Last month the Rottnest 70cm repeater came online (http://www.vk6uu.id.au/Rottnest-mark-2.html).

Getting into the repeater should have been easy for me at my QTH with nothing but water between, but due to some teething limitations of the new repeater a challenge has been set.

Firstly I tried my flower-pot dual-band antenna (pictured at the top of the mast) with no luck. Sometimes I could open the repeater, but that was about it.

Next I tried a home-brew 8 element co-linear. I could consistently open the repeater, and had reports of carrier with some modulation, but not enough to hold a QSO.

So then, just the kick I needed to build a Yagi! I settled on a modified design of the Bow and Arrow dual bander (http://www.radioaficion.com/…/1478-qbowq-and-qarrowq-satell…) utilising a gamma match to feed it, negating the requirement for a balun.

For less than $50, including mounting hardware, here is the result.

My first contact was with Will, VK6UU where my signal was reported to be a readable 5.