Part 2

The chip board cabinet had a Sun roof fitted at some stage to keep as much water
off as possible. After a couple of years a 5'x5' garden shed was placed over the top
of the cabinet to improve the life of the cabinet. Some water had effected the chip
board but over all it had done a good job.

Eventually the chip board cabinet was removed and unceremoniously dumped a
short distance from where it had given shelter to Perth's first repeater for a
number of years.

The remains of the chip board cabinet
 

The garden shed.

This garden shed remained for about 20 years before it was replaced with the
existing much larger enclosure.  The inside of the garden shed was insulated
and at a latter date had an air conditioner fitted.
 

VK6RAP Mark 2
1970's

The Pye F60 had done a great job and had accelerated VK6's first repeater getting on air.

All along the intention had been to replace the Pye F60 with a solid state version.
The VHF group had designed and provided kits for building a 25 Watt FM mobile.
This design was chosen to build up a solid state 2m repeater.

Such a repeater was built and proved to be limited in its performance.
The new solid state repeater worked but receiver performance was not as good as
was required. Also the transmitter had a noise output that could be better.

However this design did provide service for a period of time.

The exciter design is still used as the VK6 WIA news link transmitter from
Roleystone to VK6RMW Mt.William
 

VK6RAP Mark 3 (The IC22a)
Late 1970's early 1980's

ICOM had released a very successful 2m FM, 22 channel 10 Watt mobile, the IC22a.
Many amateurs had purchased the crystal locked (Synthesizers were a way off yet)
IC22a and thoughts turned to replacing the VHF Group transceiver for the IC22a.

Even though the IC22a was all built on a single board it was found possible to hacksaw
the board apart so as to separate the receiver from the transmitter. So was born the
Mark 3 repeater that formed the basis of VK6RAP & VK6RAH (VK6RTH).

The IC22a repeater in machined aluminium box.