Following the success of last year’s visit, Cray Valley Radio Society returned to the historic Meopham Windmill on the weekend of May 9th and 10th for the 2026 “Mills on the Air” event. Operating under the special event callsign GB6MW, our club members enjoyed a highly successful two days of operation.
Built circa 1820, Meopham Windmill is a beautifully preserved Grade II listed building and one of only a handful of six-sided hexagonal smock mills remaining in the UK. We are incredibly grateful to the Meopham Windmill Trust for once again welcoming us to their site and making this event possible.
The station was on the air from approximately 09:30 until 16:30 (local time) on both days. We were treated to very fine weather all day on Saturday, which made for a great operating environment, though Sunday brought colder and slightly wet conditions. Despite the weather shift, the team pressed on and successfully logged well over 300 QSOs over the weekend including contacts with 18 other mills.
Our operations spanned multiple bands and modes, with our equipment setup including:
- HF Station: Yaesu FT-DX10 paired with a KPA500 amplifier and a doublet antenna, operating across various HF bands, making contacts with stations in Asia, American and Europe.
- VHF Station: Yaesu FT-857D utilizing a triband collinear antenna for 2m work.
- QO-100 Satellite Station (Saturday only): A special addition this year was an impressive station operating on the QO-100 geostationary satellite, utilizing a Portsdown transmitter, Ryde receiver, and a 1.2m dish.
A massive thank you goes to Justin G8YTZ and Gareth G4XAT for generously loaning the equipment and setting up the QO-100 station, which added a fantastic new dimension to the weekend.
Special thanks are also due to Dave G4BUO, who organised the event so expertly. Putting on an event like this is a real team effort, and we extend our gratitude to everyone who assisted with the setup, tear-down, operating, and manning the station, as well as to all the stations who called in to make contact with us.
QSL Information: Any club members who would like a QSL card should reach out to Bob M0MCV with the details of their QSOs. After checking the logs, he will gladly issue the QSL cards.