The Island of Foula Shetland
IP80
VHF & UHF Dx Pedition 2005
By Keith G4ODA
Several years ago when I first went to Shetland, on a clear day the hills of Foula could be seen to the west. I hoped then one day to be able to visit the Island. Since then I had been back to Shetland on many occasions both on holiday and in transit to the Faroes or Iceland but on each trip the hope of visiting passed me by.
Last year (2004) Paul (G1GSN) agreed to join me on my trip to Iceland and because of the ferry timetable being changed and that Paul had just retired from work it proved possible to arrange a trip to Foula for one week on the way back from Iceland. We were unable to take anything other than basic kit as everything would take space up on the Icelandic part of the trip but at least we were able to make a few contacts on 50Mhz.
Before going on I should say something about Foula. There is some information on the WEB and in books but it is all well out of date. Even the 2005 tourist information book published in Shetland talks about the island electricity being generated by a wind turbine.
There is indeed a turbine on the island (we operated next to it) but has not worked for ten years and is beyond repair.
The island lies some 20 miles east of the Shetland mainland. It is about the shape of a diamond 2 ½ miles from north to south and 2 miles east to west. The east side is quite low and is where everyone lives. The ground then rises very steeply to the second highest hills in Shetland greater than 1400 feet with the West side being a sheer cliff face (the second highest in the UK, some 10 feet less than St. Kilda).
It is an important breeding ground for many birds including the biggest population of Great Skuas in the UK (known in Shetland as "Bonxies" as a result of their habit of diving at a persons head!)
YouTube Video of Skua attacking a sheep Click Here
Approx. 30 people live on the island earning a living from raising sheep and selling wool supported by employment, for example, people working on and running the island ferry service. 3 children go to the island school. There is no shop on the island and all food milk etc has to be brought in. The inhabitants still use the Julian calendar and thus I believe are the only ones in the UK to celebrate Yule (Christmas) on 6th January and Newerday (New Years Day) on January 13th. Electricity is produced from a diesel generator, which is turned off overnight and at odd times during the day.
The island has a single light aircraft landing strip built by the islanders in the early 1970's, following the loss of their mail boat "Island Lass" in 1962. The strip runs North to South and is served by a small plane. There is no radar and therefore no flying in mist or fog or when the wind is from the East or West. It would not be possible to bring in any amount of radio kit by air. There is also a small ferry, the "New Advance", which sails three times a week during official summertime, and only twice a week in winter, if the weather permits. Whilst we were there we went a whole week with no boat service and in winter the island can be cut off for weeks at a time. The boat can even be lifted from the water for safety's sake if the weather is really bad.
I had hoped to have an internet connection but this was not possible. Some people have an rf link but not via telephone. The island does not yet have a digital telephone exchange. Also there is no mobile phone cell. There is one place on the island where sometimes it was possible to get a mobile signal, on occasions by voice, but in the main as a text service only. Even the public phone boxes indicated on the tourist map had not worked for some considerable time.
There is only one croft on the island where it is possible to stay. This is well located for exploring the island, but for VHF radio the ground rises in all directions save to the North East. Last year we had some good 50Mhz contacts but none on 144Mhz. Paul and I decided last year that we wanted to go back to Foula but that we wanted to find a better location to operate radio from and to be able to give many more people the chance of a QSO with the square. So it was that about the turn of the year plans started to be made to return this year (2005).
Last year we identified a part of the island that could be accessed and looked a good VHF site. I have always thought that the choice of a good site was the most important part of VHF dxpedition planning and have always put much effort into that. We then had a number of things to decide. Foula is privately owned and the site we wished to use was common grassing land for the islanders. We therefore needed consent from the laird, and the islanders and also a method of accessing the site, which was well off the only road and accessed off a private croft. The ferry was too small to carry my Land Rover. However, Paul has a twin axel trailer, which would just fit on the deck of the ferry. We decided to use Paul's trailer both to carry some kit and to operate from. Paul spent a considerable time designing a framework that would ride in the trailer yet be capable of being erected into a shack 8 feet by 5 feet by 6 feet high and over the ensuing months he put much effort into constructing this.
Bryan, on Foula, arranged all the consents we needed and I cannot thank him enough for this. Also, he would provide the means of transporting the trailer from the ferry to site and back.
Although our main target was 50Mhz and 144 Mhz, we also decided to take kit for 50, 70, 144. 432 and 1296Mhz. This was just in case we were lucky enough to get an opening, which we regret did not occur during our stay.
We left my home in the early hours of Friday 3rd June (02:00Z) to drive the 450 miles (720km) to Aberdeen to catch the ferry to Lerwick having spent all Thursday loading the vehicle and trailer. Friday night the ferry set off for the 12hr trip to Lerwick on a calm sea but with the ferry vibrating severally. The captain explained that they had hit debris and damaged the propeller. This lasted for 3 hours until one engine was switched off. I was concerned whether this would have damaged any of the kit.
On arrival in Lerwick we spent time buying all the fresh food we would need for two weeks and a reserve supply then set off for the small ferry to Foula. The sea was quite choppy and whilst I enjoy these conditions, again I was concerned as to the effect on our radio kit. All radios etc were packed in waterproof containers and lowered by crane into the boat's hold. The trailer was then lifted onto the boat's deck and thoroughly lashed down with the aerials and poles lashed on top of the trailer.
We arrived on Foula late on Saturday 4th June, transported our personal kit (clothes food etc.) to our cottage, prepared a meal
and then set about catching up with some much needed sleep. Early Sunday Bryan pulled our trailer and radio kit up to the chosen operating site and we spent the rest of the day erecting the shack and setting up kit. This took all day and indeed we were still erecting aerials on the Monday morning.
We could then set about operating. I should perhaps explain that it took about 30minutes to walk from our cottage to the shack some of the way being over rough boggy terrain and quite steep climbs. We settled into a routine of having breakfast, dealing with the daily chores and then walking to the shack to operate until about 4.30pm. We would then walk back to the cottage, cook and eat and then go back to the shack for the evening. We thus spent about 2 hours a day walking. About half way along the route if lucky we would pick up our text messages.
The site we had chosen was only 120 feet asl but was about 300 feet from the sea all the way from North East through South to West.
As far as kit was concerned we had a vast choice of what to take from the items we use for contesting. I personally believe that for serious weak signal work on VHF/UHF an HF transceiver with a good transverter will always out perform commercial VHF radios. Also I needed to be able to interchange kit if faults arose as there was limited space for spares. We settled on a TS850 and Mutek transverter for 6/4 mtrs and a Elecraft K2 with DB6NT high performance transverters for 144/432.
We took 2 spare transverters for 144 (although did not use them). The 850/K2 could be swapped over if needed. Also as a standby and for use in the cottage I took my mobile rig out of the Land Rover (IC706).
For PA's we took homebrew 3cx800 amps with separate psu's. Again this was all interchangeable and would make repairs quick (in fact all worked well throughout). On 23 only a small station would be taken, FT290, DB6NT transverter and 2x blockmodule PA giving 30 watts. For aerials I prefer M/2. They are light, strong and match well. So it would be 5el on 6, 2 x 12 on 144 (a reasonable size for /p) and 2x 28 for 432. On 4 we took a 6 el eagle and a quad loop for 23. We did not have the extra space or time that would have been needed for stacking frames. Given the height of the QTH the aerials did not need to be high and this would help as it was often very windy. Everything was powered by our well-traveled 3KW gas powered generator.
What worked and what did not? Well actually we had few problems. 23cm was not working but this was soon traced to the Osc. core having moved (my fault for not fixing it when I built the kit). On our first day of m/s we had a problem with decodes. I thought no one was replying whilst many stations calling must have wondered what I was up to. The screen readouts were all normal. Not sure here as the problem did re-appear briefly on one other occasion, pulling out all AF leads and plugging back in seamed to resolve the problem (sorry to all for this). One high wind did damage the 6/4 ant. support making it difficult to hold against the wind but that was soon repaired. Paul and I both went down with colds, I almost lost my voice and Paul went deaf and we both for a time found the daily walks took all energy from us. The wx did not help as it was often cold (standard clothing was 5 layers of garments!). I know we missed the only aurora and some small Es on 6. As soon as we noticed the aurora I rushed back to site but it was over by I arrived.
We had few openings on 6 and few requests to QSY to 4. I expected most 4 m QSOs to be arranged on 6. We had no good tropo but that was always a bonus if it occurred anyway. I was quite disappointed in the interest in UK on tropo. We worked a number of stations in IO83 and IO92 on 144 at distances of 800km plus and I would have expected many more stations to be capable of being worked. Given this and the lack of 50MHz Es I decided to concentrate on 144 ms, which (after the initial problem) went very well. It seamed to make sense to do this as the effort to activate 144 is much greater than 50. It should be possible for us or someone else to go back with a 50 mhz station with much less effort in the future.
Lessons? Well again not a lot. Do regret not having taken a second computer to enable wsjt to be run on 6 and 144 together. The one we had was tied up on 144 and never was used on 6. For those who tried or did work us on 144 ms please consider that there were often many stations calling and I had difficult decisions to make on who to call. I still believe random calling (which was the only choice) enabled more QSOs to be made than skeds would have. I tended to go for stations who were giving most reflections but also to pick out weaker signals to give everyone a chance. Most operators were first class but for the few please remember (a) listen to the later bursts as the info sent could be changed during 30 sec period, (b) once the QSO is complete please clear the frequency to give others a chance (c) do not ask the /p station for its loc during the QSO the QSL will tell you if you do not know and (d) when calling the /p station send not only callsigns but also a report, most did but a few did not. This makes the QSO faster and when I had a choice of who to go back to the station who sent a report got the vote over the one that did not.
  
Now for the thanks. First to Radcom and Dubus for the publicity. Then to all the friends we made on Foula and for them putting up with two mad Englishmen- in particular to Eric for permission to go through his croft. To Marion for putting up with my phone calls throughout the spring and in particular to Bryan who (whilst I was trying to get contact numbers for the consents needed) just got on and organized it all for us and who made all the transport arrangements on the Island, without him the dxpedition simply would not have happened. To all the people who took time to work us and put us on the cluster. To David (G4DHF) for designing and providing the 6m ant for use at the cottage and to Howard (G0VTL) for his help on the materials for the "shack". In particular to Bob (G1ZJP) for acting as liaison from phone to internet (a difficult job with phone contact being so poor) and for setting up the website.
Last but by no means least to Paul (G1GSN) for agreeing to join me again, for all the work on the shack and for putting up with me again .
Now for the results (all times GMT):-
144MHz WSJT
10th June from 11.02 to 13.47
G0GMS 27/27 PE1AHX 28/28
OZ1LPR 27/27 DF2ZC 37/27
G4FUF 37/38 HB9DFG 28/27
DJ9MG 27/27 DJ5RE 27/27
PA2M 27/27 PA1GYS 27/27
OK1TEH 27/27 PE1GNP 27/36
PA3CEE 28/27 F5VHX 27/27
GW3LEW 27/27 EI5FK 26/27
PE1HWO 28/27 DK3WG 27/27
DC9YC 27/27 F6HVK 27/26
PA3FPQ 27/27 DL8BDU 27/27
F6EAS 27/28 F6FHP 28/27
PA3COB 27/27 DL9MS 27/26
DK7BY 27/27
11th June from 10.38 to 14.44
SP6GWB 27/27 DG6JF/P 27/27
DL6BF 27/27 DH3YAK 27/27
ON4IQ 28/38 ON4GG 28/28
DL5ROB 27/27 OK1DFC 27/26
DJ8ES 27/27 PE1RLF 27/28
PE2SVN 28/38 PA2DU 27/27
DL3YEL 27/27 DH2OAA 27/27
PA3ECU 27/27 DL1EAP 28/37
G3WZT 27/27 PA3BIY 28/39
DK3EE 27/27 S54T 26/27
DH2UAK 27/27 DL5GAC 27/26
G4IGO 27/26 G8APZ 27/27
DL4DWA 28/37 F5ODA 27/27
IW4EHZ 27/27 PA5KM 27/27
DF9QT 27/27 DF5DE 27/27
PD0HCV 28/27 PA3BGM 27/27
G4AEP 27/27
12th June 10.25 to 14.41
PA0V 27/27 SP2JYR 27/27
OO7EH 28/37 DK0OG 27/27
DL2ARD 27/27 DL1RNW 27/26
PA0JMV 28/28 DD3SP 27/27
F4CYZ 27/27 IK4PMP 27/37
OK1TEH 27/27 DL6ZAU 27/27
F6DRO 28/38 DL5FDP 27/27
I4YNO 27/26 9A3JH 27/27
DJ9YE 27/27 S57TW 27/27
G4RRA 27/28 HB9DKM 27/27
HB3YIT 27/26 DJ5HG 27/27
13th June 12.05 to 14.51
F6EAS 27/27 DG5AAG 27/27
DO1EDK 27/27 G8VYK 27/27
ON6NL 27/26 OK1COM 28/27
DF5NK 27/27 DL8LAQ 27/27
HA3UU 27/27 DF8IK 27/27
F5JNX 27/27 DF7KF 28/38
OE5MPL 26/27 DJ9CZ 27/27
PA1GYS 27/27 S53VV 27/27
IZ4AIK 27/26 DB8AT 28/27
DG2BCP 27/38 DH8BQA 27/27
OK1MZM 27/27 SM2CEW 27/27
14th June 11.35 to 15.36
S51AT 26/26 SP3VSC 28/27
DL1DUR 27/37 ES6RQ 27/27
G4EZP 27/27 G4DEZ 27/26
HA5UK 28/26 HA6NQ 27/26
OZ5AGJ 27/27 SM7FMX 27/26
OZ8FR 26/26 DL7FF 27/38
DF5DE 27/28 SP4MPB 27/26
PD0RFU 27/27 SP6IUQ 27/26
SM5CUI 27/27 DJ8MS 27/27
SP6IWQ 27/26 DK3BU 37/26
15th June 14.30 to 15.38
DG9YIH 27/27 DG2KBC 27/27
DG9MAQ 27/27 G4MKF 27/27
PA1LA 27/26 F4DXX 27/27
DL1DAX 27/27 HB9BNI 27/27
15th June 20.04 to 20.30
OH6KTL 27/27 OH6PA 27/26
16th June 10.27 to 15.00
DL8UT 27/26 OK1CDJ 26/26
PA3DZL 28/27 DC6GK/P 28/38
PA2CHR 27/27 DG0KW 27/27
GW3HWR 27/27 PE9DX 27/27
DK0VHF 28/27 DM2SR 27/27
HA5RL 26/27
144 tropo (excluding GMs, say over 700km)
6th June
G1ZJP 53/53 IO92 (810km)
G4KWQ 52/41 IO92 (825km)
G4CBW 54/52 IO83 (783km)
G8LHT 51/41 IO93
7th June
G0UWK 53/51 IO83
G4DHF 51/41 IO92
PA5DD 52/52 JO21 (1086km)
M1MHZ 53/53 IO92 (810km)
8th June
G3WCS 53/52 IO83
9th June
G8GXP 42/52 IO93
G8VHI 41/51 IO92
G0TKJ 52/52 IO93
13th June
SM2CEW 59/59 QSB KP15 (1366km)
14th June
OZ2TF 55/55 JO46 (793km)
432Mhz. Only 7 QSOs all in GM
1296Mhz 1 QSO GM6VXB IO97 (269km)
70MHz
10th June
G4FUF 529/529 Scatter (tnx to CT1HZE for QSY info)
S51DI 59/59 and S54T 57/59 (Es)
15th June
G3JHM (scatter?) 519/539
16th June
GW8IZR 37/26 (MS after 419 tropo start)
50 MHz (in brief):-
9th June.
18.13 to 19.45. 12 QSOs S57,I,EH and CT
10th June
09.52 to 10.46 9 QSOs CT,G,ON,PA,EA
18.03 to 19.56 good Es. 97 QSOs S51,9A2,I,F,DK,OE,SP,HB,EH,CN and ZB
11th June
12.00 2 QSOs into IO91
18.46 to 19.36 38 QSOs OK,I,9A2,F,DG,HB,SP,OE,EH
12th June
Not much to report although further south band clearly well open. 2 backscatter QSOs to G but few other contacts.
15th June
An interesting day. Completed quickly a sked with G0JHC at 12.30 (after nil from cottage on earlier sked). Between 12.30 and 14.51 53 QSOs on scatter mode hard work but good fun. G,F,PE,DK,GD,ON,GW,MU,
From 17.15 to 18.35 strong Es opening from cottage QTH but low activity. 22 QSOs into OH,ES and SM.
At 19.47 the PA beacon came up strongly from /P QTH and from then until 20.25 short but strong short skip Es, 57 QSOs G, GM(south west corner),DL,PA,ON,GW,EI,GI.
At times, during this period, all G beacons 5/9...........
Nothing however on 70Mhz....... despite pointing beam at OZ and calling on 70.100. I regret there were no QSOs.
And to end, from IO99 on way home .......
19th June
8 QSOs on 50MHz, 10.16 to 12.25
73
de Keith G4ODA / GM4ODA/p
PS ALL QSLs to G4ODA NOT GM4ODA.
Cards will be sent to confirm all contacts but this may take up to 3 months.
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