The mysterious 442.600 has lost its mystery

I previously wrote about the Maplewood 442.600+ (156.7 PL) repeater and the mystery surrounding it. This UHF repeater has quite excellent coverage and reception, and almost no one using it. Its status was listed as "unknown" on RepeaterBook until I "ker-chunked" it earlier this year to confirm that it was, in fact, on the air. I updated the RB listing and began to explore the repeater's coverage. I am able to hit the machine from inside of my condo with an HT and a stock duck, and I am on the opposite side of the metro from Maplewood here in Plymouth. I can reliably hit it in my car with my 5W HT "mobile" wherever I go.

It was always mysterious to me because I was unable to find out who operated it. The QRZ email address comes up as "undeliverable", the group that runs it (SPEARS) is unknown to me and has no web presence, and nobody that I've asked seems to know anything about it. Most people seem unaware of its existence. When I wrote about it here on the blog, an anonymous person left a comment with some basic info on the machine. Somebody went to the trouble and expense to put up a first-class UHF repeater, but they apparently didn't want to take credit for it. It seemed like just another "emergency" repeater that was supposed to sit unused.

This afternoon, however, I fixed my six-element UHF Yagi that was damaged at the July AITP event. Since the 442.600 is on the lower end of the repeater spectrum, it's nice to use it to check SWR. I threw out my sign on the .600 and dutifully noted that my SWR was excellent. With 10W and a beam pointing east, hitting the repeater was definitely not a problem.

To my complete surprise, WD8CBO (Gary) came back to my sign! He was mobile, and we had time for a short chat before he arrived at his home. He was also surprised to hear anyone on the machine. We chatted about repeaters and UHF in general, and closed. Shortly after that, KB0SED (Dave) announced himself, and we struck up a QSO. It's always nice to meet new people, and Dave was definitely a stranger to me.

As it turned out, Dave was the person that maintained the mysterious 442.600 repeater! The machine itself is ostensibly operated by the St. Paul Fire Department, as I already suspected, and it's located on the 3M Center building in Maplewood about 15 - 17 stories above ground. The altitude explained the repeater's great coverage. Dave also confirmed that the repeater was, in fact, open to all licensed amateur radio operators. That's nice to know.

I would class the 442.600 with the 444.800 MARA repeater as truly superb repeaters that sit unused.

There are quite a few UHF repeaters in the metro, and possibly too many (for the limited number of hams that operate on UHF) to keep them all active. There's a fair amount of "churn", as some repeaters go down (442.550, 444.850, 444.075 spring to mind) and others get improvements (443.050 and 444.925 are examples), but there is a solid core of dependable repeaters on the band. Several of the machines are "hobby" repeaters that aren't intended to provide wide-area coverage, as there still are open UHF frequency pairs available in the metro. And there are three power-house "emergency" repeaters that reach all across the metro with ease (444.500, 444.175, and 444.200). Many seem unaware of the linked WINET 442.075 repeater that will allow you to reach all across Wisconsin. The bulk of the UHF activity is pretty much restricted to a few repeaters: 444.425, 444.100, 444.650, and 444.525.

With the explosion of cheap dual-band HT's, the building-penetrating characteristics of UHF propagation, and the ease of setting up relatively small UHF gain antennae, it would seem that UHF would be a natural choice for most new hams. Older hams seem to have an inherent bias against the band, seeing it as a new-fangled gimmick that isn't practical or worthy of a 'real' ham. Rural hams find UHF to be impractical due to the "green-leaf attenuation" of trees and foliage on a UHF signal, but that's not a significant issue in urban and suburban environments. UHF (and it's neglected sibling, 1.25M) is actually the superior propagation option for metropolitan areas. It's just that equipment was generally only available for two-metre operation back in the day when repeaters were first installed widely, and that VHF model tended to stick for no other good reason.

I'd encourage any new ham to get a mag-mount and a 5/8-wave mobile whip, attach it to something steel next a window (I use a paint can), and hook it up to their HT. You'll probably be pleasantly surprised at the number of repeaters that you can reach, especially from an upper floor. Or program a few UHF repeaters into your HT and use it as a mobile. All that it takes to turn a "dead" repeater into an active one is a few people willing to invest the time to hang out and actually come back to thrown-out signs. Maybe you're not the "pioneer" type. Check out on the more active repeaters and join in the fun there.