About BBRC
The Burnham Beeches Radio Club meets at 8pm on the first and third Monday of the month, sometimes by Zoom but mostly in-person meetings at Farnham Common Village Hall. Do check the calendar though, in case the meeting is out and about.
We are a friendly amateur radio club that encompasses all aspects of this fascinating hobby, for those just starting out and for old hands too.
For more information, please email us at bbradioclub@gmail.com. Club members wishing to sign up to the club’s email reflector can email the same address or contact Mike, G4RAA, at a club meeting.
If you are interested in becoming a radio amateur have a look at our Training page where we explain how we can help.
85 years of amateur radio and still going strong!
Despite the coronavirus pandemic, and unlike many radio clubs, BBRC has kept a full calendar of events going. Many meetings took place via Zoom but there were a few notable socially-distanced outdoor events. These included the VHF direction-finding ‘foxhunt’ and several DX Picnics, where members set up individual stations in a field.
A very special event station
The Burnham Beeches Radio Club and Cray Valley Radio Society were honoured to run GB70E, the English special event station for the late Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, over the June Bank Holiday weekend 2022. It ran from the evening of Thursday 2 June until early morning on Monday 6 June.
GB70E’s location in Windsor really could not have been a more appropriate location to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee: the station was located in the Home Park, in close proximity of Windsor Castle, the home of the late Queen.
GB70E had four stations – three covering the shortwave and 6m amateur bands and one station on 2m/70cm VHF FM for local contacts. An 80ft tower supported a 4 element SteppIR and wire antennas. There was also a 5 element yagi for 6m and a quad for 17/12m, each on separate masts.
The station made around 13,000 contacts with amateur radio operators around the world and was also open for visitors from 10am to 6pm on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, June 3-5. A marquee housed an exhibition area and the four stations, which were all capable of simultaneous operation.
A BBRC member also created GB70.co.uk a special website for the RSGB covering the activities of all the GB70 stations including, GB70E, GB70M, GB70W, GB70I, GB70D, GB70J and GB70U.
You can find fuller details of GB70E on the GB70 website, including a map, the operating schedule and QSL details. The website is at www.gb70.co.uk.
Pandemic production
In the early summer of 2020 club members went into production of headshields for health and care workers, as personal protection equipment was in very short supply. We produced many hundreds of items which were distributed to NHS staff, care workers and even a funeral director or two.
