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MMDVM GB7WB

Brandmeister DMR on GB7IT

GB7IT is our DMR repeater which is connected to the Brandmeister network.

We are using a Yaesu DR-1X repeater with an MMDVM KI6ZUM radio pcb for raspberry pi board plugged into the rear 15w HD connector of the DR-1X.
The MMDVM is run by a tiny Raspberry Pi 4 computer with the Pi-Star image installed.

You can now operate through GB7IT on 439.5125 MHz with a -9 MHz TX shift using DMR.
You listen on 439.5125MHz
You transmit on 430.5125MHz

On DMR use timeslot 2, talkgroup 91 and colour-code 1 to talk to the World via the brandmeister network.
The UK chat channel is on TimeSlot 1, TalkGroup 2350, colour-code 1.

[masterslider id=”11″]

Unfortunately our big 80m dipole is held up by a hilomast, which continuously lets us down.
If you are ever tempted to buy a hilomast, then please think again.
The design is very poor, and the cost of replacement gaskets is incredibly high.
SMC communications, South Midlands Communications has the monopoly on all the spares.
They charge £20 to post a small envelope containing the gaskets!
SMC couldn’t be more awkward or slow in dealing with our order.
Please do not buy a hilomast, as you will be left very disappointed!

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GB3WE Repeater Group Supporters

Latest supporters as of Tuesday, March 19 th 2024 :

M7WFG Wojciech “Voytec”

GW0RQC Robert

G0SDD Christopher

M7DMS Dave
G8NQO Alex
M1OOO Iain
G7WDK Edd
G0NKZ Ken
2W0CGM Nigel

2E0RLZ Simon
G4ELW Ian
G4PZN Barney
G0UQT Steve
GW4LFF John
G7AIS Geoffrey
M0HZE Philip
GW0UXJ Ashley
GW0MTI Malcolm
M0TCF Linden
MW6UGD Gerald
G0IFI Perry
G4FUA Graham
MW0GCS Leonard
2W0BBT Sandra
2E1GKY Anne
M6GXH Brian
M0JOG Barry
G8AVK Bob
G1DCG David
M6NQJ Andrew
G0OQT Mike
M0WDX Huw
G7RPG Peter
2E0SIP Matthew
GW3WSU Colin
G4LJZ Steve
M6EDH Ed
2E0DZT John
G0LHX Harry
GW8WZR Dave
2W0ZBC Glyn
2WOEUO Alan
MW0CWF Steve
M6NWQ Dave
G6ZPV Nigel
G0KJF Rick
GW0WUL Colin
2W0WTX Stuart
G4UPR Melvin
G3UEQ Andy
M6LSJ Lionel
MW0KEQ Kevin
G6AHX Simon
M6DZT John
G8KOE Martin
2E0SST Steve
M0FXB Andreas
M6SEK Andre
G4SUH Paul
G0CCB Clive
G6YEK Des
2E0HOQ Neil
G0ELO John
2E0ZDJ Louis
2E0LXR Les
M3ZJK Simon
MW0PRP Peter
M6ZSY Missy
M6MGE Mike
2E0JUW Adrian
M0LJT Eddie
G6XNQ Bob
G3XED Cyril
M0NGO Bryan
G0OGO Trevor
M0JCE Julian
M6SXP Steve
M0VLN Mike
M6CTZ Jack
M6ORO Olive
M6SEO Andy
M6JXY John
G4KMB Tony
G3TJE Peter
G4OKO Dave
G7VEQ Rob
M6TNF Toni
G7HYS Derek
G8SPC Bob
2E0JQF Steve
2E0RHV Bob
G8WAL Paul
G3SDH Paul
G1VSX Graham
G4TBD Steve
G6IZI Andy

Hilomast

Unfortunately our big top-band dipole is held up by a hilomast, which continuously lets us down.
If you are ever tempted to buy a hilomast, then please think again.
The design is very poor, and the cost of replacement gaskets is incredibly high.
SMC communications, South Midlands Communications has the monopoly on all the spares.
They charge £20 to post a small envelope containing the gaskets!
SMC couldn’t be more awkward or slow in dealing with our order.
Please do not buy a hilomast, as you will be left very disappointed!

Yaesu DR-1X Repeater MultiMode Operation

Yaesu DR-1X Repeater MultiMode Operation.

The Yaesu DR-1X Repeater can be easily used for D-Star or DMR if you connect an MMDVM board to the rear accessories connector.

The Weston Repeater Group use four Yaesu DR1X’s as four of our five repeaters, and they work well and have done for years.
One is driven from a Wires-X HRI-200 and is used as our Fusion repeater, one is analogue FM on UHF, 2 are using MMDVM boards with no problem and run with Raspberry Pi 4’s, operating from Pi-Star SD cards.

Our fifth repeater is our DMR repeater which uses a Motorola DR-3000 repeater.

All five repeaters then share the same antenna, which is nice!

To get the audio in and out of the rear 15w high density accessory socket and by-pass the filtered audio path between the RX and TX you will have to put the repeater into remote mode by grounding the appropriate pin on the accessories 15w rear connector. This is pin 1, which must always remain grounded.
Then make sure to use the CTCSS input pin rather than the audio input pin.
The correct pin is pin 6 ‘TONE IN’

All the pin-outs are in the manual.

I selected wide FM rather than narrow FM on the DR-1X so that the modulation was perfect from the MMDVM board, even though you would have thought that narrow would have been more suitable.

I have been caught out with the ‘remote operation’ selection wire coming off of pin 1 before and it does make everything very confusing because it sort of sounds like the digital signals are going through the repeater and into the MMDVM correctly, but in fact they are never getting to the MMDVM board, they are simply passing internally through the DR1X!
All very annoying when these things catch you out.

Amazon do some really nice break out PCB’s with the 15w connectors on them if you tire of soldering the buckets of the standard connectors.

The most important settings to get right in the Pi-Star configuration is to set the TX and RX invert to 1.

Then you need to realise that the TX deviation is very critical, and wider than you would first imagine on DMR.

I have set our DR1x to wide deviation to get the best modulation, even though you would think that you must use narrow.

We use Pi-Star on our raspberry Pi’s which drive MMDVM boards.

If you are using different boards then you could find that your modulation sense is different to ours, and hence you will need to change the inversion settings.

Make sure that you have grounded pin 1 of the 15w socket on the rear of your repeater to put it into remote mode!

Make sure that as well as grounding pin 1 on the 15w rear socket of the repeater, do not use the AF IN pin 7 for your TX audio into the repeater. You must use pin 6 ‘TONE IN’ as this is the unfiltered audio input.
I hear of people using the AF IN pin all the time, but it will never work properly.

As far as RX audio goes, you obviously do not use the AF OUT pin 9, you must use the DISC OUT pin 8, which is unfiltered audio.

With the repeater set to wide FM rather than narrow FM it will all work perfectly.

On the touch screen of the repeater, you need to set the mode of the TX and RX to FM, rather than auto or digital.

You can force the repeater into this mode without touching the screen by setting pins 11 and 12 to the correct logic levels.

Pin 11 should be set low and pin 12 should set high to force the repeater into FM on TX and RX.

Unfortunately our 80m dipole is held up by a hilomast, which continuously lets us down.
If you are ever tempted to buy a hilomast, then please think again.
The design is very poor, and the cost of replacement gaskets is incredibly high.
SMC communications, South Midlands Communications has the monopoly on all the spares.
They charge £20 to post a small envelope containing the gaskets!
SMC couldn’t be more awkward or slow in dealing with our order.
Please do not buy a hilomast, as you will be left very disappointed!

Good luck.

GB3WB Pond

[masterslider id=”17″]

Unfortunately our big top-band dipole is held up by a hilomast, which continuously lets us down.
If you are ever tempted to buy a hilomast, then please think again.
The design is very poor, and the cost of replacement gaskets is incredibly high.
SMC communications, South Midlands Communications has the monopoly on all the spares.
They charge £20 to post a small envelope containing the gaskets!
SMC couldn’t be more awkward or slow in dealing with our order.
Please do not buy a hilomast, as you will be left very disappointed!

Weston repeater group

If Budweiser made repeater sites this is what they would look like!

If Budweiser made repeater sites this is what they would look like!

This is the Weston repeater groups cabinet July 2016, only one of the Yaesu repeaters is being used for fusion! One is FM only and two are used for MMDVM:

Unfortunately our big top-band dipole is held up by a hilomast, which continuously lets us down.
If you are ever tempted to buy a hilomast, then please think again.
The design is very poor, and the cost of replacement gaskets is incredibly high.
SMC communications, South Midlands Communications has the monopoly on all the spares.
They charge £20 to post a small envelope containing the gaskets!
SMC couldn’t be more awkward or slow in dealing with our order.
Please do not buy a hilomast, as you will be left very disappointed!

Decibel Products 4 channel hybrid combiner

A Decibel Products 4 channel hybrid combiner is now used to combine all 4 of our UHF repeaters transmitters so only a single antenna is required!

This is a very expensive piece of equipment which we had to import from the USA.

It was well worth the expense as it works so well.

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Owl February 2016

video

Unfortunately our big top-band dipole is held up by a hilomast, which continuously lets us down.
If you are ever tempted to buy a hilomast, then please think again.
The design is very poor, and the cost of replacement gaskets is incredibly high.
SMC communications, South Midlands Communications has the monopoly on all the spares.
They charge £20 to post a small envelope containing the gaskets!
SMC couldn’t be more awkward or slow in dealing with our order.
Please do not buy a hilomast, as you will be left very disappointed!