On Sunday, February 5th two members of the Tech Committee – Jason N8EI and John N8CD – executed the planned upgrade of the W8WKY 147.39 repeater.
At the end of 2022, the club purchased two brand new Kenwood NXR-710 commercial-grade repeaters after continuing quality struggles with the Bridgecom BCR-50V. The club also purchased a complete set of brand-new ABR214 double-shielded coaxial cables for the 39 repeater system. All of that equipment was installed on Sunday, February 5th.
The new system as a noticeable audio improvement. With the NXR, we were able to appropriately dial in the audio levels using an oscilloscope for the best possible audio performance. Also gone is the noise from the fans and the electronic whine that cluttered up 39’s output audio. The Kenwood NXR is a high quality commercial repeater that should serve the club well for many years to come and the club now has a “warm standby” repeater with the same configuration that can be installed if necessary.
It should be noted that the system is optimized for best performance when users are using tone squelch. The output repeater tone will drop away approximately 500ms before the squelch itself closes. This allows radios to have a very quiet transmission drop. If you aren’t using tone squelch, you’re highly recommended to update your radio’s settings.
Here’s a picture of the current SARA repeater cabinet:
