Cotswold 7 channel UHF

[stuart mackay]

Had a visit from Paul Howey, the designer of the Cotswold UHF radio system today, to collect a bunch of Lemon DIY RF modules that he needed for conversions that he is doing and he brought along this lovely example of tbe low volume UHF system built in the Cotswolds during the 70s and 80s.
A lot of the pylon racers from that area who I knew, such as Sid King, Clive Wall and John Parker all migrated to the Cotswold system from their FlightLinks.... and being an ardent collector of all things FlightLink thought a Cotswold system would be a great adjunct to those! Well, today a deal was done with Paul with a swap for a JR PCM10 heli radio that he wanted and Swaffham Radio Museum has a new addition!
Paul told me that most of the case hardware was SLM. They folded their own cases locally.

[Pchristy]

Fascinating! The Cotswold was the "Rolls-Royce" of UK UHF systems. My own system was definitely built down to a price - but it worked, which was all I asked! The Cotswold was built up to a specification!

I never met the designer. I heard, on the grapevine, that production of the Cotswold sets ceased after he went to the USA to build bird trackers, but I have no idea if this is true or not! Perhaps you might be able to find out?

Unfortunately, the Reftec sets did a lot to damage the reputation of 459MHz UHF sets. A combination of strange design choices and extremely poor build quality made it difficult to convince buyers that there was nothing fundamentally wrong with UHF.

459 MHz was seen as a way of escaping CB activity on 27 MHz, but once we got 35 MHz, UHF was never going to be able to compete on price - especially as it was (is!) unique to the UK, so none of the major international manufacturers was interested.

Anyway, a nice set you have got your hands on there!

--
Pete

[stuart mackay]

Hi Pete, yes Paul Howey did move to the States and worked at Johns Hopkins Uni in Maryland on the migrating bird trackers, he told me when the funding ran out, he formed a company in the US, now run by his son, that still makes these trackers.
Paul now spends his time between travelling between his farm in the west country and the US.
He told me that Max Coote of Ripmax approached him at the Model Engineers Exhibition, wanting to buy the design for his radio, which Paul declined, only to find the REFTEC come to market a short while later! So that might well have been a different story if Paul's design had been adopted rather than the bodged together PYE radio transceiver circuitry that the Reftec ended up being based upon!?!
If you need Paul's contact details Pete, I am sure Paul will not object if I share them with You!

Have ordered some new Tx batteries with the intention of getting it re-commissioned! The receiver output pins are the SLM 3 pin female socket type, so might need some modding to suit the current style of servo plug...Watch this space!