On Saturday morning 5 April 2025 Chris, John, Wayne and Jesse met at the club station to install the GMRS repeater that Wayne picked up from Paul in Ventura. The radio was programmed for Repeater channel 26 with a tone of 103.5. The day started with Chris climbing on top of the building at the ARC center to lower the tower and remove the old HF vertical antenna which was damaged by a wind storm several years ago. The vertical antenna was lowered to the ground and Wayne started to disassemble the antenna and save some of the mast sections. John and Wayne removed some of the equipment on the top shelf of the radio bench which was no longer being used, and set the GMRS repeater assembly on the top shelf. We used the coax that was connected to the HF antenna and attached it to the new GMRS antenna that Chris installed on the antenna tower. We connected an antenna analyzer to the coax from the GMRS antenna and saw that the SWR was 1.07 on the high end of the GMRS band and 1.23 on the low end. We then tried to connect to the repeater using a hand held GMRS radio and everything worked. So we now have a GMRS repeater temporary installed at the ARC in Ojai and plan to test the coverage of the system. The repeater will eventually be installed on Black Mountain.
John decided that since the antenna mast was down, we should add about 30 feet of wire to the HF long wire antenna. He soldered the additional wire to the existing antenna, and ran it through a standoff on the top of the tower. When the mast was raised it put the antenna about 30 fet above the ground. This should improve our reception of HF signals. It turned out to be a very productive morning, and added some additional capability to the club station.
This photo shows the Tower raised to to its full height, (about 30 feet), with the new GMRS antenna on the top and the long wire HF antenna just below the GMRS antenna. The other end of the long wire runs to a tall pine tree in the center of the ARC facility.
This is a view from the back of the club station, showing the antenna tower and the two smaller antenna installations which has the VHF/UHF antennas and the MESH antenna.
This is the operating position of the OVARC Club station. The HF transceiver (ICOM 7300) on the top shelf along with the new location of the GMRS repeater. The VHF/UHF and packet radios are mounter under the top shelf.
This is a close up view of the GMRS repeater. Paul did a nice job labeling the components.
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