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GB3WES - the Westmorland 5MHz beacon
GB3WES, the Westmorland beacon, made its debut on 5290kHz at precisely
16:31Z on 30-October-2004. It is one of a chain of (currently) three
propagation research beacons, the other being GB3RAL, Oxfordshire and
GB3ORK, Orkney.
Due to an unfortunate fire at the G3WGV QTH, GB3WES was QRT from 10:02Z on
28-Dec-04 to 14:46Z on 15-Jan-05.
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The beacon hardware |
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The inverted V antenna (it is there, honest!) |
GB3WES technical information
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Operates from the QTH of G3WGV, IO84QN
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Ground elevation: 205m above sea level
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Antenna height: 9m above ground level at apex
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Antenna: Full size dipole in inverted V
configuration, orientated approximately North/South
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Power: 10W at full carrier
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Transmit periods: 1, 16, 31 and 46 minutes past
the hour for a period of one minute. GB3RAL transmits one minute earlier and
GB3ORK transmits one minute later, so the three beacons fire up one after
the other, in south to north sequence GB3RAL, GB3WES, GB3ORK.
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Format of the GB3WES transmission:
0 seconds - transmission starts
Callsign sent at approximately 16WPM, followed by a period of full power
carrier
7 to 15 seconds
Nine transmission intervals with a 6dB
reduction in power for each step, giving 48dB overall power reduction at the
final interval. For each step a 100ms break in transmission is followed by
900ms of carrier at the appropriate level.
16 to 24 seconds
Repeat of the power step sequence described
above
25 to 30 seconds
5 seconds of continuous transmission at
full power – this is the interval used by G3PLX’s beacon monitoring
software.
30 to 59 seconds
Sounder sequence consisting of a 500us wide
pulse of full power carrier repeated at a 40Hz repetition rate.
60 seconds - transmission ends
Reports and other information
Signal
reports are welcome, on GB3WES only please,
direct to me at
john[at]g3wgv.com.
For more information on
the 5MHz beacon project, including the RSGB's official beacon monitoring and
reporting programme, please see
http://www.rsgb-spectrumforum.org.uk/beacon_reporting.htm |
