RATS Repeater History

Here's a look back at notable events and memorable moments on the RATS repeaters over the last 50-plus years:

1970s

1971 - The 146.88 MHz repeater goes on the air from Alford's Radio Communications at 2500 North Lombardy Street in Richmond.  The repeater is a GE MASTR Progress Line (ProgLine) system with an antenna at about 80 feet.

1972 - The Richmond Amateur Telecommunications Society is formed.  Founding members are John Alford WA4VOS/SK, Sally Alford (Talmadge), Ralph Spring WB4WMQ, Joyce Spring, Allan Thorn N4NLQ/SK, Fred Towers WB4KXS, Judy Towers WA4MSH, and Jerry Williams KJ4IT.

1975 - The 146.88 MHz repeater is moved to its current home at the WCVE-TV studios in Chesterfield County.

1990s

1996 - The RATS 442.55 MHz repeater goes on the air from the top of the NationsBank building at Villa Park, located at the southwest corner of Parham Rd and US-1 in Henrico County.  The Standard LMR3 signs on in March, transmitting 60 watts through a Diamond antenna from 125 feet.  The call sign is WA4DHY/R and the transmit PL is 127.3 Hz. 

1996 - RATS is granted the W4RAT call sign at the launch of the US vanity call program on November 4.  On November 15, W4RAT/R replaces WA4ZBE/R on the VHF repeater and WA4DHY/R on UHF.  The VHF system in place at this time consists of a GE MASTR II repeater, Advanced Computer Controls (ACC) RC-850 controller, WACOM 6-cavity duplexer, and celwave Super Station Master antenna.  The repeater transmits 70 watts at 482 feet with a transmit PL of 71.9 Hz.  No PL is required to access the repeater.

1997 - An archived copy of the RATS web site from December 1997 notes that the club "is the largest amateur organization in the Tri-Cities area, boasting over 300 members."  The 146.88 repeater is carrying the popular Amateur Radio Newsline broadcast every Monday night at 8:40 PM.

1998 - Cell phones have not yet killed the autopatch.  The ability to place telephone calls through the repeater remains a popular feature among club members.  A Christmas Eve ice storm knocks out utilities for many and emergency shelters are opened.  Club member Bill Gandel WA4QFP writes an e-mail to the Board about how the autopatch was a help in the days following the storm.  His e-mail is published in the January 1999 edition of the club's Solid Copy newsletter:

"On Sunday December 27, 1998 I used the autopatch twice from the far southwestern part of Prince George County. Once in the morning about 10AM then later about 3 PM. This in response to being paged by our Disaster Chairperson Of the Hopewell-Prince George Red Cross Chapter. I had a cell phone but it decided to go south for the winter and there was simply no way to respond to this page without searching for a wired phone that would have taken 20 minutes to a half hour. [...] There was priority message traffic I needed to have regarding emergency shelter ops. here. The 146.88 repeater and autopatch let me respond and no emergency services or operations were delayed due to the phone problems I was having. Shelter operations continued and all was well."

2000s

2003 - WCVE-TV installs a new, taller tower in preparation for the upcoming digital TV transition.

2003 - Hurricane Isabel makes landfall on the Outer Banks of North Carolina as a Category 2 storm with winds of 105 miles per hour the afternoon of September 18.  The storm tracks northwest through Virginia, causing widespread damage and some flooding throughout our area.  A majority of area residents wake up to no power the morning of the 19th and 146.88 is running on battery power.  In the December 2003 edition of RATS Solid Copy newsletter, club president Jerry Williams later writes:  "Many RATS members were involved in the emergency proceedings surrounding Isabel both from public shelters, setting up equipment at the Virginia Department of Emergency Management not to mention the fact that that the W4RAT repeater was a backup for ARES during this emergency and a number of members were involved in emergency nets."

2004 - The UHF repeater is relocated from Villa Park to WCVE and RATS is moved to the new tower at a height of 680 feet.  An entirely new repeater system is installed consisting of two new antennas, about 700 feet of LDF-6 hardline, Link Communications RLC-Club controllers with dual independent autopatches, and a pair of Motorola MTR-2000 repeaters.  A third MTR-2000 is placed on standby for backup VHF use.  A pair of duplexers allows RATS to place two antennas and two repeaters on one hardline up the tower, enabling the VHF and UHF repeaters to share the prime 680 foot position with minimal cost.  Around this time, trustee Dave Kiefer N4DWK programs the RLC-Club controllers with the now-famous "long-winded bozo" timeout message.

2006 - RATS installs two IRLP nodes.  The Internet Radio Linking Project uses the Internet and VoIP technology to provide high-quality links between any two simplex and/or repeater nodes, or multiple nodes through the use of conference rooms called reflectors.  By entering a 4-digit node number using the DTMF keypad on any analog radio, any ham in range of the repeater can connect to any other user of the IRLP network globally.  Node 4424 (VHF) and 4995 (UHF) are periodically used to create links for public service events such as bike rides between Richmond and Williamsburg, and the system is utilized by various groups such as Wakefield SKYWARN, ARES, and VDEM-ARCA for movement of emergency radio traffic.  RATS members and non-members alike make a number of friends around the world using IRLP, such as Bob Perkins VK3FROB of Melbourne, Australia, who becomes a frequent caller into the RATS VHF node.  Several RATS members meet Bob during his visit to Richmond around 2010.

2006 - RATS begins deploying Automated Packet Reporting System (APRS) digipeaters across central Virginia.  APRS.RATS.NET is formed from the 3-node VA-APRS network, which was founded by Peter Martin KF4VIZ and Jay Silvio N9WMU (SK) to promote APRS in the Metro Richmond area.  Digis are installed in downtown Richmond, Chesterfield, New Kent, Goochland, Prince George, King William, Lunenburg, and Buckingham Counties between 2006 and 2008, growing to become the largest single-operator APRS digipeater network in Virginia.  

2006 - Tropical Storm Ernesto moves through Central Virginia on September 1 severely flooding the Battery Park area of Richmond.  The American Red Cross opens a shelter at the Arthur Ashe Center for displaced residents and Chesterfield ARES is called up to provide communications support.  The RATS 146.88 repeater is used for communications between VDEM and the shelter.  The efforts of 13 hams are recognized with a Certificate of Appreciation from the ARRL, many of whom are RATS members:  Travis Cox K4RCK, Ralph Fetty W4FEG (SK), Roger Sack N9ARC, Jason Hawes AA4AS, Keith Derringer WA4KD, Stephen Adams K4CMR, Phil Davis Jr. KI4DX, Tray Murphy N4PAT (SK), Roy Schultz KI4MCX, Anthony Harbour KG4YXP, Jerry Williams KJ4IT, Thomas Flippin KD4CMK, and Mike Baker N4LSP.

2008 - Wakefield SKYWARN shifts its primary repeater designation for central Virginia to the RATS VHF repeater.  The 146.88 machine starts regularly handling SKYWARN traffic for spotters from Ladysmith to Petersburg, Zion Crossroads to Providence Forge, and beyond, as well as over the IRLP system.  SKYWARN joins K9 Alert Search & Rescue Dogs and a number of local ARES teams as EMCOMM users of the RATS repeater system.

2009 - After months of elusive noise on both the VHF and UHF repeaters, RATS hires a crew to climb the tower.  The tower crew finds water intrusion in the diplexer at the top of the tower, which allows the VHF and UHF antennas to share a single feedline.  The faulty part is replaced and connections are sealed.  At the same time, a pair of backup VHF and UHF antennas is installed on the WCVE tower at 580 and 460 feet, respectively.  The backup VHF antenna becomes home to a new APRS digipeater.  Backup service to the 146.88 repeater takes precedence, so the APRS digi will go off the air if the antenna is needed for the repeater.

2010s

2014 - RATS enters the digital era through a partnership with club member Jay Lovelady KD4BPZ, who furnishes the use and ongoing maintenance of a Motorola XPR8300 repeater.  The DMR repeater is placed in service May 30th on the club's backup UHF antenna at 460 feet on the WCVE tower.  The 443.5875 MHz W4RAT DMR repeater becomes a prominent part of what is today known as the DMRVA network.  Separately, a 900 MHz P25 digital repeater is brought online around this time by club member Fred Towers WB4KXS.

2017 - At 3:15 on the afternoon of April 6, a downed tree limb makes contact with a power line near the repeater site causing a significant power surge into the club's equipment.  A failure of the VHF backup batteries takes that repeater off the air instantly, while the UHF repeater and DMR systems remain operational for a couple of hours on battery power.  The RATS Technical Committee works quickly to run temporary power and bypass or replace damaged components.  In the days and weeks following the outage, a trio of new Arcom RC-210 repeater controllers replace the aging RLC-Clubs and the battery backup systems supporting the VHF and UHF repeaters are overhauled.  Additional surge protection is installed.  Repairs and upgrades continue into early 2018.

2017 - RATS signs its first official Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for use of its repeater.  The MOU between RATS and Wakefield SKYWARN formally acknowledges the relationship between the two organizations.  It establishes precedence for SKYWARN traffic over non-MOU'd traffic, defines how SKYWARN will share the repeater with other users, spells out maintenance obligations and other pertinent details.  The MOU demonstrates the importance of the RATS repeater system to the National Weather Service.  It is signed on October 20 by Tim Farrell KJ4NPB on behalf of RATS and Howard Waxman WZ4K on behalf of SKYWARN, to be effective through December 31, 2021.

2017 - RATS signs a second MOU for the VHF repeater, this time with Virginia ARRL District 6 ARES.  The ARES and SKYWARN MOU's are similar.  This MOU is signed by Tim Farrell KJ4NPB for RATS and Dr. Joe Palsa K3WRY (SK) for ARES, to be effective through December 31, 2021.

2018 - Prompted by the April 2017 outage, RATS obtains permission from WCVE to connect to the TV station's large diesel generator.  A licensed electrician is hired by the TV station to install a dedicated breaker and outlet.  Work is completed in mid-January.  The battery bank and UPS remain in place for short-term service between outage and generator power, while the diesel generator ensures RATS can continue providing critical communications infrastructure for central Virginia.

2019 - After months of troubleshooting noise on the VHF repeater a tower crew is sent up to inspect connections and perform antenna work.  The backup VHF antenna at 580 feet is erroneously removed and replaced with the old UHF antenna which had just come off our 680-foot position on the tower.  This brings the end of the APRS digipeater at the WCVE site, but several RATS-owned and RATS-affiliated APRS digis remain in service around the area.

2019 - The 442.55 repeater has been seeing roughly 6% of the amount of traffic on the VHF repeater.  Operation of the club's 442.55 MHz repeater is delegated to club member Jamie Stapleton KD4RJN in an effort to find a more productive use for the mostly-dormant pair.  The higher-trafficked DMR repeater is moved to the top antenna at 680 feet, while the 442.55 slides down to 580 feet.  Jamie donates the use and maintenance of a Yaesu System Fusion DR-1X repeater operating in dual-mode analog and digital service from the 580-foot position on the WCVE tower.  The repeater uses the KK4RER call sign.

2019 - Jay Lovelady brings a second DMR repeater to the RATS site.  The WA4FC/R 443.5375 MHz repeater is on the Brandmeister network and was previously located in downtown Richmond.  It uses an antenna at approximately 460 feet which was vacated by the move of the 443.5875 MHz repeater to 680 feet.  The repeater goes on the air in late December.

2020s

2020 - The COVID-19 pandemic is taking off and society is locking down.  RATS members begin reaching out to the Board about a recurring net to help area hams check in with each other and share any needs they may have such as food, medicine, or other supplies they don't have access to due to social isolation or quarantine.  At 7 PM on March 16, the first RATS Health & Wellness Net is called by Tim Farrell KJ4NPB.  It is an immediate hit with participants and initially meets every night, gradually tapering off in frequency over a period of months.  The local amateur community drops off groceries, prescriptions, and meals, helps with rides to medical appointments, and goes to check on ham friends who haven't been heard on the net for a few days.  The net gives hams "something to look forward to" in the evenings and also provides an important lifeline for our sick, elderly, and transportation-challenged members.

2020 - With some noise issues persisting on the VHF repeater after the 2019 tower work, the VHF MTR2000 is swapped out for a loaner Motorola SLR8000 running in analog mode as a 30 to 90-day test.  Testing begins in July and the swap yields some improvement in performance.  In October, the Technical Committee recommends replacement of the 17 year-old MTR2000's with Yaesu DR-2X repeaters.  Operation of the 442.55 MHz repeater is brought back under the W4RAT call sign and the purchase of a trio of DR-2X's is approved by the membership in December.  The MTR2000's and Arcom controllers are sold, marking the official end of autopatch services on the club's repeaters.

2021 - The club installs Yaesu System Fusion DR-2X repeaters on the 146.88 and 442.55 MHz frequency pairs, with a third repeater racked and ready for backup use by late January.  In March, the 442.55 MHz repeater is placed on the Virginia room 24/7.  The VHF repeater is not on the WIRES-X network.  It accepts transmissions in analog or digital mode, but only retransmits in analog.  The VHF repeater transmits and receives from the upper antenna at 680 feet, and the UHF repeater uses the middle antenna at 580 feet.  Both repeaters operate at 50 watts output power with an analog PL of 74.4 Hz in and out.

History compiled and maintained by Steve Crow KG4PEQ
Initial publication 2022-09-19
Updated 2022-09-20:  added Health & Wellness net info 2020, Ernesto response 2006