So much of what keeps the country running seems to be in the hands of volunteers...

A group of people I came across the other day is the Wellington VHF Group.

This is a club "established to promote and encourage an interest in and generally to assist in the development of the science of Amateur and experimental radio".

If you look at this link you will also see they run a number of repeaters! http://www.vhfradio.co.nz/vhf-radio-coverage-and-range.html.

Repeaters if you recall from our article on VHF radio coverage are a stand-alone receiver and transmitter and are vital to ensuring adequate coverage.

A VHF Uniden Solara for example has a range of 25watts which has a theoretical maximum range of 25 nautical miles. So these repeaters are vital to keeping our VHF channels alive...