Great South Bay Amateur Radio Club Trailer not a Regular one

December 17, 2023

John (W2HCB) from the Great South Bay Amateur Radio Club shares details about the club's highly capable mobile communications trailer:

The Great South Bay Amateur Radio Club communications trailer has 3 HF stations plus 6 additional radios for VHF, UHF, and DMR. All radios do all modes and are powered by 300 amp hours of battery. The computers run off a Renogy 3500 watt inverter & charger with the batteries also charging from the same inverter. A 200 watt solar panel array on the roof of the trailer helps to keep the batteries charged.

We use the trailer for public service events, special events, and Field Day. The VHF/UHF radios have dual band antennas on the roof. In addition, we have a marine radio and a tempest weather station.

The HF radios run through filters and a triplexer for 10-15-20 meters. We also have a repeater in the trailer which we use at events. The trailer even has heat and AC.

The radios are three Icom IC-7100s, two Icom IC-5100s, one AnyTone AT-878UV for DMR, and a Motorola CDM1250 for GMRS. We can run for 8 to 10 hours without the generator running which makes the trailer always ready for operation.

Thanks to our great membership and the volunteers that helped over the years for all the hard work during the build and upgrades. We have used the trailer for many events, including the Hope for the Warrior Run, the Suffolk County Marathon, the Babylon Village St Patrick's Parade, and the country fair. We also built a tower trailer which holds a tri-bander and vertical for the portable UHF repeater. The tower trailer has a 30 foot crank-up antenna with a power winch.

When well roll up we can be operating as soon as we park the trailer which means at events, net control operators are on the air without having to do any setup.

Contact Great South Bay Amateur Radio Club with any questions.

Source: Great South Bay Amateur Radio Club  open_in_new