Activation Report Billinge Hill 21/04/2011

A last minute decision to have a go at Billinge hill, it was a fantastic day and when work had finished I was chomping at the bit to test my home brew 2m slim jim and 70cm moxon coat hanger special (A life saver as it turns out).

A short trip down the M6 to park at the top of Beacon Rd (SD 527010), very handy, although I was rather wondering if there is access to the big area at the top of the road to the substation. However after a short walk we found ourselves at the trig point looking at hazy but fantastic views of the
surrounding areas.

Having heard of previous problems on 2m from SP-017 due to the presence of the nearby masts, I though we would start on 70cms, so up went the coat hanger special and contacts where made (fantastic) only 3 though and no other takers, so up went the slimjim and a further 2 contacts qualified the activation, but wow the paging interference made any further contacts impossible, I heard a couple of other stations but unable to hear for long enough to make an exchange, Sorry to those who replied but I really couldn’t here a thing due to the overwhelming de-sensing on 2m (probably the one fault I can complain about the Wouxun).

Anyway I had activated the summit so back to 70cm to allow Joe M6JRZ to activate, which he managed.