Delaware Valley Radio Association

“Radio Hams” from  Mercer County join in National Deployment

Public Demo of Emergency Communications June 27 – 28

The DVRA’s “hams” will join with thousands of Amateur Radio operators who will be showing off their emergency capabilities June 27-28. Over the past year, the news has been full of reports of ham radio operators providing critical communications during unexpected emergencies in towns across America including the California wildfires, winter storms, tornadoes and other events world-wide. During Hurricane Katrina, Amateur Radio – often called “Ham radio” – was often the ONLY way people could communicate, and hundreds of volunteer “hams” traveled south to save lives and property. When trouble is brewing, Amateur Radio’s people are often the first to provide rescuers with critical information and communications. On the weekend of June 27 – 28, the public will have a chance to meet and talk with Mercer County’s ham radio operators and see for themselves what the Amateur Radio Service is about. Showing the newest digital and satellite capabilities, voice communications and even historical Morse code, hams from across the USA will be holding public demonstrations of emergency communications abilities.

This annual exercise, called “Field Day” is the climax of the week long “Amateur Radio Week” sponsored by the ARRL, the national association for Amateur Radio. Using only emergency power supplies, ham operators will construct emergency stations in parks, shopping malls, schools and back yards around the country. Their slogan, “Ham radio works when other systems don’t! ” is more than just words to the hams as they prove they can send messages in many forms without the use of phone systems, internet or any other infrastructure that can be compromised in a crisis. More than 30,000 amateur radio operators across the country participated in last year’s event.

“We hope that people will come and see for themselves, this is not your grandfather’s radio anymore,” said Mark Bespalko of the DVRA. “The communications that ham radio people can quickly create have saved many lives when other systems failed or were overloaded. And besides that – it’s fun!”

In the Mercer County area, the Delaware Valley Radio Association will be demonstrating Amateur Radio at Soccer Fields 3-9 In Mercer County Central Park on June 27-28. They invite the public to come and see ham radio’s new capabilities and learn how to get their own FCC radio license before the next disaster strikes.

By going to http://www.arrl.org/contests/announcements/fd/locator.php and entering the callsign W2ZQ, a map showing the location of the station can be found.

There are over 650,000 Amateur Radio licensees in the US, and more than 2.5 million around the world. Through the ARRL’s Amateur Radio Emergency Services program, ham volunteers provide emergency communications for thousands of state and local emergency response agencies, all for free.

To learn more about Amateur Radio, go to www.emergency-radio.org. The public is most cordially invited to come, meet and talk with the hams. See what modern Amateur Radio can do. They can even help you get on the air!

Every year the Armed Forces Day Crossband Test is a fun event which tests ones ability to have crossband conversations – where you transmit on one frequency and receive on another, with a considerable difference between the two.  Stations in the US military transmit on military frequencies and listen on the amateur bands, while ham operators do the opposite.  This year, the test date is May 9th (though Armed Forces Day is later in May, it’s the same weekend as the Dayton Hamvention, so the test date was moved to avoid a conflict).

This is not only a fun event, but when I’ve participated in the past I’ve used it as an excuse to dust off the portable gear and go participate from a park somewhere – making it also a test of my batteries and portable setup!

The October 8 meeting of the Delaware Valley Radio Association will feature a talk by Doug Dixon on electronic devices to please the techno geek in everyone. Doug is a regular contributor to the Route One Newspaper, an established author in the field of technology, a former Sarnoff and Intel technology lead, and a regular attendee of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada. Please check out his site at Manifest Technology.

The public is invited to attend. The DVRA meets the second Wednesday of each month at 7:30 PM at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church, 137 West Upper Ferry Road, West Trenton, NJ. The church is located one-quarter mile west of the intersection of routes 634 and 579, and is just south of Mercer County Airport.

With over a hundred active members and a fully equipped radio station, the Delaware Valley Radio Association is one of the nation’s oldest radio clubs, having been founded in 1931. Persons interested in learning more about wireless electronics or Amateur Radio are encouraged to visit the club’s website at www.w2zq.com or attend any regular meeting of the club.

For more information, contact Tomas M Bagdas at 609-585-2001.

Since September is Back to School month, the DVRA meeting on Wednesday September 10th will feature an assignment for all club members to be prepared to speak for 5 or 10 minutes on “What I Did on my Summer Vacation”. While Ham radio topics are best, things such as travels and DXepeditions are also appropriate. So, the guest speaker is you!

The Delaware Valley Radio Association meets on the 2nd Wednesday of each month at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church 137 West Upper Ferry Road in West Trenton, NJ. Meetings begin at 7:30pm and are open to the public. Refreshments are served following the meeting.

73

Gary Wilson, K2GW
DVRA Program Director

DVRA’s August “Second Saturday” event will be an Open House and Work Party at the Red Cross Amateur Radio Station N2ARC. We’ll be showing off the base station and new satellite communications trailer there, as well as relocating the antenna feed lines within the building to the new radio room that has been created for the station. The activity will run from 9AM until Noon on Saturday August 9.

The Central New Jersey Chapter of the American Red Cross is located at 707 Alexander Road in Princeton Junction just south of US Route One. Gerry Jurrens, N2ARC is leading the event, and can be reached at email hidden; JavaScript is required if there are any questions.

All are welcome to attend. I hope to see you there.

73

Gary Wilson, K2GW

DVRA Program Director

No, I’m not being redundant; repeaters repeat things. The DVRA meeting on Wednesday July 9th will feature Bob Schroeder N2HX as he gives a history of the Technician Class License, and the development of Radio Repeaters. He’ll also be explaining some of the bells and whistles on the clubs current repeaters.

The Delaware Valley Radio Association meets on the 2nd Wednesday of each month at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church 137 West Upper Ferry Road in West Trenton, NJ. Meetings begin at 7:30pm and are open to the public. Refreshments are served following the meeting.

Also I hope everyone enjoyed Field Day as much as I did. Since it’s the holiday weekend and you might have some spare time, find a piece of rope and try tying the tautline hitch twice a day from memory for the next week to burn it into your memory. As you found out on Field Day, it’s a great knot for guying temporary antennas and keeping tents from blowing away. Here are some pictures to help you get started.

http://www.iland.net/~jbritton/tautlinehitch.htm

73

Gary Wilson, K2GW
DVRA Program Director

DVRA will participate in the annual ARRL Field Day on June 28-29, 2008, at Mercer County Park in West Windsor NJ behind the Skating Center. We’ll transform a quiet wooded grove into a bustling, exciting 100-watt radio station! Station setup begins about 9 AM Saturday, and we’ll be on-the-air nonstop from 2:00 pm until about 2 PM on Sunday. Yep! You read it right! We will operate for 24 hours! And outdoors, with portable generator power only to show our emergency capabilities! Woo-hoo!

Throughout the event we will use our Extra class club call sign, W2ZQ, so anyone can operate on any amateur frequency using all of the Extra class privileges! This is a great chance for all the new Technicians (and even non-hams) to get a taste of HF contesting. During this event, amateur stations from all the corners of the nation try to contact as many other stations as possible—many even outside the USA! During an event like this, stations exchange a small amount of information, and then move on to another contact. The exciting result is that you can make hundreds of contacts in a very short time!

Mark all your calendars and make plans to attend Field Day!

Invite your friends and family members to come out and see an emergency radio operation in action. We will have a “GOTA” (Get On The Air) station, specifically designed for them. Boy Scouts who attend can also meet some of the requirements for both Radio and Emergency Preparedness Merit Badges

Visitors are also welcome during the lunch and dinner hours, when we typically see many family members show up for free food! If the daytime turns out to be too hot for them, invite them to come in the evening. We’ll be there all night!

Check out the photos and details from Field Days of past years.

Our station will be located behind the Skating Center in the middle of Mercer County Park in West Windsor. This year you can find our location by searching for “W2ZQ” on the ARRL Field Day Locator. A Google map shows stations that have registered to operate Field Day—including DVRA! “Zoom out” and see the other stations around the USA.

Not yet convinced? Then check out this short video to see the excitement of Field Day : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=varHL752Odk . See you this weekend!

The DVRA is please to announce our 2008 Hamfest for April 20th. Again his year, the event will be held at the Skating Center at Mercer County Park. There are plenty of great indoor locations still available. Locations with power drops will be assigned on a first registered basis. More information is available on the 2008 Hamfest Flyer. We hope to see you there!

On today’s Federal Register “Public Inspection” page, they list items which were submitted this morning for publication in tomorrow’s Federal Register. Since the Morse Code change (E7-00729 [04-140]) is listed there, that means they should be publishing it tomorrow and the rule will go into effect on February 23rd (30 days from publication).

While this means that Morse Code (Element 1) testing is no longer required for getting a General or Amateur Extra license, I do encourage hams to learn Morse – just as much as I encourage them to learn RTTY, PSK31 and various other modes which I enjoy. They all have their place on the air, they’re all fun, and sometimes you can snag that last DX you need for an award with one mode over another. So learn them all, and most importantly enjoy the airwaves!

Update 2007/01/24 @1520Z: The official posting in the Federal Register is now available.

On December 15th, not only did the previously mentioned Report & Order go into effect, but the FCC also released a public notice which officially drops the Morse code requirement for all license classes. While this new Report & Order has not been released yet, the FCC has adopted it, so the end of the Morse requirement for amateur licenses is now very near. Because this is only a public notice, there is not yet a time established for when the changes will take effect – the Report & order must first be published in the Federal Register, and then 30 days from that date the change will be official. But with the FCC’s announcement today, it likely won’t be too long away. The change also means that all current technician class licensees would have the same privileges as those who have the Element 1 credit, aka “Tech Plus” operators. Full story available at the ARRL website.

The only downside I personally see to this announcement has nothing to do with amateur radio at all, but more to do with the Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt that it will create – from mailing lists, web sites and forums where “the death of ham radio” will be proclaimed from every corner of the US.

Update 2006/12/19 @ 2033Z: The FCC today issued the official Report & Order.  It will probably be published in the Federal Register sometime in January, and will go into effect in February (30 days after its publication).  ARRL has the updated story as well.