[Zaphod]

Just looking for more pics of the above earth stations.

One of Elfordstown on web archive:

Elfordstown, Ireland's largest earth station, entered service in 1984 and carries telecommunications traffic to Europe and North America. There are 3 antennae in the Earth station complex. The largest, a 32 meter Intelsat Standard A, carries the North American, Canadian and Saudi Arabian traffic. European destinations use the 11 meter antenna in Eutelsat TDMA system. The third antenna, a 13.5 meter Intelsat Standard B, is used for PTAT cable restoration.
http://web.archive.org/web/200104280...go.ie/~eftirl/

There was a link to the RTÉ uplink dishes mentioned here when they first went onto Astra. But the link therein is dead, and also broken on wayback. Anyone got these saved to hard drive?



Finally there's a mention of Mt Gabriel, Schull on the Wiki entry on Echelon
Any more info on this?

[watty]

Mt Gabriel is Irish Aviation. Atlantic Approach Radio. I knew a guy that worked there. (died recently). The IRA bombed it once thinking it was NATO. It is only civil radar. Nothing to do with Echelon.


Elfordstown Google Earth
http://www.tageo.com/kml.php?lat=51....ce=Elfordstown

[Zaphod]

Thanks watty. I hadn't heard of Mt Gabriel before and only came across it while looking for info on Elfordstown.

I also recall a 6-8M dish right in the middle of Tralee town, near the courthouse but it was dismantled a few years back. Anyone know what became of it?

On a similar note from the Armstrong website

1995 Satellite Earth Station installed for RTE in Tralee, Co. Kerry.

Again anyone know of this?

[Solair]

It's amazing that old Telecom Eireann webpage is still online. The wonders of archiving! I would suspect however, that the Midleton dish no-longer plays a major role in Irish telecommunications. Almost all international calls and data go by fiber optic routes thesedays and Ireland's has pretty substantial connections to various fiber networks. The only role that dish would have thesedays is to serve as a back up, should there be a problem with fiber.

Satellite links are generally prone to echos and delays so, for live phone traffic they're not great.

It'd be interesting to know what traffic actually goes through it thesedays though.

Any ideas?

[watty]

Yes Middleton is mothballed. eircom are open to the right offer...

[zilog_jones]

There's some dish about the same size as the smaller ones in that picture in Castletroy (Limerick) behind the old AIB. Any idea what it could be? Could it be something to do with UL? Looks pretty old and mossy anyway - I'll take pics some time if I remember to bring a camera to college.

[Zaphod]

AFAIK the one in Limerick near the Jewish graveyard is owned by TE/Eircom.

[Victor]

Background information on Mount Gabriel including some specificiations http://vekinis.org.lu/mtgabri.html

I was on the mountain c. 1977 (please remember I was 5 at the time). The INLA blew up at least one in 1982, but I understand there are two again. They have built a fence. In 1977 it had two radomes that looked like this. http://www.flickr.com/photos/eoinoc/265122067/

It would be possible that they are the same http://historical-debates.oireachtas...312140006.html

Some pics all pointing in the wrong directions.

Interesting links
http://www.eurocontrol.int/asterix/g...1/astx1v1e.pdf
http://www.sei.ie/index.asp?locID=325&docID=-1
http://www.sei.ie/getfile.asp?FC_ID=925&docID=260
http://www.raytheon.com/businesses/s...s04_019499.pdf

List of aircraft radars http://www.aaiu.ie/upload/general/3500-0.PDF (MSSR = Monopulse Secondary Surveillance Radar)

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Dooncarton, Mayo http://images.google.ie/images?svnum...n+&btnG=Search

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UCC used to have an array of 3-5m dishes on their tall building (science?).

[zilog_jones]

The one on Woodcock Hill (on that Flick link above) is quite visible on Google Earth:
52°43'15.52"N
8°42'26.54"W

I think there may have been an older one there that was dismantled - I vaguely recall there being two up there for a while - or maybe I am imagining things.

[Zaphod]

Looks like a Viasat setup similar to the one in Donnybrook.

[watty]

Originally Posted by zilog_jones

The one on Woodcock Hill (on that Flick link above) is quite visible on Google Earth:
52°43'15.52"N
8°42'26.54"W

I think there may have been an older one there that was dismantled - I vaguely recall there being two up there for a while - or maybe I am imagining things.

Yes there were two. The base may still be there.

[Antenna]

Some photos of Mt Gabriel on the web.




one of the 2 Radomes has an RTE TV relay around its wall. 2 sets of UHF panels facing different areas (one set is H polarisation, the other Vertical), the receive aerials for Mullaghanish also visible

[Scottish paddy]

Has anyone got a pic of the Sky uplink dish at Donnybrook?

[Foggy43]

Antenna!
Looking at the close up pictures of Mount Gabriel can you tell me what the white rectangular panels are? There are in a group of 4.

I have seen them at ground level and presumed they were either low power mobile phone base stations or handheld radio related?

Just Curious!

[MYOB]

Foggy - I'd suspect they're the RTE relay he mentioned just below the pics.