New site found for Irish beacon network - March 2025

A few weeks back, I had a post up about how the EI1KNH, EI0SIX and EI4RF beacons in Ireland had to shut down due to a change of ownership of the beacon site. The good news is that a new site has now been found!

The new location is about 4kms to the south of the old site and it's a bit lower in altitude. It's certainly not as good as the old site but the challenge for any amateur radio beacon is to find any site where a beacon can operate.

The new site is nestled in the foothills of the Wicklow Mountain just to the south of Dublin and then local mountains and hills will certainly have a major impact in certain directions.

This is the approximate horizon of the new site...

To the north-east and on a heading of about 40 degrees, the Irish Sea is visible and there is a very good path to the Isle of Man and Scotland.

As we move further south, the local terrain starts to become more of an issue. The take off to the north of England is reasonable but once we go below a line say running from Liverpool to Leeds, it gets to be more challenging.

For example, the horizon in the direction of London and the south-east of England is about 6-degrees which will make reception difficult especially on tropo. 

To the south-west of Ireland which is in my direction here in Cork, the horizon is about 14 degrees which effectively kills all signals.

This map shows where tropo signals might be heard and the maximum range for one-hop Sporadic-E.

The range for single hop Sporadic-E to northern Europe is pretty good but the maximum range to Spain and Italy is shorter due to the mountains near the beacon site.

As of early March 2025, work in now progressing on the beacon and it is hoped that the beacons will be up and running in time for the start of the Sporadic-E season in mid to late April.

Due to the change in location, the EI1KNH beacons on 40.013 MHz and 60.013 MHz will be getting a new callsign. EI0SIX will return on 50.004 MHz while EI4RF will return on 70.013 MHz.

It is hoped that all four beacons will use FT8 as part of their transmission sequence which should help identification under weak signal conditions.

I'll put up another post once the beacons are operational.

Irish VHF beacons off-air for the foreseeable future

For the last few years, the EI1KNH, EI0SIX and EI4RF beacons have been operating from a site to the south of Dublin with an excellent take off to the east towards the UK. Now due to a change of ownership of the site, the radio beacons will be turned off on Saturday 15th February 2025.

The EI4RF beacon on the 70 MHz band (4m) will be the first to re-locate and it is hoped that a site will be available in the same general area. All going well, it will be operational for the start of the Sporadic-E season in May. It is hoped that EI0SIX operating on 50 MHz (6m) will be added soon after.

Getting the EI1KNH 40 MHz and 60 MHz beacon back on air will take longer. The change of location will likely require a change of callsign and this must be applied for. Hardware considerations at the new site should mean that the 60 MHz (5m) beacon will appear first but the 40 MHz (8m) beacon may be more problematic.

As soon as there are any more developments, I'll post them on the blog.

Upgrade to the Irish 70 MHz beacon EI4RF - Apr 2021

The Irish 4m beacon EI4RF has now been upgraded and is now transmitting on 70.013 MHz. It was previously operating on 70.130 MHz due to the limits of the older Irish 4m band. 

It is still located to the south of Dublin in the locator square IO63VE.

It is running 25-watts into a 3-element Yagi pointing east (90 degrees). The map above shows the beam heading with the -3dB (half power) headings as well.

EI4RF: 3-element Yagi for 70 MHz

The signal for the beacon comes from a GPS locked RFzero board and it uses the following format per minute: 3 x 15 second FT8 transmission and 1 x CW transmission.

Analysis: This new upgraded EI4RF beacon should prove to be a valuable propagation tool for the 70 MHz (4m) band especially as it is running 25-watts into a directional antenna with about 6dB (x4 time power) of gain. 

Anyone in England up to a distance of 500kms with a very modest station on 4m should be easily able to hear the beacon via tropo. Under enhanced tropo conditions, well equipped stations in the Netherlands at about 700-800kms might hear it.

As regards Sporadic-E, it should be very strong in the range of 1500 to 2200kms when the band is open... e.g. Poland, Baltic states, Croatia & Slovenia. During stronger openings when the MUF is higher, shorter distances down to 1000 kms may be possible... e.g. Germany.

Reception outside the -3dB points will be possible but obviously the further away from -3dB points you get, the weaker the signal.

EI4RF Site Profile: I have done up a site profile for the EI4RF site and it is shown below with the outline of the horizon.

I have included the 0 degree and 1 degree lines and I have coloured in the sea in light Blue to make it clearer.

As you can see, the beacon is on an elevated site and is looking down at the Irish Sea. Some of the mountains in the NW of Wales (90 deg) at a distance of 150kms or so are also visible. The plot clearly shows that there are no local obstructions between the -3dB points which is very good.

Outside of the main beam heading to the East, the path to the rest of Ireland is largely blocked by local hills and mountains. In the direction of Waterford (210 deg), the horizon has an elevation of about 3 degrees. In the direction of Cork (227 deg), the horizon rises to about 5 degrees. To the west, the horizon is over 7 degrees. It's highly unlikely that this beacon would be heard across the North Atlantic if there was ever some double hop Sporadic-E.

In conclusion: This beacon with its 25 watts should be easily heard in England via tropo and in eastern Europe via Sporadic-E. The inclusion of the FT8 digital mode is a welcome touch as it allows people to hear signals buried in the noise and there is already a lot of people using that mode. Any reception reports can be automatically uploaded to the PSK Reporter website to alert others of any opening.

Thanks to Tony, EI7BMB and Tim, EI4GNB who got this upgraded 4m beacon up and running.

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Other site developments: From Tim, EI4GNB...

EI0SIX had a mild tune-up, as one of the pair of antennas had gone a bit droopy, now the SWR and bandwidth are excellent. It remains 40w to a pair of loops phased.

EI1KNH on 8m has had it's monopole antenna moved to the top of the 4m mast, away from the FDP for 5m, and now has a much healthier looking lot on my VNA. No more interaction with 5m. It's happy on 40w from the NXP PA.

EI1KNH on 5m now runs FT8 for 3 periods of 15 seconds, then runs a slow CW ID and a long carrier - previously it had been looping FT8 every 15 seconds. It's PSU was toast, and was causing hash all over HF to the remote stn there, so it's temp on the same PSU as EI0SIX. No change to the chain, 25w to a folded dipole.