From: Chris GM3WOJ
Date: Sun, 10 Mar 2019 20:05:48 GMT

Hello UKHF Contesters

The Jack Hum G5UM callbook from circa 1930 contains an entry – ‘GM3DR – RSGB Highland Region’. This callsign has now been reallocated to the RSGB Contest Club, so it seemed appropriate to give GM3DR its first airing in possibly 89 years from here in Highland Region, in a contest which dates from the same era.

I found the contest a bit of a struggle for differing reasons. My station is being completely renovated, from the ground up (literally – I am digging a big hole outside the shack window for a new improved earth system) After about 3 hours my Alpha 91B amp died – a fault which I thought I had fixed about two months ago, but obviously not. It’s a tricky fault – standing current = OK, but as soon as the RF drive exceeds the Electronic Bias Switching threshold, the plate current rockets up and it trips with an overcurrent fault. I suspect the negative bias voltage is disappearing completely when the EBS threshold is exceeded (or a duff valve / oscillation) but I’ll find out soon.

This meant that GM3DR was then on reduced power on all but 20m, which was especially frustrating on 15m and 10m where UK stations are usually workable on scatter. A number of UK stations refused to work GM3DR when I called them – they did not realise they were losing Bonus points 🙁

Finished with 484 QSOs, but no idea of the final score. I am a fan of WinTest logging software, but it performs very badly for BERU – quite a few things just don’t work properly.

Thanks for all the QSOs. A special thanks to those who travel to make BERU more interesting for everyone.

73 Chris GM3WOJ / GM3DR