November 2007
W7PX
http://www.users.qwest.net/~k7vk/
Next meeting is November 12, 2007
At St. Patrick Hospital Meeting Room
1900
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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@hughes.com
Treasurer, K7PX, Steve Schlang at ripply1@msn.com
Secretary, KE7NO,
Craig Nelson at twincreek@blackfoot.net
Program Director, AC7UZ, Lewis Ball at ac7uz@blackfoot.net
Training, W7DHB, Dennis Barthel at w7dhb@montana.com
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Hellgate Amateur Radio Club
October 8, 2007 President Ehli, N7GE called this meeting to order at 7:06 P.M.. Thirteen members and one newly licensed ham were present at the
meeting. Treasurer’s report of
$3,336.31 was accepted and approved. Although there was not printed minutes (no
September Hellgate Static), they were
jokingly approved.
OLD BUSINESS
HARC repeaters have had cavities tuned and have been placed
on the 146.80 MHz and the 146.90 MHz machines.
The 147.04 MHz repeater will not be done this year. Paul, N7PAS, has visited the site and the
146.80 MHz repeater works well. There
currently is no UHF link from the repeater to Eric’s, NZ7S, house.
The Christmas dinner is coming. Lewis, AC7UZ, suggested St. Patrick’s Hospital. Frank, W7PAQ, will check into this
suggestion. We are expecting
approximately 40 people.
NEW BUSINESS
The equipment donated to the club by Jim, WA7OPE who has
left the hobby. This equipment will be
primarily sold, club members will have the “first pick”, as part of a motion
made by Lewis, AC7UZ, and the remaining equipment will be sold on Ebay.
Equipment donated to the club from Wayne Van Meter, N7TAE
(SK), will be dealt with later. It will
be separated away from the gear donated to HARC from Jim, WA7OPE.
Byron, NN8A, mentioned two pieces of radio equipment that
were from a former repeater site.
Lewis, AC7UZ, motioned to sell this equipment and the above mentioned
N7TAE gear. This motion was seconded
and approved.
Presentation at a local rest home by HARC is needed. Lewis, AC7UZ, has brought that to our
attention. The suggestion of using
shortwave listening radios and old tube rigs was raised. This will be done on Tuesday November 6th.
Local net control stations are as follows:
Oct. 17 Bill, W4YMA
/ Byron, NN8A
Oct. 24 Frank, W7PAQ
/ Paul, N7PAS
Oct. 31 Frank, W7PAQ
/ Dennis, W7DHB
Nov. 7 Liz, WG7E /
Elmer, WG7P
Nov. 14 Bill, W4YMA
Frank, W7PAQ, let the HARC know that the Jamboree On The Air
(JOTA) will take place on October 20-21.
It will begin at 9:00 Am and continue to 5:00 PM. They will be using W7PX. Radio equipment to be used will be the
recently donated Icom IC-736.
The SKYWARN activation event will take place this year on
November 30. Michelle Mead has put in
an application for the upcoming event.
It will begin Friday afternoon and end 24 hours later. Antennas planned are the loop at the weather
service site and the G5RV. We will meet
at the site at 3:00 PM. We also will
have the vertical and the trailer and plan on using the Yaesu FT-857 that is at
the Weather Service and the Icom IC-736 if
“everything goes to bed”.
After the next meeting, Byron will discuss IRLP. What is IRLP? I don’t know, but the acronym stands for Internet Radio Linking Project. Stop by and see
what it’s all about.
Lance Collister, W7GJ, is doing well after his diagnosis of
liver cancer. Surgery is scheduled for
Wednesday.
An Antenna Compendium book will be raffled at the next
meeting. Tickets will be sold at $0.50
each. These are great additions to your
library and have great information on antennas, feed lines, and propogation.
Just so you do not forget, Jackie, KA7RBC will need
volunteers for First Night. She would
like help from around 32 members.
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CHRISTMAS ISSUE IS NEXT MONTH AND I NEED YOUR HELP
Similar to
the previous years, I need the club to send in their “Christmas want
list”. This will help your family know
what you need, and, can even make other club members chuckle a little with some
seasonal levity. Like years past, price
is not a consideration. The worst thing you can do is not ask! What do you want? Do you want a new handheld radio that allows you to work FM, SSB,
CW, digital modes, has built in GPS, and runs 50 watts? Do you want at least 300 hams to show up and
help with First Night? Do you want 640
acres of tall evenly spaced trees on a very tall bench with a small ham shack
in the middle? Let me know. E-mail, phone, club meeting, or snail mail
will get them to me.
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SKYWARN NEWS RELEASE TO
THE CLUB
The event will start on November 30th at about 3 pm with set
up of the antennas and the like at the weather service site. SKYWARN
Recognition Day, a 24 hour
(0000-2400 UTC) demonstration of amateur radio capability and National Weather
Service cooperation. Hellgate ARC members and other participants are
needed to operate radio equipment from the National Weather Service office,
just North of the Missoula Airport Terminal off Broadyway. We will discuss this more at the November meeting.
The NOAA weather service will need to know if they have all
the necessary contact information and log sheets for our winter season in place
for SKYWARN activation. If there is
another document or references you need during SKYWARN activation, let Peter
Felsch know. We will discuss SKYWARN activation and procedures at your next
meeting and see what suggestions or improvements are needed?
From the NOAA National Weather Service perspective, the few
SKYWARN activation events that occurred during the summer helped their staff
tremendously in verifying and/or justifying warnings.
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WELCOME BACK LANCE
As most of you know, Lance, W7GJ, received the diagnosis
that he had liver cancer. Any time that
someone is given such news, it is a serious condition! Fortunately, his liver tumor
was operative. They were able to
remove all visible signs of cancer by taking out his liver tumor, and were able
to leave him with 80% of his liver intact.
The operation took 4.5 to 5 hours, during which he also lost his gall
bladder. As Lance said in an e-mail, “I
guess this was just an added bonus since it was in the way, anyhow”. The recovery from the liver operation seems
very good. Currently he is at home
although still weekend from his surgery.
He was able to operate in an EME contest! He is looking forward to some radio time to help him heal the
scars of his surgery. Welcome back
Lance!
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HEY,
WAS THAT?
N7STM, Jerry
Willis is pictured on the front page of the Missoulian.
http://www.missoulian.com/articles/2007/11/02/news/mtregional/news06.txt. He and a fellow American
Legionnaire are replacing the American Flag at the Veterans home. Jerry
is a long time volunteer for veterans' causes and is deeply involved in the new
Montana Veterans Cemetery. Thanks Jerry! – Vick, K7VK
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BPL In Missoula?
Recently, N7WKR (Mike) sent an
e-mail out to K7VK (Vick) regarding the potential of Broadband over PowerLines here in Missoula. To those that may not know, BPL could be the
death knell of amateur operation on high frequency bands. Please read the following e-mails between
Vick and Mike, and if you get the chance, please check out the internet
addresses that are supplied. They are
very interesting and help shed some light on this potential problem.- ed.
Hi Vick:
BridgeMaxx Communications formally Montana Wireless TV
cut the ribbon in a ceremony today to launch Internet service by "plugging
your computer into any AC outlet in Missoula", I saw this on the KPAX 10PM
news. If it is indeed BPL then I think us Amateurs should but listening for increased
interference on the HF bands and if so,tie-in with ARRL on the matter. I will
check-into this from my end. Hopefully this will not be a "Trick"
rather that a "Treat" sorry had to inject a little timely sense of
humor. 73's Mike N7WKR
Thanks Mike.
We'll need to check into and monitor this one. 73, Vick
For those of you with DSL internet connection. Here are three
video examples of what BPL interference sounds like and what the concerns
are.
VK7 Land experience
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdcY0Eetvsw
ARRL Message
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDSQJ8zOnhQ
A Virginia news account
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6sYD3C0jo8
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OUR
NEWEST LOCAL HAMS
Congratulations to our newest technicians from earlier this summer, KE7ONP,
Jake Flood and KE7ONQ, Buddy Smith. Thanks to Hellgate ARC
volunteer examiners, K7PX, N7GE, AC7UZ & W7DHB. Our newest licensees, KE7PEH,
Patricia Joubert (Technician) and KE7PEI, Mark Skeels
(General). Both received their new licenses October 11, 2007. Also at
Monday's examination session was KE7IZG, Michael Leary upgrading
to General.
Thanks to volunteer examiners: AC7UZ Lewis, WG7E
Liz, WG7P Elmer & N7GE,
Jerry for facilitating this examination session.
Our next examination session is
November 12, 5:30 PM at St Patrick Hospital community room.
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DUES
WILL BE DUE, SOON
2008 Dues will
be due. Please
support the repeater system and club activities. Annual membership is
$25.00 ($5.00 for additional family members). Dues are payable to the
Hellgate ARC treasurer, K7PX, Steve at ripply1@msn.com. New members
may fill out the application membership
(available on the website or in the December Hellgate Static) and send it to us.
Remember,
your membership provides:
*Maintenance and funding of
over a half dozen VHF/UHF
repeaters and emergency and portable repeaters. These provide wide-area coverage for emergency, public service, club events
and routine communications for all VHF/UHF ham radio operators.
*Additionally, HARC maintains portable
and fixed HF communications equipment (radios, portable tower and antennas) for
emergency,
public service, and the
numerous radio communication events held throughout the
year.
*Monthly Newsletter, hard
copy mailed to your postal address and on the club website.
*Monthly meetings to enjoy and
interchange information with other radio amateur enthusiasts.
*A source of
assistance, advice and encouragement (we call it
"Elmering") with your antenna projects and/or radio
operation.
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SUNSPOTS ARE COMING
Although not everyone may care, the sunspot cycle rules the HF end of
ham radio. Some may be fairly
depressed, such as Steve, KK7UV, who has increased his low power DXCC number on
160 meters. But others, like me, look
forward to the heady days such as January 2000 to 2002!
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FROM THE OCTOBER
31, 2007 ARRL CONTEST RATE SHEET
EDITED BY Ward Silver, N0AX
Subscribers to the (free) K9YA Telegraph (http://www.k9ya.org/), a PDF newsletter on topics of interest to CW operators specifically and all hams generally, were treated to an interesting article on Q-signals, their history, and how their meanings have evolved over the years. For example, in 1927 QSB was used to indicate a signal with bad tone, but eventually became the reference to fading that we use today.
Bob N6TV reports that a recent presentation on the OH8X/OH8NC super station, not far from the Arctic Circle, "absolutely boggles the mind". Such as? How about a full-sized 3-element, 160 meter Yagi on a rotating tower with elements made out of very large steel tower section? Or a full-sized 5- or 6-element 80 meter Yagi, 80 meters high. (Both scheduled for installation next year.) The radios will be state-of-the-art digital designs with DSP to optimize receive and transmit phasing of the stacked monobanders. Photos(http://www.radioarkala.com/) are available on-line.
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SO HOW DID WE DO ON 2007
FIELD DAY?
Call Score Cat. QSOs PWR GOTA Sect. Part. Club
Mult Call #
W7ED 5194 2A 1671 2 MT 25 Gallatin
Ham RC
KB7TG 2336 1A 564 2 MT 6
KE7NO 2184 1B1 712 2 MT 1
W7POE 1886 1A 359 2 MT 4 WPPS
RC
K7EUR 1648 2AC 469 2 K7BIR MT 16 Tobacco Valley ARC
K7LYY 1476 1A 492 2 MT 14 Flathead
Valley ARC
W7PX 1470 1A 477 2 MT 25 Hellgate
ARC
W7FTX 1084 1A 357 2 MT 10 Bitterroot
ARC
N7SEE 1078 3A 234 2 MT 4
W7VNE 1054 1A 252 2 MT 12 Anaconda
ARC
KJ7IZ 544 1E 137 2 MT 2
K7HWK 522 1A 111 2 MT 10 SE
Montana ARC
W7TCK 426 4A 106 2 MT 10 Capital
City ARC
W7FO 359 1AC 359 1 MT 10 Butte
ARC
WA7YNU 274 1D 112 2 MT 1
W7DXQ 110 2A 50 2 MT 7 Lower Yellowstone ARC
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CONTEST
SEASON IS UNDERWAY
It is still fall
and the winter snow has yet to arrive.
Most of us have been hunting for our winter’s meat or have been
listening to the Grizzlies plug away at their un-beaten season. It is also time to think about what will
activating the ionosphere. If not for
your hard core participation, maybe give up some points to your fellow ham
brothers that are active those days. On
the weekend of November 3-4, the 74th version of the ARRL
Sweepstakes will be underway. On the
weekend of November 17-18, the sister phone competition will also be
underway. That same weekend, the PSK63
contest will attract the digital folks out there. Before Thanksgiving, the CQ WW DX CW contest and the ARRL EME
contest will be available for people to occupy themselves and earn their turkey
on Saturday and Sunday. The last
weekend of November stretches into December (November 30-December 2) with the
ARRL 160 meter Contest and the SKYWARN activation. Please get on 160 meters and support Steve KK7UV in his quest to
become #1 in the Northwest. December
8-9 brings us the ARRL 10 meter contest.
New Years weekend brings more than First Night to Missoula hams as both
the Stew Perry contest and the Straight Key Night. On the next weekend, digital folks are the active bunch when the
ARRL RTTY contest will hit the air. Within
February and March, the season begins to wane with the ARRL DX contest. No matter what you like to do, it seems that
there is always an excuse to get on the air and jolt the ionosphere. See you there.
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QSL? QRZ? BK K
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.
I hope
that your shack is ready for winter, and you will be on the air a good amount
this year.
Sorry you
didn’t get an issue of the Hellgate Static over the summer. I was distracted a bit and one never came
out of the press.
Wayne Van
Meter, N7TAE, passed away in early September and he will be missed
greatly. His help with the club
activities and his work with the Red Cross will not be easily let go. Our wishes go out to his family.
Remember, the Christmas party will be
upcoming. As always, voting for club
officers will take place. Some of us
want “out” for a while, and if we want to keep a club that wants to meet
together, it is obvious that we need to “take our turn”.
I need your quick one liners for the
December “Christmas” wish list. Please
send them in. Plus, if I made any
mistakes this month, let me know. I try
to make it as clean as I can, but errors sneak through.
Have a great Thanksgiving and see you
next month.
