Bottelary repairs 20200530

On Saturday 30 May, John ZS1EQ, Paul ZS1V and Jan ZS1VDV visited the Bottelaryberg highsite that hosts the 145.575 DSTAR and 438.300 multimode digital repeaters. While both repeaters were operating correctly, the internet link to the site had been down for several months, limitting the utility of these repeaters.

The internet link was re-established and a general health check of the site was performed. The gateway unit for the VHF DSTAR repeater was found to be faulty and removed from the site. As a consequence the UHF multimode repeater is now fully functional, but the DSTAR repeater is not linked to the internet.

A battery switch over and low voltage cutout unit on the backup batteries was installed.

Jonaskop maintenance 20200509

On Saturday 9 May, Jan ZS1VDV and Ralf ZS1RK visitted the Jonaskop 145.675 repeater site. High wind conditions prevented close up inspection of the antenna connections on the tower, but the SWR of all the antennas were checked and found to be good.

The VHF repeater squelch was adjusted. The audio levels were re-aligned and one coax connector was seated correctly.