV1AT was at his home QTH.

5. Costas Tzezairlidis SV4CG. (SSTV).

In 1970 Costas Tzezairlidis SV4CG built a unique electro mechanical machine using two motors to achieve horizontal and vertical scanning. He had found a motor which rotated at 960 R.P.M. which corresponds to 16 revolutions per second, the exact speed required for the horizontal scanning. The speed of the second motor was 1 revolution per second. The reciprocal motion was produced by a cam through an 8:1 reduction gear. A weight attached to the microscope pulled it back to start the next line. The microscope was focussed sharply on the drum carrying the picture to be transmitted. Resolution was excellent.

The 'microscope' consisted of a cardboard tube with a 13 cm focal length lens at one end and a Philips OAP12 photo-diode at the other with another lens in front of it. This primitive microscope produced a picture of reasonable quality.

For reception SV4CG made a converter using the long persistence P7 c.r.t. With this set-up Costas had his first SSTV contact on 40 metres with SV1AB on February 28th 1971. After that he had many contacts on 7 and 14 MHz as can be seen from the extract from his log.

(The special commemorative prefix of SZ0 was used by all SV stations during 1971).

6. Costas Georgiou SV1OE. (E.M.E.)

Up to the end of 1988 the only Greek amateur who had positively authenticated Moonbounce contacts was Costas Georgiou SV1OE. His very first contact was made in 1982 when he contacted VE7BQH in Canada on 2 metres. In the ensuing four years Costas managed to work four more stations: K1WHS, SM4GVF, W5UN and KB8RQ.

In 1982 Costas had been trying for three years, without success, to hear his own signal via Moonbounce. The reason for his failure was that he was unaware of a very basic fact.