Hi,my name is Dom I have been a ham radio operator continuously for over 50 years
I was first licensed as i1CVS in 1955, operating CW AM and SSB mainly 40-20-15 and 10 meters until 1970

Radio Electronic experimenting & DXing have been my primary ham radio interests and tanks to the ARRL Handbook's I have designed & built many receivers,transmitters,amplifiers and antennas over the years.

In 1960 I started designing and building my first VHF low noise grounded grid triode converter and yagi antennas to succesfully receive the 108.000 and 108.030 MHz beacons carried out by the passive communication satellites ECHO-I and ECHO-II. I was fascinated to hear the beacon signals meanwhile to see ECHO-I as a bright flying star by naked eye and this nightly experience changed for ever my style of life in amateur radio.

In 1970 I started designing and building several 136-138 MHz converters,antennas,demodulators and faximiles to receive and reproduce with the help of NASA publications the first APT pictures sent by the early ESSA-8, TIROS and NOAA meteorological satellites.

In 1973 I was attracted by the OSCAR Amateur Satellites. I have been AMSAT-NA member Nr 798 and AMSAT-UK member Nr 229 and since than all my home made equipments and antennas where gradually specialized for HF/VHF/UHF/SHF/MW space communications using all OSCAR and RS satellites beginning with OSCAR-6

From 1977 I have been an active 432 MHz EME operator. Under the guidance of my great elmer i5TDJ and the help of EIMAC technical publications I was able to build a 16 x 21 element array, a K2RIW KW amplifier,several low noise preamps,converters and measuring instruments. CW communications off the moon was my main activity until a storm destroyed my EME array in 1980

HEO satellite communications via OSCAR-10, OSCAR-13 and AO40 was my primary ham activity beginning from 1980 and when AO40 died jan 2004 I started again designing and building satellite stuff to be technically prepared for the future.

Currently waiting for the next HEO satellite P3E I improve my equipments and laboratory instrumentation. Actually I mainly operate CW and SSB with the linear transponders of FO-29 and VO-52 experimenting and testing my new home made satellite equipments and antennas.

From 1970 to 2000 I wrote for ARI magazine Radio Rivista many technical articles completely devoted to satellite technique and operation. Some of them where published in to the AMSAT-NA journal and AMSAT-DL journal.

I have been the AMSAT-Italia President continuously for over 10 years and for 6 years I served as a member and Vicepresident of the ARI Board of Directors.

I have several other serious interests including applied mathematics and amateur astronomy. Using my QUESTAR 3.5" optical telescope I regularly observe the sun spots and it's correlation with the radio wave propagation and sun noise level at 2400 MHz

I am retired from the job. I have been continuously responsible for the Electrical and Electronic maintenance and commissioning working in to a plant of the main italian steel manufacturer consociated with the U.S.Steel Pittsburgh, PA. I hold certain that my expertise in electrical and electronic engineering gained for the job over the years was made easy in virtue of my previous interest in amateur radio and that my wonderfull hobby helped tremendously my technical knoledge for the benefit of my company and my managerial career for the benefit of my life.

I live with my wife Margherita, children Isabella (IW8CVS), Bruna and Sergio in the middle of the gulf of the sunny Naples just over the beach in front of the beautiful Capri island.