[Mich VHF UHF Society] 2 meter beacon

[Tom]

There has been discussion about a 2 meter beacon for west Michigan. I 
have the equipment and location to add a 2 meter beacon. It would be 
located just north of Holland, Mi at EN62wu, at the same site as the 
K8TB 6 meter beacon. I would expect it to run from 5-10 watts, omni.

But there are two questions:
1.  Do we need it? Would a 2 meter beacon transmitting from Holland be 
useful, or a frivolous exercise? Would it cause undo interference?

2.  What frequency? in looking over the existing beacon lists, I see a 
hole at 144.286 MHz.  It should avoid interfering with any beacon within 
200-300 miles.

If there is a consensus that we should have a beacon at this location, I 
will order the Motorola channel element for this frequency immediately 
so that i can run it continuously on the bench for the winter time, to 
burn the channel element in.

And in looking at the beacon list, I see the following listed as 
operational in the lower peninsula of  Michigan:

144.282 WI8Z     EN84ca MI Standish
144.285 WB2LHP   EN74gq MI Traverse City
144.287 W8VHF    EN64sa MI Ludington
144.295 K8MM     EN83fa MI Flint

Are these operational, and would the 144.286 frequency be too close to the others?

Tom Bosscher K8TB