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About
It is with humble thanks and gratitude that I share that my 2nd N0AGI DMR Repeater (N0AGI-BKH) is now live on the air on top of the Buck Hill-Burnsville Site.
Today March 6th 2016, Sunday‘s deployment of the N0AGI Buck Hill-Burnsville DMR Repeater marks a key milestone not only to me as an individual, but, more so for the MN-DMR community at large as we reach the 5th DMR Repeater in the state; And, moreover, it speaks to how a group of similar-passion-minded individuals come as a singleton group and together accomplish such a landmark event in the DMR history in the state of Minnesota.
Today’s deployment took a lot of hauling, dragging stuff around on slushy ice, climbing up and down stair-less slopes, lugging around over make-shift zip lines, and more. At the end of the day, we look back and share the fun and passion of putting her up on the air.
Over the last few weeks, I have been working closely w/ a good friend of mine and the owner of Buck Hill – to explore and secure his blessing, support and sponsorship of access to his pristine site – the Summit at Buck Hill. I am very blessed to have a good friend in McClure. And I hope that this DMR site will help grow the DMR community, joy of DMR, and surely communications and emergency preparedness in an around the state.
Credits and Thanks
As they say, No Milestone is traveled alone, no achievement is built alone and no story is said solo; This milestone also took a village and this could not have come to fruition w/o the friendship, support, partnership, a shared-passion and the coming together with these key friends:
I look forward to working w/ these gentlemen yet again in future projects – and I cannot wait till that next exciting milestone.
I would like to take this opportunity to also thank these key individuals who have provided help, commentary and feedback to this team in preparation toward the Buck Hill deployment and several ad-hoc testing; NQ0G – Chris Wolfe, KA0JWC – Scott Blixt, N0VZC – Mike Norrbom, KB0SVW – Terry Thurn, KC0DGY – Kent Peterson, NK0M – Brandon Perrine, KC0BBK – Galen Erickson, KA0KMJ – John Czech, W0DJK – Don Klier, KC0CAP – Dan Gelle, KC0VUZ – Tom Zappa, et al;
Thanks to K1DMR – Ken Bryant for providing good deals for hams on Motorola DMR gear. All of my DMR gear was purchased from Ken. I don’t have any personal or business interest in Ken’s business. Sharing this here so fellow hams might also benefit from good price bracket he offers on Moto gear.
Gentlemen, it’s a blessing to have your friendship and partnership.
The Buck Hill DMR Repeater setup is configured as follows:
DMR Network Config:
Repeater ID: 312708
Repeater Callsign: N0AGI
Repeater City: Buck Hill-Burnsville
Repeater State: Minnesota
Repeater Country: United States
Repeater Frequency: 443.12500
Repeater ColorCode: 1
Repeater Zone: 5
Repeater Offset: +5.000
Repeater M/P: Peer
Repeater Time Slots: TS1 TS2
Repeater Trustee: N0AGI
Repeater Network: MNDMR (previously on K4USD)
Projected Coverage Heat Map:
The projected coverage map was built using RadioMobil software targeted to articulate the coverage for Handi-Talkies at 5W. Post deployment of the site, this projected map was compared to real-time coverage using “drive thru” on-field exercise; So far, the projected coverage map and the reality match accurately.
It should be duly noted that at the time of deployment of this site, the terrain was void of typical foliage we see during the Spring and Summer time. With that footnote, during the event of spring and summer foliage, I expect to see some coverage changes.
We will be monitoring as the season moves along.
A few pictures from Buck-Hill Install/Deployment Day – Mar 6th 2016: (a few pictures here are courtesy KD0YRF – Bill Breyer, N0BVE – Don Rice).
Some early projected coverage/propagation analysis (courtesy KE0NA):
These projections include the Chaska area when I was exploring that as a potential site – side-by-side Buck Hill.
A few pictures of the 2nd repeater and the duplexer are below:
YouTube Videos:
More than HAM Radio and DMR, this is a journey of making good friends, meeting good people, and together, building and helping the communities we represent.
God Bless
73s N0AGI