Lots of cool things in my Twitter feed this morning…….Dan
k9hi
Apr. 15 deadline is fast approaching for FAR scholarship applications. Seehttp://t.co/8eCHFvTM1x #hamr
dangerousproto
How to measure stability when testing power supplies http://t.co/WkzW6ZXMKD
hamradiopodcast
VOA Radiogram features MT63http://t.co/gslMp6qukr
WA2HOM is our club station at the Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum. I go down there nearly every weekend and operate for anywhere from two to eight hours. This weekend, I had a lot of fun down there.
Late last week, I was contacted by a woman who was a Cub Scout pack leader, asking if she could bring some Scouts by. Silly question. Of course, she could! We arranged to meet around 1:45 on Saturday. Well, right on time, she arrived with three Cub Scouts in tow.
Fortunately, I had just made contact with Jim, K0JIM, and he had a really solid signal here in Ann Arbor. That’s important because it’s sometimes difficult for inexperienced operators to hear a weak signal or one that’s accompanied by a lot of noise. When signals are weak or hard to copy for any reason, the kids get frustrated.
We were doubly fortunate in that Jim was just great with the kids. He asked each their name and got them to tell him a little bit about themselves. And, none of the kids were mike-shy, so it was a good experience for everyone involved. In addition to having them talk on the air, I took them over to our Morse Code display and showed them how to send their names in Morse Code.
I really hadn’t planned to go down on Sunday, but after doing some things around the house, I decided to zip down there about 2:30 pm to check into the Rotarians on Amateur Radio net. It’s so much easier to do from down at the museum because of the beam antenna. I didn’t hear a peep on the net frequency (14287 kHz) at either 3 pm or 4 pm (2000Z, which is the time listed on the ROAR website), though, so I’m not sure what’s going on there.
When I’m at the museum, I’m usually also tweeting. (I’m @kb6nu on Twitter.) I tweeted that 20m sounded kind of quiet, and got a reply from @hamradioireland, EI2KC, suggesting that we give it a try. After agreeing on a frequency, I pointed the beam northeast and gave him a call. Unfortunately, the propagation didn’t cooperate, and we could barely hear one another. Even so, it was still pretty cool using Twitter to arrange a DX QSO.
Tuning around after my short QSO with EI2KC, I found a couple of interesting nets. The first was the Collins Collectors Association Net on 14263 kHz. I could really only hear the net control station, but it sounded as though everyone checking in was running some kind of Collins gear. It was interesting to listen to, but not being a Collins operator, I didn’t check in.
Around 4 pm, I started looking for the ROAR net again. I never did find that net, but I did find the Heathkit Net on 14293 kHz. According to the Web page Heathkit Resources, the net starts at 2030Z, but I’m guessing that it really started at 1930Z.
Since I have a bunch of Heathkits—several that I still use regularly—I did check into this net. They’re a great group of guys, and I will definitely be checking into this net again. Who knows? It may even spur me to get my HW-101 back on the air.
The annual meeting of the ARRL Board of Directors was held January 18-19, 2013 in New Orleans, and the minutes of the meeting were recently published. You can download and read the entire minutes yourself, but here are a few items that I found particular interesting:
As I was club president here in Ann Arbor for several years, and for several years served as the Michigan Section Affiliated Club Coordinator, I’m especially interested in #16. I’ve e-mailed my director and vice-director to get their takes on it, and I would encourage all of you to do likewise for any of the items that are of interest to you.
VA3XPR
Ontario Science Centre Demonstrates Ham Radio Digitally Remastered http://t.co/sU2HgoYO
K5PO
My catch-phrase! RT @K5KVN: New meme! @K5PO says: Put A Ferrite On It! http://t.co/CxrqFIMY
wa5ray
Amateur Radio Quiz: A Log of dBs: By H. Ward Silver, [email protected] f there is a single unit of measurement b…http://t.co/lkdKX9cb
Central Middle School radio club students work on projects
The future of amateur radio in Midland was in room 127 of Central Middle School on Wednesday afternoon.Bill Albe brought kits to build the FET crystal radios he designed, along with tools sure to excite middle schoolers — drills, solder, means to measure electrical resistance across their bodies — plus ample adult supervision.
I’m trying to find out more about this project so that I can do something similar at the Hands-On Museum….Dan
Back to the Future — amateur radio enthusiasts bring transmitter back to life
The wait – four weeks short term and 40 years and counting long term – was well worth it when the 75-year-old transmitter built by amateur radio pioneer Marshall Ensor was reactivated Saturday evening at Ensor Park and Museum south of Olathe.
Ham radio alive and well in Boulder County
This is a nice profile of the Boulder Amateur Radio Club (BARC). BARC Juniors is a program of the club, which encourages kids to get involved in amateur radio. Great club, great program.
Junk, continued. A couple of months ago, I wrote about the importance of junk in amateur radio. Well, here’s another example.
Last week, my friend, Ralph, AA8RK, acquired a used TS-850. Unfortunately, it didn’t have a power cable, so he sent a message to our club e-mail list asking if anyone had a cable he could buy from them. It struck me that while I didn’t have a cable that I wanted to sell him, I did have all the parts needed to make one. For some reason a year or so ago, I happened to purchase the Molex connector at a hamfest, and at Dayton this year, I purchased more 12-ga., two-conductor wire and a big bag of PowerPole connectors.
Ralph came over Monday night, and we had a fine time making the connector and talking about ham radio in general. Ham radio is more fun if you have the right junk!
Horse-fence antenna revisited. One of the things that Ralph and I talked about was my horse-fence antenna. I was unsuccessful with my first attempt at making a 2m dipole with the horse-fence material and just haven’t had the motivation to get back to working on it. Well, when I showed it to Ralph, he said, “It looks to me like you have a bunch of little capacitors there,” referring to the 14 very fine stainless steel wires running through the plastic ribbon, “maybe that’s detuning it.”
I think he might be right. I’m going to go get a couple more clamps and clamp the far end of the antenna elements and see what effect that has.
Jamboree on the Air (JOTA) 2012. Almost two weeks ago now, we had a great Jamboree on the Air at WA2HOM. On Saturday, we had eight or ten Scouts. Several of them already had their General Class licenses, so all I had to do was sit them down at the radio, show them how to use the controls, and they were off to the races. They even worked a new country for us – Trinidad. The cool thing was that the station they contacted down there was also participating in the JOTA, and they got to talk to some Trinidadian Scouts.
Sandy quiets the bands. On Tuesday night, the 40m band was oddly quiet as hurricane Sandy took out the power on the East Coast and otherwise occupied hams there. It was quite noticeable that there were a lot fewer stations on the air.
I don’t know how I missed watching HamRadioNow, but now that I’ve seen my first episode, you can bet that I’m going to be a regular viewer from now on. If you ask me, it’s more interesting than HamNation on TWIT.
The last episode I watched is episode #24, which talks about WB2JKJ, the radio club of Junior High School #22 in New York City. You’ve seen the ads in QST and the other ham radio magazines. If you ever wondered about those ads–and the program behind it–you should watch this episode.
The program is actually not about getting kids their amateur radio licenses. Instead, it’s about using amateur radio to teach language arts, geography, etc. And, the program is now more than just a New York City kind of thing. The program reaches out to all educators nationwide.
This episode of HRN was a real eye-opener for me. If you’re at all interested in ham radio in education, watch this episode. If you’re at all interested in any other aspect of ham radio, watch one of the other 20+ episodes.
This is both a great PR move by Amateur Radio Supplies, a company I’ve never heard of, and a good thing for amateur radio. I also love that they’re including a set of paddles :) …..Dan
Sep 26, 2012 –
Amateur Radio Supplies of Haverhill, Mass., announced today a new biannual giveaway to promote youth in amateur radio DXing and contesting.
“Getting on HF (high frequency) in today’s economy is very challenging for many, but especially for our youth operators,” said Jeff Demers, owner, Amateur Radio Supplies. “Many youth operators are unable to purchase the needed equipment to get on the air. Here at Amateur Radio Supplies, we want them to experience the joy that has propelled us in this hobby for many decades. Thus, on January 1, 2013, we’ll be doing the first of many station sponsorships to support youth in DXing and contesting.”
Amateur Radio Supplies will give a complete HF (high frequency) station to the selected applicant, including:
Applicants from any country under the age of 21 are invited to provide brief answers to the following three questions, as well as their name, call sign, and license class, online at http://www.amateurradiosupplies.com/youth-s/222.htm.
1. How often are you able to operate on the HF bands?
2. Where (what QTH) do you typically operate from?
3. How do you intend to use the equipment provided?
Nominations will also be accepted. If you know of a deserving youth, please email Randy Rowe at [email protected].
My recent post, “Another take on getting kids into amateur radio,” garnered nearly a dozen comments, so there certainly seems to be a fair amount of interest in the topic. Coincidentally, I recently came across two items on the Internet on this topic:
Amateur Radio at the South Florida Science Museum. This effort is very similar to our station, WA2HOM, at the Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum. They’re exposing kids to amateur radio, with a view towards getting them interested in the hobby. Unfortunately, they’re having trouble raising funds. I e-mailed Tom, AJ4XM, about how we were fortunate to get grants from the IEEE and the ARRL and have encouraged him to try as well. In the meantime, he’s trying to raise funds by getting hams to donate on the Net. If you have a few bucks, you might consider donating something.Over the past couple of days, I’ve been swapping e-mail with a guy looking for some materials to help him get Boy Scouts interested in radio and in getting their ham licenses. He wrote:
I was wondering if you had thought about applying your approach used in “A No-Nonsense Amateur Radio Study Guide” to the Scout merit badge with the chance of getting a license during the JOTA [Jamboree on the Air] weekend.
…
Any thoughts on an approach that could be used on the “day” level that could help the scouts get enough licenses in a troop to experience the benefits’ of Ham Radio?
…
We need to come up with a program that will help 10- and 11- year-olds in Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, and even high-school kids get licenses.
Unfortunately, most of my efforts along these lines have not been successful. I once did a “ham radio club” at a local middle school, but after a whole year, none of the kids got their licenses. I attribute this to the fact that the club met only once a week and I didn’t get a whole lot of support from the school or the kids’ parents.
I also suggested that someone come up with a study guide specifically for kids. My “No-Nonsense” study guides are pretty good for adults, but I don’t think they’re all that great for kids. Nor are the one-day Tech classes I teach. I have had kids take the class and get their licenses, but in general, teens don’t do all that well in them.
Thinking about all this gave me another idea. Kids do seem to like the Elenco Snap Circuits kits. Perhaps we could come up with modules that could be used with those kits that would introduce kids to amateur radio specific and get them interested that way. Any thoughts? Did those old, 100-in-1 kind of electronics kits that you used to buy from toy stores or Radio Shack have any projects that could be construed as ham radio projects?
