Station located in Essex, above address is my QSL route

licensed as G0KOM in 1988, operated as ZC4MK from 1989 to 1991 and then as VP8COI in 1993, from 2003 until April of 2009 I have lived in Spain and operated as EA5/G0KOM, I have now returned to the UK

I was the 1st Legal ZC4 on 50Mhz, I achieved 71 Countries and WAC before leaving Cyprus to Return to the UK, not a bad achievement in Cycle 22 as there were few Eu countries QRV at the time, DXCC would have been relatively easy now (as shown by Nick 5B4FL) due to the General release of the Band to most of Europe.

I had some memorable QSOs on 6m during my time in ZC4, most memorable probably VK9YJ worked whilst I was operating the CQ WW single op 10m entry I heard some weak CW on 50.110 after working over 2000 10m qsos I was sure I was hearing things, I fell of my chair when I heard VK9YJ Cocos Keeling CQing on 6m, I forgot all about the contest and went on to work him first on CW then about 30 mins later on SSB, other memorable ones out of the blue one day, N6AMG/KH8 American Samoa is one I will always treasure and especially as Joel is now SK, he was a true gentleman and someone who embodied the spirit of 6m and what it has meant to amateurs throughtout the world, what other hobby/band would have a bunch of us sad amateurs listening to white noise for hours each day in the hope of that rare DX, thats why its the Magic Band

Recording of  VK9YJ excuse the poor quality I recorded this on a dictaphone and one of my kids got hold of the tape years later and decided to rip it out, I managed to recover it but with some detoriation, although its still a great listen, towards the end of it you can hear me reporting this on 28.885mhz I sound a little excited as you can imagine

www.50mhz.org/vk9yj.wav

Other memorable stuff, the long path 6m openings to KH6, I worked a string of KH6s one day via LP never heard it before and even stranger virtually 12 months to the day later I had the same Long Path opening to KH6 and work another hand full of them, Nick G3KOX came to visit me and he probably wont remember this but whilst he was in my shack we heard the HC8 Gallapagos island beacon it peaked at 599 and was in for over 2 hours, couldnt not raise anyone on 28.885 and there was no activity from HC8, that was the one and only time I ever heard HC8 on 6m, other noteable stuff on 6, the openings to JA and VK some huge pileups to JA never huge signals but just lots of JA's very organised and disciplined, and last but not least K1HTV my one and only USA contact on 6 from ZC4 the first ever 6m Usa/ZC4 contact, tnx rich

I was Posted to the Falkland Islands in 1993, unfortunately I had lost interest in Radio at the time but when I arrived I accidentally found the Radio shack that was used very little with a TS-430 and 3 Element Tribander, I went to the Post office and was issued VP8COI, I played around for a few days and was soon hooked again, my biggest disappointment was not having a 50mhz Radio whilst in VP8, I think I could have worked quite a lot of stuff (Oh well that's life)

I have a preference for 6m and 10m in that order but can be found on other bands when 6n10 are dead, I have always had a modest station, I do not have or have ever had HF Yagi antennas at home, most of my HF antennas are homebrew, 6m is the only band where I run a Yagi, I have never owned an amplifier for any band

I currently have no 6m equipment (for the first time in 20 years) but am hoping to remedy that sometime soon, I am currently using a Kenwood TS-570DG with a Huster 6BTV Multiband Vertical antenna which is ground mounted

73 de Adrian

G0KOM---ZC4MK---VP8COI