August 2009

Amateur Radio Club of Green Valley

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Meeting July 8, 2009

The above meeting was canceled due to a monsoon rain that took out 18 power poles leaving the SAV without power prior to the meeting starting. Hope most of you got word of the cancellation and did not make the trip to the SAV only to find out there was not going to be a meeting.

CONTINENTAL SCHOOL

Continental School regular classes started on August 5th, but Radio Club will not start until October 29.  This gives students time to get adjusted to their regular school routine before starting an after school program.  One exception to this is the Robotics group which will start October 1st.  This earlier start is required as the first robot competition is held in January and the robot must be completely redesigned to meet the new game requirements.  This year the program will move from Wednesdays to Thursday afternoons due to school scheduling changes.  We offer three different programs, radio club, robotic club, and radio controlled airplane club.  If you would like to work with students 10 to 14 years in any of these areas contact Lloyd, N7GV, at 648-2834.  No specific experience is required.

New club member

Richard Boyles  K7INN  375 E. Camino Rancho Seguro, Sahuarita, AZ 85629  480-540-8555

Silent Key

Long time club member Fred Russell W3JNE  from Wheaton, Md

Misc. Items of Interest

1. Meredith Attwell Baker, Mignon Clyburn Sworn in as FCC Commissioners:
   Now There Are Five (Aug 3, 2009) -- The Federal Communications Commission now has its full complement of five Commissioners: On Friday, July 31, Meredith Attwell Baker joined Chairman Julius Genachowski, Robert McDowell and Michael Copps. On Monday, August 3, Mignon Clyburn came on board.
2. Feature: QRP "Over the Top" for the Colorado 14er Event (Jul 31, 2009) -- After reading the August 2005 QST article by Chris Ormsby, K0CAO, and Bob Witte, K0NR, I thought what fun a HF low power (QRP) operation from a Colorado 14er (A mountain over 14,000 feet high.) would be. The "carrot" would be that an out-of-state 14er to 14er HF contact had yet to be made after the N7UN and WG0AT fun-packed hike through the Canyonlands National Park in April 2008, Steve and I made plans to participate in this unique Colorado operating event. It was after we heard that Brian Boschma, N6IZ, was planning to HF QRP activate Mt Whitney (14,491 feet) the same weekend as the Colorado 14er event that our mutual plans solidified.
   
   We would take a crack at making the first out-of-state summit HF QRP contact between a Colorado 14er and Mt Whitney in California. Uncompaghre Mountain at 14,309 feet and located just northeast of Telluride was a perfect choice. We had requested N0B (pun intended) as our special event 1×1 call several months in advance. The summit climb, at just under 8 miles roundtrip from the base camp area, was remote enough to not have hundreds of hikers distracting us from our mission of making contact with as many HF and VHF folks as we could. Even then for the 30 or so hikers we encountered at the summit during our 3 hour stay, we put on our "ham radio ambassador hats" to explain what we were doing and why. It also amazes me how curious folks are about ham radio — or was it Steve’s pack goats?
   
   After several contacts and difficulty explaining our location (QTH) (How do you sound believable: "QTH CO, CO SUMMIT OF 14ER MTN"), I hear N6IZ weakly under several stronger stations. I yelped "that’s Brian" with a fist pump into the rarified air. I called N6IZ and with a quick exchange to solidify the contact and a few "FB" congrats to each other, we were off to other callers. Steve took over the CW key on the K2 and then made a number of additional contacts.
   
   We switched over to 20 meter SSB and also made a number of contacts throughout the US. But we were watching the weather closely as some dark based clouds were forming upwind from the mountain top. Around noon, we decided to start our decent just as a threatening dark cloud was forming. The descent was easy since gravity was working with us. We made it back to base camp, wearing the excited glow of accomplishment and a job well done. We exceeded our goals of not only climbing a 14er, participating in the Colorado 14er event as primarily a QRP HF station, but to also make contact with N6IZ and become the first for an out-of-state, summit 14er-to-14er contact.

August 12th Meeting

The meeting on August 12th will include a demonstration of the Buddipole antenna. Meeting time 1900 hours at the SAV building behind the library.

Hope to see you there.