Hellgate Static

DECEMBER 2006

W7PX

http://www.users.qwest.net/~k7vk/

Next meeting is December 9, 2006

→→→At the Golden Corral Restaurant←←←

1800

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Hellgate Amateur Radio Club

P.O. Box 3811

Missoula, MT. 59806-3811

HARC Board of Directors

Club President, N7GE, Jerry Ehli at jehli@modernmachinery.com
Vice-president, W7PAQ Frank Kisselbach at fkissel@direcway.com
Treasurer, K7PX, Steve Schlang at ripply1@msn.com

Secretary, AC7UZ, Lewis Ball at ac7uz@blackfoot.net

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Hellgate Amateur Radio Club

November 14, 2006

Fourteen members and two folks to be tested soon were present. Minutes were accepted as presented in the November Hellgate Static.

Old Business

The last meeting included a presentation given by Frank, W7PAQ, regarding chasing awards and other “wall paper”. It was well received by the members. Tonight’s program will be done by Dennis, W7DHB, regarding station grounding and its importance. Future meetings will need ideas and speakers. Ideas put forth were digital modes and potential tours such as through Clear Channel and the National Weather Service. The Scout Jamboree (October 20-21) was a great success. States that were worked were kept track of on an overhead that was overseen by Mike, KE7IZG and his son. Two scouts passed the Radio Badge and were overseen by Frank, W7PAQ.

New Business

A motion was made to have the Christmas party at the Golden Corral on December 9, 2006 at 6:00 PM. There was no second but the site was acceptable to all. There will be a gift exchange like last year (gifts of up to $10.00 if you wish to be part of the gift exchange). Byron, NN8A did such a great job that he will be asked to do it this year. This will include the vting for our new officers, so arrive or get elected.

Sky Warn Recognition day will be December 1& 2.The setup will start at 3:00 PM. WX7MSO will be on the air again, and there was discussion of building the loop antenna if all of the parts are available. All operators are invited to stop by and take a turn on the radio.

First Night Missoula was discussed and Jackie Harrington, KC7RBC, will be acting as coordinator. Those volunteering currently are Dennis, Frank, Ray, and Lynn. The portable repeater will be used again. This is a great event and benefits the citizens of the Missoula area. It also gets you into the events for FREE!!! This is a great way to end the year bring your spouse and children and enjoy the evening. Jackie said that she would need up to thirty operators and it would make for a great night.

The Wednesday evening net for VHF will be conducted on 147.040 with 146.900 to be used should the repeater fail. SEE THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE. The 80 and 40 meter nets will immediately follow.

Net Control will be:

Nov. 29 Lewis AC7UZ Frank W7PAQ

Dec. 6 Frank W7PAQ Jerry Ehli N7GE

Dec. 13 Jerry N. K7IMZ Eric NZ7S

Danny Guthrie, KC7ZO will be starting CW classes soon, with the place and time to be set later. There will be a general theory class projected to follow.

The Salvation Army has a mobile kitchen with a generator, and would like to show it to the club soon and discuss the idea of using it as a radio communication van..

A Boy Scout jamboree will be held next July at either the Sieben Ranch near Helena or at Malstrom air base in Great Falls. Classes will be held along with an operating station. K2BSA/7 will be the on air station, and Frank, W7PAQ is looking for potential help.

Meeting adj at 8:18 PM

Dennis, W7DHB then presented a talk on grounding of your radio tower and station.

IDEAS FOR THE WEDNESDAY EVENING NET

Hi Net Controls and others,

Thanks for your time/scheduling for operating and participating in the nets. These are valuable for gathering folks and information, and checking equipment.

A bummer that the 147.04 MHz repeater is acting up and intermittently failed Wednesday evening prior to the HARC net. Repeaters are great, however, when one fails especially intermittently, it can be havoc for scheduled or distant contacts such as nets or events.

Here are some repeater failure considerations/suggestions for net controls & participants:

Move to another repeater. Announce several times on simplex and on the dying repeater that the net is moving to another repeater. In our case, 147.04 MHz to 146.90 MHz for example. Have another operator stay on the repeater output frequency for several minutes to continue to announce that the net has been moved to another repeater.

Announce in the preamble of the net to mention the alternate repeater frequency the net would move to if the current one fails. This would 'condition' folks to listen to the other frequency if the net/repeater is not heard.

Operate Simplex When operating on a repeater simplex output, remember that if the repeater comes up, it will heterodyne or bury your signal depending on how strong your signal is to the receiving stations. Pause before you transmit to allow the repeater to drop out. On a net, this can be a real problem with an intermittent repeater as it may come up periodically as folks not hearing an operator on simplex, attempt to bring up the repeater.

In general, only use a simplex repeater output frequency long enough to alert folks to move to another repeater or to a standard band plan simplex frequency.

If you have some thoughts, let me know. I'll post something similar on the website.

Thanks and 73

Vick K7VK

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MONTANA FIELD DAY 2006 RESULTS

Call Score Category QSOs Power Mult Section Participants Club

W7MRG 3804 2B2 1102 2 MT 2 Machias RG

W7ED 3754 2A 1141 2 MT 21 Gallatin HRC

N7VR 2444 1E 555 2 MT 2

W9RVP 2364 3A 926 2 MT 15 Grand Nelson Clan

K7SAM 2220 2A 509 2 MT 4

W7POE 1906 1A 364 2 MT 4 WPPS RC

KE7NO 1852 1B1 570 2 MT 1

W7PX 1712 1A 652 2 MT 15 Hellgate ARC

K7EUR 1526 3A 408 2 MT 7 Tobacco Valley ARC

K7LMT 1440 2A 269 2 MT 5

K7LYY 1220 1A 325 2 MT 30 Flathead Valley ARC

W7FO 1207 1A 598 1 MT 10 Butte ARC

N5AC 976 1AC 195 2 MT 5

W7VNE 942 1A 246 2 MT 6 Anaconda Amateur RC

W7FTX 806 1A 268 2 MT 15 Bitterroot ARC

W7TCK 410 4AC 146 2 MT 13 Capital City ARC

W7DXQ 372 2A 72 1 MT 5 Lower Yellow Stone ARC

WA7YNU 308 1D 105 2 MT 1

NB7V 222 1D 222 1 MT 1

KD7WTO 110 1D 55 2 MT 1

So, it shows that we can improve for next year. Watch out Gallatin ARC!!!

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WELCOME TO THE NEW FOLKS!!!

We had a great night, November 16, as all 5 candidates qualified for Technician class. Congratulations and receiving their licenses on the FCC data base November 17 are KE7JQC, Elizabeth and KE7JQD, Elmer of Florence (both also passed written General class); KE7JQA, Don and KE7JQB, Heath of Salmon, Idaho and KE7JPZ, Claude of Sheridan, Montana. The distances that are traveled by dedicated candidates continues to amaze us.

Thanks to VEs; W7GJ, Lance; K7PX, Steve; K7VK, Vick & N7FMW, Ruth.

Our December - February examination schedule will be out shortly. The December examination will mark the Hellgate VEs 200th session in our 23rd year! During this time, we've seated over 1,000 candidates. KE7JQD, Elmer is successful candidate number 555.

The next scheduled examinations in Missoula will be held December 20, January 16 & February 15. All are at the Missoula Public Library, 6 PM. Thanks N7TAE, Wayne, for scheduling.

Vick K7VK

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TEST FOR “SMART PEOPLE”

The following short quiz consists of 4 questions and will tell you whether you are qualified to be a professional planner. Scroll down for each answer. The questions are not really that difficult. But no cheating now! Don't look for the answers UNTIL after you have answered the questions.

1. How do you put a giraffe into a refrigerator?
2. How do you put an elephant into a refrigerator?
3. The Lion King is hosting an animal conference. All the animals attend, except for one. Which animal does not attend?

Okay, even if you may not have answered the first three questions correctly, you still have one more chance to show your true abilities.

4. There is a river you must cross but it is used by alligators and you do not have a boat. How do you manage it?
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MOONBOUNCE NEWS

Here is an interesting link to a website describing one of W7GJ, Lance's moon-bounce contacts. It is computer displays of the contact software. Greek to me, but he could explain this stuff at a future HARC meeting. hee hee. Pretty cool.

Hey Vick,
My first 100w 6m EME contact today! :-) Quite a story of it on Peter's website! The secret weapon was the fact that I had ground gain on my moonset aiming out over Missoula valley! VY 73, Lance

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LIBYA IS NUMBER 108 (6 meter moonbounce) for W7GJ

Hello! At 1318Z on 18 November 2006, I worked 5A7A for my DXCC #108 on 6m. They were -25 dB signal strength on JT65A mode during their moonset. I think that also is a "first" for USA to Libya on 6m. VY 73, Lance

RECORD LIGHTNING BOLT

On October 13th in 2001, a 118 mile long lightning bolt was detected over north Texas by special sensing equipment. The bolt initiated over Waco and extended north and east of Dallas in one continuous string! So much for “counting the seconds” after seeing the lightning flash to determine if the storm is close enough, and it is time to disconnect the antenna.

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TIDBIT

In golf, the 3^rd and 18^th holes are the most fatal. Most deaths on the golf course are health related, only 2% are caused by golf clubs or golf bals.

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THE ANSWERS

Correct answer: Open the refrigerator, put in the giraffe, and close the door. This question tests whether you tend to do very simple things in an overly complicated way.

Did you say, 'Open the refrigerator, put the elephant in, then close the door? Sorry, that's the wrong Answer. Correct Answer: Open the refrigerator, take out the giraffe, put in the elephant and close the door. This tests your ability to think through the repercussions of your previous actions.

Correct Answer: The Elephant. The elephant is in the refrigerator. You just put him in there. This tests your memory.

The correct answer: You jump into the river and swim across. Have you not been listening? All the alligators are attending the Animal Meeting. This tests whether you learn quickly from your mistakes.

According to Anderson consulting worldwide, around 90% of the professionals they have tested got all of the answers wrong. However, many preschoolers actually answered most of the questions correctly. This would prove that most professional planners have the brains of a four year old.

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CHRISTMAS WISH LIST FROM THE GUTHRIE FAMILY

Well it’s coming, and I wish for a few more souls to answer when someone calls on the repeater...any repeater! How about simplex? Have we all forgotten how it is to want someone to talk to? Instead of ker-chunching the repeater to see if its on, drop you call in there, you might just meet someone new. Oh yeah I could really use a nice tower. Happy Holidays

Danne KC7ZO Andy KE7DIZ Debby KA7OHP

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VACATION SAFETY IDEA

If you are going on vacation, some experts have said to leave your curtains OPEN. It looks less unusual to have your curtains left open at night than having them closed during the daytime. I would figure these experts live in an area where the winter time temperatures seldom get below freezing!

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QRZ?

We hope the HELLGATE STATIC was interesting for you this month. Let us know if this newsletter is to your acceptance. So far, I’ve only heard good things. If there is something YOU would like to see, or that you feel is overdone, please let me know. This is the Hellgate Amateur Radio Club newsletter, not mine! If you have something (even a simple one-liner) please write to me at our address or e-mail me (Craig, KE7NO) at twincreek@blackfoot.net.

So that’s it, another year has been tucked away and has become memories. Again we owe thank yous and kudos to the HARC Board of Directors, the repeater committee, the VE’s, K7VK and the webpage, KC7ZO and his classes, and our members that have offered their time and energy for bank races, First Night, TOSRV, JOTA, Lewis and Clark, and Sky Warn. We have been a “busy” club, but there is always time for more activities. The only thing we lack is people to do them. You “are the people”. If you feel the club needs to do something else, bring it up at a meeting or e-mail me. The club is yours (if you pay your dues!), just like the newsletter is to provide you with what you want. Without hearing from members, we will bumble along the way we have.

As for myself and my wife KE7FAH, our Christmas wishes have been answered with the new “harmonic”. That and our almost 5 year old daughter constantly amazes us. When asked recently what she wanted for Christmas she replied “an antenna for Daddy and for Grampa (KB3MQQ)”. What a bright child! By the way, my antenna is finally up, how about yours? Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!