The Somerset and Dorset Railway Heritage Trust are based at the former Midsomer Norton South Railway Station. The postal address is Midsomer Norton Station, Silver Street, Midsomer Norton, BA3 2EY. However, there are some specific details that will be of interest to radio hams:
Lat/Long (WGS84 Geoid): 51.280956°,-2.482629°
IARU: IO81sg
IOTA: EU005 (UK Mainland)
WAB: ST65 – England
///empires.wheat.drifting
Equipment Used
We’ve been undertaking our Special Events for a number of years now and have gradually fine tuned our equipment and setup over time. Railways on the Air is one of our favorite events and the only one where we regularly operate both SSB and Data. However, this year due to limited numbers of operators we elected to only operate SSB.
Following the success of the Clubs activities in the centre of Bristol for Lighthouses on the Air we were looking forward to a similar activity weekend for Railways on the Air. Sadly, as alluded to above, attendance was minimal. The event did coincide with the media frenzy induced fuel crisis which limited the ability for some of our members to travel into deepest, darkest Somerset.
Saturday
Andy G7KNA was joined by Ken G4XCB and Dave G4ULV for the initial station setup. This entailed erecting the centre pole to support the 80m doublet. The centre pole was strapped to the gazebo and the ends of the antenna tied off to convenient supports, with the feeder brought into the carriage through a window it was then necessary to arrange the internal equipment on a helpfully located table in the buffet car.
After Ken and Dave departed in the late morning, Andy was joined by Greg MW7BUF.
During the day 31 contacts were made, slower than our usual rate but we were single handed for part of the day and spent some time operating “hunt and pounce” trying to locate other Railways on the Air Special Event Stations. In this vein we were reasonably successful working 9 other Special Event Stations over the course of the day.
Sunday
The antenna was left up overnight, but the in carriage equipment was taken off-site overnight. Nevertheless the setup on Sunday was quite straight forward with just the internal equipment to be re-established in the buffet car.
Andy was rejoined by Greg on Sunday although the day was slower with only 22 stations worked, of which 2 were other Special Event Stations.
Log
Date (UTC)
Time (UTC)
Station Worked
Band or Frequency
Mode
RST
Operators Name
QTH
Gridsquare
Notes
Sent
Rec'd
25/09/21
10:53
G4PZK
80m
SSB
59
59
Cliff
Wimborne
25/09/21
11:32
M0VZA
80m
SSB
58
59
Tony
Essex
25/09/21
11:03
G3KAG
80m
SSB
57
59
Tony
Derbyshire Dales
25/09/21
11:30
G0CKP
80m
SSB
59
59
Steve
West Kent
25/09/21
11:26
G3PGA
80m
SSB
59
59
Mike
N Devon
25/09/21
11:57
G0ORD
80m
SSB
59
59
Eric
N Forest Of Dean
25/09/21
11:43
2E0GKO
80m
SSB
59
59
Paul
Maidstone
25/09/21
11:37
G0MUK
80m
SSB
59
59
Rick
Portsmouth
25/09/21
12:47
GB0LMR
40m
SSB
59
59
Mark
55th anniversary Club Station
British Railways ARS
25/09/21
12:10
GB4LHR
40m
SSB
59
59
Ray
Lakeside and Haverthwaite Railway
Furness ARS
25/09/21
12:35
OO21WCC/P
40m
SSB
59
59
Peter
Special Event Staion for Cycle Race
25/09/21
12:39
GB2KDR
40m
SSB
59
59
Dave
Keith and Dufftown Railway
Grampian Hilltoppers
25/09/21
13:09
GB0EOR
40m
SSB
59
59
Sid
Epping and Ongar Railway
Harlow and District ARS
25/09/21
13:45
GB0HBL
40m
SSB
59
59
Terry
The Helston Branch Line
Poldhu ARC
25/09/21
13:45
GX4FF/P
40m
SSB
59
59
Andy
Lakedean Nature Reserve
GF0154
25/09/21
13:48
M0HEM
40m
SSB
59
59
John
Dagenham Dock
John O’Toole
25/09/21
14:20
GB0ELR
40m
SSB
58
59
Lynda
East Lancashire Railway
Bury RS
25/09/21
14:16
2E0XBT
40m
SSB
58
59
Shaun
Worthing
25/09/21
14:04
F4VPL
40m
SSB
59
59
Dave
Brittany
25/09/21
14:24
GB0WHR
40m
SSB
59
57
Dave
Whitrope Heritage Centre
Galashiels and District ARS
25/09/21
14:06
M0GLP
40m
SSB
59
59
Garry
Nottingham
25/09/21
14:49
GB5RSR
40m
SSB
59
59
Nonia
Ribble Steam Railway
Central Lancashire ARC
25/09/21
14:38
G3EFX
40m
SSB
59
59
Alan
Bushey
25/09/21
14:12
M0DFW
40m
SSB
58
58
Dave
Cambridge
25/09/21
14:42
2M0DES
40m
SSB
58
59
25/09/21
14:48
GB1CR
40m
SSB
57
58
Simon
Corris Railway
Aberystwyth and District ARC
25/09/21
14:28
M0XLT
40m
SSB
59
59
Kevin
Skipton
25/09/21
14:50
GM4WZG
40m
SSB
59
59
25/09/21
15:08
G0JBA/P
40m
SSB
57
59
Phil
25/09/21
15:53
GI0LGV
40m
SSB
59
59
N Of Belfast
25/09/21
15:36
G3RXQ
40m
SSB
59
59
Stuart
Lancaster
26/09/21
10:29
2E0HFR
40m
SSB
56
57
Rikki
Bristol
26/09/21
10:01
F8FLK
40m
SSB
59
59
Terri
N France
26/09/21
10:40
F5VCR
40m
SSB
58
59
Derek
Nw France
26/09/21
10:19
G3YZY
40m
SSB
59
59
Howard
Portsmouth
26/09/21
10:33
DM3AVB
40m
SSB
55
57
26/09/21
10:32
G8HBS
40m
SSB
59
59
Peter
Great Yarmouth
26/09/21
10:45
M0JCF
40m
SSB
59
59
Mark
Sidcup
26/09/21
10:05
G0BPK
40m
SSB
58
59
Nigel
Pontifract
26/09/21
10:22
DK8VX
40m
SSB
59
59
26/09/21
10:01
PH3ADD
40m
SSB
59
59
26/09/21
10:41
G7SQW/P
40m
SSB
59
59
Andy
Buckingham Marshes
GF0218
26/09/21
11:05
M0MJA/P
40m
SSB
58
59
GF0268
26/09/21
11:42
GB0NDR
40m
SSB
59
59
Richard
North Dorset Railway Shillingstone Station
Flight Refuelling ARS
26/09/21
11:02
G4ACS
40m
SSB
57
59
Geoff
Kinver South Staffordshire
26/09/21
11:15
MW0IDT
40m
SSB
59
59
Ian
Llantwit Major
26/09/21
11:13
M0SDY
40m
SSB
59
59
Paul
26/09/21
12:39
GB2EVR
40m
SSB
59
59
Matt
Eden Valley Railway
Eden Valley Railway
26/09/21
12:21
M0AUG
40m
SSB
59
59
Geoff
26/09/21
13:41
M0JKI
80m
SSB
59
59
Adrian
Stowmarket
26/09/21
13:35
G7KYH
80m
SSB
59
59
John
Fox Norton Nr Banbury
26/09/21
13:58
G2NV
80m
SSB
59
59
Tom
26/09/21
14:54
M7AOK
80m
SSB
59
59
Steve
All Original Website Content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.