New reception records that in some case marked a milestone in the VHF and UHF community, started in March 2015 when D4C/B signal was put in the air again, after some off time due to permanent damages to the transceivers by the harsh environment, from the Monteverde contest station located in Mindelo, Sao Vincente Island, Cape Verde.

HB9BCD Carlo Molteni with the help of team member HB9DUR Andrea, put together and refurbished a 30years old 2m beacon in service in the southern Switzerland.
The 2m beacon has served a few locations over the years as HB9H/B and latter as HB9OK/B. We thanks the TERA Radio Club in the person of HB9OAU Claudio Tiziani for the beacon donation.
With certitude, Cape Verde is going to be the last destination of this hardware.

As you can see from the maps and as earlier reported on the d4c.cc pages, the 2m coverage has gone incredibly far as into the Caribbean, giving birth to the confirmation of the W-E tropospheric path according to William Hepburn predictions maps, etc.

We are now in close contact with North-East Brasilian community which is very interested in trying to copy the 2m beacon and of course, as all of us, to complete a 2-way communication.

We are in the research of sponsor for one or two 2m Power amplifier in the 150W -300W class to extend the coverage to Brasil, or even a solid state 1kW PA (LDMOS) to  be splitted into 3 or 4 directions (we could add continental Africa). 

The advantage of such PA is that, in case of openings, the operator at D4C could enjoy the full power for a bilateral contact.

At the moment D4C station isn’t remote ready as internet reliability being the main concern, so QSO have to be tried while operators are on-site.

Moreover, another article concerning the extension to 1296MHz will be posted soon.

73’s and happy DX on VHF

D4C – D4Z Monteverde Contest Team