Jan 20, 2026 – Purpose of and a Brief History of the Intermountain Intertie
Thank you Sylvia. You always have commanding voice. Once again my name is Les call sign W1UT. Tonight’s training is about “The Purpose of and a Brief History of the Intermountain Intertie system.” The Purpose of and Why the Intertie system was created is to:
To support ARES and RACES operations during emergencies or disasters
To provide long distance communications over a wide area of the Intermountain region
To provide repeater installation and maintenance support in rural areas of the state
To encourage greater use of amateur radio on the VHF and UHF bands
Let me turn tonight’s training over to John Lloyd K7JL who will provide a brief history of the Intertie system. He, along with a few others, was the initial creator of the Intertie system going back over 50 years. Take it away John.
[This is for John Lloyd to present]
The Intermountain Intertie System started in 1974 when I Installed my first repeater on 147.180 at the Snowbird Hidden Peak site. There were only a hand full of repeaters in the entire State of Utah at this time.
I started discussing linking repeaters with Don Blanchard, WA7GTU (SK) who lived in Cedar City. We installed our first link between Snowbird and Frisco Peak near Milford which covers the Cedar City area in the early 90’s. These links were on 224 MHZ.
Soon after this, Vance Hawley, WA7FDR, in Idaho Falls was steering his remote base in Burley, Idaho to the Snowbird repeater. After a number of years we installed a link between Snowbird and his new site near Malad on a 440 MHz Pair. This repeater was connected to his Jumpoff repeater operating on 146.850 MHz.
We then determined that all of our links needed to be full duplex which meant that all links were almost like their own repeater. Each link had their individual duplexers, duplex radios and antennas.
Since most of our repeater sites were at high elevations above 8000 Ft, it was a necessity to install heavy duty antennas capable of surviving high winds and ice buildup during the winter. Rugged antennas were added when funds and time would allow.
We were granted permission in the early 90’s to put a new repeater on Farnsworth Peak west of Salt Lake. It was on 147.120 and we implemented the need of adding receiver PL on each of our repeaters. We decided to have the PL tone of 100 Hz be the same on all linked repeaters.
Eldon Kearl, KB7OGM had a desire to link a repeater at the Lake Town, Bear Lake site and I helped him set up his repeater on 147.020 MHz and we installed a 440 link back to Snowbird.
We then installed a new repeater on 145.270 at the Scotts Peak site near Brighton. It was linked back to Snowbird. Before long Blowhard near Cedar Breaks was added to the system along with Utah Hill near St. George. Over time the system grew to a total of 33 linked repeaters covering a vast area from the Phoenix and Las Vegas area north into southern Idaho with links to SW Wyoming and western Idaho and over to eastern Oregon. Not all repeaters are owned by the VHF Society rather we decided to allow clubs or operators wishing to join the Intermountain Intertie System be “aligned” with the society provided they met the criteria established by the society.
If you have questions regarding tonight’s training, you can send an email to John Lloyd. Please check the VHF society webpage for his address.
Thank you John. This is our training for this week. I will turn the time back to the net control station from W1UT.