KARC NEWS

The Koolau Amateur Radio Club Newsletter for April 1998

-ANNOUNCEMENTS-

NEXT MEETING: April 11, 1998 @ 0930 at Ho'omaluhia Park Visitor's Center- Be There!

Our next guest speaker will be Alan Lloyd, retired Senior Electrical Engineer for Hawaiian Electric Company. Mr. Lloyd will speak about "Global Warming..Fact or Fiction."

Next meeting, the EXCHANGE BOX will be there with used books, magazines, catalogs, and electronic parts. Reminder: You do not have to bring anything to take something from the box. The ever-popular "Show and Tell" needs you to bring something from your shack for those attending to see, while you briefly explain about it. Remember, you can not win the door prizes if you do not attend. The April prize will be a storage cabinet with clear plastic drawers for your parts and hardware.

-NEWS-Features-CONTESTS-Ham Ads-MINUTES-Articles-PHOTOS-

MINUTES- March 14th 1998- What you missed!

The "Big" prize winner of the New 12" B&W TV Set was Ralph Pinner. Ralph will be coming to more meetings!

Correspondence- Outgoing: Incoming:

Attendance: 16 Members & Guests

Treasurer's Report-: Balance: 12/31/97- $540.77, Income:$144.78, Expenses: $307.76, 1/31/98= $377.79

NEWS

NEWS RELEASE SENT TO MILITARY NEWSPAPERS

From an idea brought forward at a recent meeting a news release was sent out mentioning our Website http://www.pilikia.net/karc/ and contact information with a reminder that "No Code" Licenses were now availiable. Email was sent to Army, Navy, Marine, and Air Force. The Army immediately responded affirmatively and said they would be running a story. Not hearing from anyone else, stamped mail was sent with the same message to their mailing addresses. It will be interesting to see if there is any response. In 60 days a similar news release will be sent to other newspapers on Oahu. KARC Member Randy Scott rounded up copies of the 4 service papers with their contact information. Thanks Randy!

CORRECTION SENT TO WORLD RADIO MAGAZINE

Within an hour of reading the backpage story about the KARC VEC ending, (One less VEC...) an informational E-mail was sent to World Radio, and Newsline [the source of the story] with current KARC VE testing activities explained. While the brief story was factually true (Joe Keola decided not to renew his VEC) it left the impression that KARC was not involved with testing and amateur radio promotion.

The content of the E-mail was that KARC immediately formed an informal consortium of VEs utilizing ARRL and W5YI VEC programs. It was pointed out that there are now more, not less VEs, and that there are test locations on both sides of Oahu [Kaneohe & Honolulu/Manoa].

Many KARC members have dusted off their existing VE credentials or obtained new ones from ARRL & W5YI. Several have dual accreditation, so they may serve where needed. On the KARC Website there are pages for listing schedules for various Member and Non-Member VE's that have submitted them. World Radio Editor, Rick McCusker, KO6DJ, was very interested in KARC, and will be putting small story in a future issue with this information. He also said that they will add our Website address to our advertisment in World Radio Magazine.

Currenty, Sid Sneidar, AH6HH, and Walt, AH6OZ, have VE testing planned, with others curently doing paperwork. They join KARC Member, Richard, WH6T who has both Review Classes and testing programs. If you are interested in helping at testing, contact any of the members mentioned in this article.

FISHING DAY at Ho'omaluhia Park- VOLUNTEERS NEEDED

June 6 & 7 and July 4 & 5 from 10 am to 2 pm (Saturdays & Sundays) we need helpers to direct traffic and provide some communications. A portable 2 meter radio is not required, but desiriable (we have loaners). It is light duty in a beautiful environment. Come help others enjoy these special Fishing Days. The smile on the Kid's faces is worth the trip. Contact Jerry, WH6BKQ, or any KARC officer.

NEW ARRL Section Manager- Ron, AH6HN

Starting April 1st, Ron, AH6HN, will assume the duties of ARRL Pacific Section Manager, succeeding Dean Manley, KH6B. These volunteer positions are a great service to Radio Amateurs here in the Pacific Section of the Pacific Division. Thank you Dean, for your hard work on behalf of the KARC.

FIELD DAY IS COMING!...Have you marked your calendar?

June 26,27 & 28..The excuse you have been waiting for to test your skills at swaping lies, operating radios, supervising, antenna errection, eating, drinking, napping, and many other skills promoted by your FIELD DAY Committee. Contact Walt, AH6OZ; Mike, AH7R; Jerry, WH6BKQ, or any KARC officer for information. There will be clean, dry, shady places to operate radios or visit. The New KARC Banner will be there and a timely announcement in the Newspaper that may bring the curious to our NUI SITE. Full information in the May Issue of KARC News. Tell the XYL that you are going to Field Day, put in an appearance and we will say you just left if she drops by. [Just Kidding...]

All Radio Amateurs are reminded that Field Day reminder is a good time to check through your own equipment and determine if you have the means to set-up an emergency station, or are able to operate your usual station on battery or emergency power,etc. Check for those necesssary items and make sure they are availiable when you need them. A checklist is availiable send a SASE to WB6FZH.

KARC MONDAY NIGHT NET- Day Change?

Does anyone have any suggestions for days of the week that might improve the check-in numbers of the KARC 2 meter Net? Think about the net, and bring your ideas to the Meeting, or drop a note or e-mail to any of the officers with your ideas. It is a great value to have a simplex net with established stations and locations to assist members and guests in knowing the coverage of their simplex signal and the repeated signals. If you need help with an antenna installation or coax run, contact your club officers and we will try to round-up some help. One of the reasons to be in a club is to help the members as more of us become truly "OM"s. This is another good reason to recruit new younger members.

CONTESTS

APRIL Contests:

SPACE NEWS-

MIR SPACE STATION-New Packet Commands for PMS- New Kantronics 9612

Due to heavy workload, few Packet PMS messages are being answered. Some contacts with schools have been made from the Ham station's new location. Some UHF voice QSOs with the local microphone of the repeater, and occasional voice contacts on the 145.985 packet/voice frequency. The new bandpass filter will be installed in the next 30 days or so, this will keep the other MIR communications equipment from desensing the 2 meter equipment. This was donated by DCI of Canada.

NH6VB..Big Gun...European QSOs on Satellite...

Peter, NH6VB, has been using his newly installed antenna system on AO-10 & other satellites to contact Europe, Asia, S. Pacific, N & S America and possibly other galaxies. Aircraft have been avoiding the area of Peter's Home, and dead insects and small birds litter his rooftop. Rumors of increased power have neighbors with electronic garage door openers concerned for a 5 mile radius. Peter would be happy to tell you about AMSAT, the Amateur Radio Organization that is dedicated to Space Communications.

QRP COLUMN: WB6FZH/KH6

The current issue of "NCJ", the National Contest Journal, reportedly has WB6FZH's WW2 TCS/HRO-W Station on the Cover. You all remember the "160 Meter Miracle Contacts" of '96, and the 160 CW contest of 1997.. Well, one of the two recent contest contacts was the Editor of NCJ. Aparently it is a slow news month, or he wanted everyone to know how stupid I am trying so hard to make contacts on 160 meters with 5 watts of QRP! He is going to mail me a copy for me to see with his QSL card.

The recent WPX contest, SSB, has come and gone. AH7R, Mike reports many 10 meter contacts from his secret stealth 10 meter antenna system, and even contacts on other bands from his restrictive antenna location. Mike had them waiting in line to get contacts. This should be encouraging to us all, especially those with poor locations. Mike was running, low power and still made lots of contacts even though he does not have alot of full size antennas.

Here at WB6FZH/KH6 I had some good luck during the WPX. The most amazing part was the contacts made on 3.8 mhz at 5W output. No 3.8 mhz operation was planned, but a CA station asked me to consider looking for their 7.2 and 3.8 mhz band stations in the late evening hours. After making many contacts on 15, 20 and 10 meters on all continents, I was about to turn the radio off, when I remembered my promise to try the low bands.

I went to 3.8 and started calling stations, then after a few minutes of the usual unanswered calls, a station came right back and I almost fell out of the swivel chair! I was so startled, I had to look down at my scratch paper to see who I was calling. I tried to regain my composure, and we exchanged contest information. I asked what his antenna was, he replied a 4 element 75 meter Yagi. I called other stations for about a half an hour, encouraged by this event, but no contacts. The next contact was a station with a 4-Square antenna, you know that 80 meter antenna we all have room for. Four sixty foot verticals with phasing networks to rotate it. I called a couple more stations, one guy with a Quad for 75 responded.The conditions peaked, I worked a couple more stations with "normal" antennas and their high power, and then realized I was talking to myself again.

I decided to try 7.2 or our "sub-band" on 40 meters. I found the station I was looking for and worked them with their 40 meter Yagi beam. I worked a station in Alaska by transmitting up at 7230 where she was listening, and listening at 7080 where she was transmitting. This was getting very confusing, so I went to bed.

I will spend almost as much time preparing the log and entry papers as I did operating and send them off to CQ Magazine. I guess if I am going to do much more of this, I had better look into one of those contest logging computer programs.

KOOLAU AMATEUR RADIO CLUB INFORMATION

YOUR CLUB OFFICERS

DIRECTORS

PROGRAM CHAIRMAN- Howard, WH6LF 247-0775

NEWSLETTER

CLUB MEETINGS

MEMBERSHIP/FIELD DAY CHAIRMAN- Jerry Mulherin, WH6BKQ, 235-3042, jerham@aloha.net

MAILING ADDRESS- KARC c/o J.Mulherin, 45-145 Mikihilina St., Kaneohe, HI 96744

VEC TESTING

2 METER ACTIVITY

KARC WEBSITE- "Our Radio-Active" Internet Presence