Category: On-The-Air
QSO #1 — Jim WE5E and John WA3KCP have an on-the-air conversation using straight keys to send Morse Code while Lynn NG9D listens.
QSO #2 — Lynn NG9D and John WA3KCP hold their own conversation upon completion of QSO #1.
Both QSOs were captured on video and audio by NG9D in real-time as the operators chatted on-the-air.
WA3KCP is a member of the Straight Key Century Club as well as the Cumberland Amateur Radio Club.
The Cumberland Amateur Radio Club is proud to recognize one of its members for producing A+ results in a recent Achievement Test.
Congratulations to Doug Stenger, KC3CPT for hitting the books, studying, and passing the FCC General Class License Exam.
As a follow-up, the other day Doug got on 20 Meters to exercise his newly earned privileges. He was rewarded with a nice DX QSO with OS8A located in Belgium. Doug worked Didier on the first call, Impressive.
If you look to the left you will see a snapshot of Didier’s Club Log screen showing KC3CPT on the second line from the top.
Ninety-eight more countries and we will have a DXCC Party for Doug.
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Editor’s Note: This information was first posted over a year ago. The content remains an important part of our Club approach to encouraging involvement and participation in ham radio events. I am re-posting the content with minor revisions as needed due to the COVID-19 situation.
A good friend of Ham Radio shared with me a story. The story involved a newly licensed Amateur Radio Operator who set out to make some radio contacts after receiving his license from the FCC. His call sign and his on-the-air techniques revealed that he was a newcomer to ham radio.
To make the story short — this newly licensed ham received a somewhat chilly reception to his on-the-air communications attempts and may have been turned-off by the whole experience. How sad.
The Cumberland Amateur Radio Club would like to warmly welcome newly licensed hams.
We stand ready to provide assistance enabling you to get on the air and to make contacts with other hams who appreciate the hard-work you put into studying and passing the Licensing Exam.
First, we invite you to attend our Club Meetings. Details are in the THINGS TO-DO/CARC EVENTS page of this website. We have a special FREE MEMBERSHIP OFFER for newly licensed hams. How can you beat that? If you are looking for help selecting and setting up your first radio station this is a good place to begin.
Second, if you already have ham radio equipment we invite you to participate in our weekly Two-Meter Net. CARC Members and guests gather each Sunday Night at 7 p.m. local time on 146.490 MHz, FM Simplex in the Two-Meter Band. No Repeater Offset, No PL Access Tones. Simply tune your transceiver to 146.490, listen for the Net Control Station to announce the net. Frank, KB3PQT, usually is our Net Control Station. He is a friendly guy and a great supporter of the Cumberland Amateur Radio Club and ham radio in general.
When it is time, key your microphone, say your call sign, release your mike, and wait to be acknowledged by the NCS. The Net Control Station will say a few words welcoming the people who checked into the net, and then give each person his or her opportunity to speak by saying that person’s call sign. Tell us your name, your location, and perhaps let us know if you have questions. After you have said what is on your mind, simply say “This is [your call sign], Back To Net Control.” and release your mike. It is that simple. No worries, No pressure, No cold shoulders.
If you experience any difficulty when trying to participate in the Cumberland Amateur Radio Club Two-Meter Net please email me your name, call sign, location, and a few words about your radio and antenna. We will try to perk-up our ears and listen more carefully for you the next week. eMail: Andrew Forsyth AF3I@RadioClub-CARC.com
• Author: Andrew Forsyth AF3I
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February – A good month to play radio!
February is a fun month. It starts with Groundhog Day and ends with the South Carolina QSO Party. It has the Minnesota, Vermont and British Columbia QSO Parties in between. February also has a couple CW contests, RTTY contests, the School Club Roundup and many others, including some Special Event stations. This month I have spent more time than usual on the air.
While the bulk of my activity is VHF nets such as the Cumberland Amateur Radio Club two-meter net at 1900 EST on Sunday at 146.490 MHz and on HF nets such as the Virginia Fone Net on 3.947 MHz at 1600 and 1930 EST daily, this month I have spent a lot of time collecting grid squares, states and countries using the FT8 mode. I have tried Olivia (see the RESOURCES page: Operating Your Station for How Do I… articles on various modes) and actually made some PSK31 contacts.
Notes from the shack….
Winter Field Day, 2020
Ah… Field Day. Summer temps, picnic food, setting up outside… can’t wait!
UH…wait….you said “Winter Field Day? Huh? Winter?? as in freezing outside? Ummm…no thanks.
Really. Winter Field Day is a thing., It was started several years ago as basically a club activity in Ohio and has grown into one of the larger events in amateur radio. Winter Field Day seems to be most popular from Virginia south. Why? In part because it’s warmer there. And in some places Winter Field Day on the 4th weekend in January is a lot more fun to be outdoors than the ARRL Field Day the 4th weekend in June. The 2020 ARRL Field Day is the weekend of June 27. CARC has already reserved the cabin at Shaffer Park in Carlisle, PA. Watch this website for more info.
Winter Field Day has essentially the same rules. With one important exception: the entry classes. ARRL Field day uses the number of operating transmitters and a combination of how they are powered and where they are located. CARC has operated ARRL Field Day as 4A (4 radios, club, commercial power). If we ran our radios off batteries we could enter as 4B. Winter Field Day uses the number of transmitters and the environment were they are located: Outdoor, Indoor or Home. Outdoor means just that. Indoor is a room or building without an existing antenna system and not normally used as a space for radios. Home is a place where you normally have a ham radio station of some sort. Most of the stations I worked this weekend were Indoor or Outdoor.
I got the current N3FJP Winter Field Day software downloaded Saturday morning so I could keep my log electronically and was ready to start at 1400 EST (1900 UTC) except that I was just getting up from my nap. So I was a bit late. I am a 1 transmitter Home station, or IH for WFD purposes. 20M was quiet but dead. 40M was busier. I figured 80M would be really noisy so I started on 40M phone (voice). I was hoping to pickup the nearby ARRL sections (EPA, WPA, MDC, SNJ, NNJ, WNY, VA, CT, WMA, ONS, ONE, QC and perhaps some others then work longer distances on 80M after dark, Nope. 40M was long. My goal is to work a new ARRL section on every QSO until I run out of ones I can realistically get. I think 3 of my first 5 were Indiana (IN) and the other 2 were I think Ohio (OH) and Illinois (IL). By supper time I had something like 24 QSOs in the log and the closest were NC and OH. Not good. After checking into the Virginia Fone Net on 75m (I could hear the Net Control in Virginia’s Northern Neck, but to check-in I had to rely on a relay in South Carolina, I went down 75m looking for WFD activity. I found 2 stations. One I had worked on 40m who moved to 80m after dark and still had a big pile up. I was surprised at the lack of activity on 80m. 40m had lots of it earlier. Due to band conditions though many stations I could hear were on top of each other; they could not hear each other and I could hear both but could not reach either without getting stepped on by the other one. Frustrating!
Got up this morning and found 80m quiet, full of nets and rag chewers and no WFD activity. 20m was very good, but no WFD activity there, so I went back to 40m and worked another 15 stations or so. Then at 1030 EST my voice quit. I was trying to reach a station in KS. I think he was running QRO (high power) with at least 800 watts, and everyone seemed able to hear him and he heard no one.
Then my voice just quit. I knew no one would hear me.
I tried CW, thinking 40m and maybe 20m and 80m would have a fair amount of WFD activity but I found none. Still not sure what to do, so I shifted my log to my second monitor and fired up FLDIGI, the Fast Light Digital modem software discussed on this website in the “How Do I…” articles featured on the RESOURCES pages. I went to 40m and switched the mode to PSK31. Found nothing.
PSK31 is fun. I like it, but since the advent of the WSJT-X modes (FT65, JT8, FT8) etc, it has become very hard to find on the air. Many of the call signs I worked on PSK31 I have since worked on FT8. I started calling CQ WFD on PSK31 and after a few calls someone came back to me. I collected a couple more, then began seeing other folks calling CQ WFD and worked some of them. I expected it would be a slow process. I eventually switched to 20m on 14.070 MHZ then back to 7.070 MHZ to end the contest. I lost a few Q’s as band conditions just blew them away mid contact. I finished with 12 and added at least 2 new sections in the process.
The end result was about double my total QSO’s for last year’s Winter Field Day and close to 4 times last year’s score. (Multipliers are your friends!). Last year I worked I think 2 bands, all on phone. This year I had 3 bands, and both phone and digital. I figure I left about 11 sections on the table as I was unable to find a band short enough to work them.
If Winter Field Day is kinda like the NASCAR race at Daytona, the contest season is just starting. Next weekend (February 1 and 2) is the British Columbia QSO Party as well as the Minnesota Party and Vermont’s.
South Carolina is February 29 and North Carolina is on March 1, 2020.
The Oklahoma QSO Party is March 14.
The Virginia QSO Party is March 21.
The Pennsylvania QSO Party is October 10 and 11, 2020. CARC plans to set up and operate a multi operator station somewhere again this year. Watch this website. We have not decided yet if we will try for a three peat from York County or take the Traveling Radio Road Show caravan elsewhere this year.
Frank
KB3PQT