Over the last several years, I've been learning about ham radio repeaters. I started learning from Jack Norris W4TWX, Terry Jones W4TL, Ron Olexa KA3JIJ and a few others. I starting getting involved in the maintenance of the local machines and have helped troubleshoot and deploy a few here and there. But I've always wanted to own my very own repeater. Nothing too fancy. A simple FM VHF repeater with a decent coverage located in Habersham County.
When I moved to the new QTH, I just stood up my Diamond X200 2m/70cm antenna on the fence in the back yard. It works well enough for most FM repeaters I use, but I have not had high expectations for SSB, FT8, or FM simplex.
While working from home, I noticed my 2m radio picking up distant repeaters collocated on the same frequencies as our local ones. I started playing around with 2m FT8 and made several good contacts including WA4CQG in Auburn, AL (176 miles), WN4WDE in Piedmont, AL (126 miles), WB4HIE in Glen Alpine, NC (124 miles), and WB4JPG in Dothan, AL (255 miles)!
