I hate to say this, but I learned absolutely nothing at the Dayton forums this year. The reason for this is that I didn’t attend a single one.
Normally, I try to make some of the forums at Dayton, and in the past, I’ve even spoken at one. Not this year. Aside from perhaps the TAPR forum, the Antennas forum, and maybe the ATV forum, none of them really called to me. (A complete schedule can be found in the online Hamvention program.)
I do regret missing the TAPR forum. They had a couple of talks on mesh networking and updates from Chris Tests, KD2BMH on the Whitebox Project and Mike Ossman on the HackRF project. I missed it because I didn’t think about the forums until about 10am Friday morning, and by that time, the forum was half over. Rather than try to shoehorn myself into what was probably a very packed room, I decided just to forgo it.
I did attend the QRP-ARCI Four Days in May (FDIM) seminar on Thursday, and this year, they had another great lineup. George Dobbs, G3RJV, gave a very nice talk that not only talked about circuits, but also the people he’s met over the years and the places he’s been. Paul, M0XPD, gave an interesting talk on crystal filters and using an Arduino to control a QRP rig. The final talk, by Glen, KW5GP, was also about using an Arduino to control a QRP rig. Other talks covered transmission lines and SWR and adventures in PCB making. I learned something in every single one.
How about 2016?
As I was perusing the Hamvention program, it hit me that there was no CW forum. This despite there being numerous vendors selling keys and paddles, and booths for FISTS, NAQCC, SKCC, and CWOps.
So, I’m going to suggest to the Dayton Hamvention folks that next year we have a CW forum. I’m not sure exactly sure what we’ll talk about, but I bet that I could easily fill a panel whether we talk about how to choose the best key or what CW club to join. I’m guessing that I’d get a good turnout of folks interested in learning more about CW. If you have a particular topic that you think might make a good forum, please let me know.