Dear PakHams,

Successfully today, the team was able to perform maintenance on the Mike Romeo Site. The site is successfully up and running.



The team:

Nasir Khan Saheb, Mirza Kareem Baig, Akif Janjua, Shehzad Hamid, Mobeen, Naeem, Huzaifa Ahmed, & Abdus Samad.

The team assembled at Nasir Khan Saheb residence and we left for the site around 9:15 with the spare equipment



Spare Equipment:

· Spare Repeater Motorola Repeater CDR 700 and Twin GM140’s

· Battery Charger – Stepper charging (provided by Ap2CJ)

· Delayed AVR (provided by Ap2CJ)

· AVR (provided by Ap2CJ)

· Surge Protectors (provided by Ap2CJ)



Issue at Site:

The Repeater was not alive and was powered down, power strip fuse was blown and the site was off. We investigated power sources and found that power strip has gone bad, we then directly connected the repeater with power source but still non responsive. Hence the Repeater was dismantled and opened up for investigation and it was later found that the transformer has blown and it was short.



Next Step:

The seniors discuss way forward and it was decided to dismantle the Icom Repeater and replace them with the Twin Motorola GM140 on the CDR 700 Chassis for repeater function. Hence the battery charging equipment was dismantled; batteries and charger removed and cleared up the rack.

Installation started with placing the CDR700 Chassis on the Pakhams Rack, connect the Tx & Rx, looped in the SWR meter, install the ground connection to the radio and start up the radio. The radio successfully started and testing was initiated with MKB. The SWR was observing fluctuation on the transmit side, hence the team was dispatched to the PTV tower comprising of Mobeen, Huzaifa and Abdus Samad to remove the antenna, perform visual inspection, service the connectors and ensure insulation. While the Tx antenna was worked upon, it was observed that the Rx antenna was also malfunctioning, hence the spare installed antenna was swapped and connected. Further the NK, MF and CJ tuned the SWR levels with the external filter and finally the tests with MKB were concluded.


Conclusion:
The team concluded the activity around 1500 hrs and headed back with a stop for lunch. The Icom shall be put in repairs and tested and put back in service. Though its observed that Kilo Kilo site is down due to some activity.


All in all it was an excellent learning experience, I am glad that the Mike Roneo site is up and running with temporary equipment and the day was well spent. Pictures are attached for your reference


Abdus Samad

B U M P