Batboard

I don't know how many folks who read this are in the west Georgia/East Alabama area, but a new 900 repeater is nearing the "on the air" stage.
It will be located on Mt. Cheaha, the highest point in Alabama and will use a Purc 5000 transmitter and two GE Edacs receivers in diversity for receive. Antennas will be A/S 3 db gain. The call will be that of the Calhoun County Amateur Radio Association. Frequency will be 927.75/902.75 with 100 Hz PL. Interest in 900 is growing rapidly in East central Alabama. We hope that the repeater will be accessible from as far away as the western suburbs of Atlanta and eastern areas of Birmingham.

Diversity, nice. That should really help with fading. Most cellular phone sites use diversity. And 800 and 900 are rather similar in theory.

Circular polarization would help, too. But I have yet to see any commercial 900 MHz [or even 800!] antennas that are circular. I know there are 800 sector panels that are dual-polarity.

Good luck!

John...

Do you all have this repeater on the air yet? I'd like to know how it's working out and if you have any issues with consumer stuff..

Thanks

Dave

Is it on the air? Well, yes and no. We don't have enough space currently available at the site to handle both the cabinets the repeater fills. But, I wanted to get something on the air, both for range testing, and to spur interest in getting some radios converted and on the air. So, I put a 2 Maxtrac repeater on about 3 weeks ago. It runs 30 watts into the duplexer and uses a ARR preamp. I have been able to bring it up with a handie talky from about 60 milkes away. Except for a one day period when something brought it up every couple of minutes, it has been flawless. It does use PL so I don't understand how something could do that but it did. I don't monitor it, but every time I bring it up, it has just been there like any other repeater. We are hopeful to have the full thing with more power and diversity on sometime this year. Alabama is mostly forrested, rolling hills. Not good 900 country. It has surprised me so far in how well it does work.

Interesting. I'm in Birmingham. I'll be watching for more on this from you.