[UK-CONTEST] G3GPO O/T

[Ken Eastty]

I can't answer the question either but recall that sometime in the 1960's
there was an amateur club at the GPO HF transmitting station at North 
Weald in Essex (now long QRT) known for reason as 'Ongar Radio' when the 
biggest nearby town was Epping. The callsign allocated was I think 
G3RSO, Dave 'ASR & others might confirm?
I'd moved on by then but doubt that running a station alongside
40+ 10 - 40kW TX's would have been very successful (unless someone 
patched in a line from the sister receiving station at Brentwood)!
(40kW to Rhombics & remote RX's also with Rhombics that sounds like a 
contest winning set up even by today's standards!) & someone once sent 
my callsign on CW on a TX running 20kW - Thanks Terry!
Some of the commercial circuits actually used what appeared to be 
amateur two letter callsigns (GnXX etc.) as opposed to the more usual 
commercial callsigns like GLO20 etc. I think that at one time there was 
an amateur station at the Central Training School at Stone in Staffs 
which had the call G3CTS, used for training 'Radio Inspectors', I bet 
that kept the locals in order!

73...

Ken

G3LVP
>

>
> Hello Stephen. I am sorry it has taken so long to reply to your query re G3GPO
> on the UK-CONTEST site. I think I may be one of the few people who can give you
> as close to a definitive answer as you ?will get. G3GPO was never issued. A few
> years after it would have been issued in the normal process, I was part of a
> group who applied to the licensing authority - then located in St
> Martins-le-Grand in London for the issue of GB3GPO. This was at the beginning
> of?January 1966 and was for a special event station to celebrate the
> commissioning of the "Birmingham Post Office Tower".?What subsequently became
> Post Office Telecommunications, British Telecommunications and then BT was part
> of the Post Office Telephones Engineering Department at the time.?We were told
> that this callsign could not be issued (and likewise not G3GPO either) in case
> it was confused with an "Official Station". We were granted GB3TEL and put it on
> the air in March 1966. I wish I had kept the correspondence. I did keep the QSLs
> - which I have been searching-for since your email to put a date to the data. I
> hope this is helpful, albeit disappointing. ?73 John G8IYS (licensed 8 years
> later in 1974).???
>