Updated Thursday, 02 July 2009 20:40 GMT
Latest Webcam Pic
The webcam is off-line until the ship sails for the Arctic in early August, although I may post pictures from time to time.
The RRS James Clark Ross is in No 15 Dock, Portsmouth Naval Base, for her annual refit.
It has been a busy few days for me onboard and hence the lack of any updates, I have not had the time or energy to sit and write about life onboard the James Clark Ross. Tonight I am going to make a bit of an effort, although it will be mainly centred around the work on the Bridge and Radio Room.
Monday saw the start of the new MF/HF installation. Alas it has been confirmed that the new equipment does not have a CW facility so I am now fully committed to operating using the Kenwood TS430. I hope to have an antenna hung before the ship heads north to the Arctic.
Amazing. The new Sailor consoles come complete with an emergency supply of
fruit! This is the unit in the Radio Room, with more work to be carried
out prior to it being accepted.
Painting of the Stbd side of the ship is due to begin on Friday morning and should continue over the weekend. Shot blasting will be carried out first and once the metal work is correctly prepared the special coating will be applied.
At the time of writing the two new consoles for the MF/HF are bolted down onto the desktops and wiring is being run between the consoles and the transceiver units. The Power Supply Units (which are much smaller and lighter than the original Skanti units), along with the Transceivers and Aerial Tuning Units are all now in place in the Transmitter Room, and most importantly I have put back in place my tool board, thus clearing a bit of space on the Bridge.
Transmitter Room with ATU (white), Transceivers below and PSU's to the
right. Toolboard back in place.
The packing cases used for the new equipment have been filled with the old Skanti equipment and will be sent back to Cambridge to be used as spares for Rothera and Halley.
The Bridge this evening. Whilst it looks a bit of a mess it is improving
as either equipment is fitted or packed away for return to Cambridge. The
console in the background that is open is for fitting a new Sailor RT2048 VHF
transceiver. I have three new to install and one to replace an existing
unit, so lots more cables to be run around the ship and antennas to be
erected in the coming weeks.
I had a visit from the new Communications Managers for Rothera and Halley today and am pleased to say that the Rothera manager is a keen ham and hopes to be active from the base. More info on this later in the year (they only started work with BAS on Monday so it is very early days just now for them both).
The final section in this update is a picture of an interesting bit of kit that I came across this afternoon whilst heading for the Bridge from the Main Deck. As part of the refit there is a lot of work being carried out on the Aft crane and I spotted this amazing machine enlarging one of the pivot points on the crane, no doubt to bit a new bush into. Slow and precision work being carried out here.
Enlarging a large hole!
I have not had a chance to update the Polar News page but hope to do so in the not too distant future.
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gm0hcq@gm0hcq.com