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Archive for November, 2012

A Grand Day Out

November 26, 2012 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, News

There’s an exciting day in Wythall Radio Club’s calendar coming up this Saturday.

A group of members is travelling down to the Radio store of our friends Martin Lynch and Sons. Wythall Radio Club won the ML&S raffle which ran for the duration of the National Hamfest in September.  We are very much looking forward to receiving our prize, a £600 gift voucher to be spent on goodies in the shop!

Martin personally gave us an unbeatable deal on our new club radio, the Kenwood TS590S, and we look forward to meeting him again, together with David Wilkins G5HY from Kenwood UK who will be presenting our members with their goodies.  Needless to say we will be partaking in the famous ML&S Hog Roast as well as purchasing more radio bits for ourselves and for the club.  In the words of Wallace and Gromit, it should be “a grand day out!”

All change!

November 17, 2012 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club

A late change to our club programme this week; James M0YOM is sadly tied up abroad on work and his talk on “Filtering in the Shack” has therefore been postponed till next year. Instead, Chris G7DDN will host another of our popular “Internet Nights”.

This takes the form of a “round table” – we visit a selection of ham radio websites of which members may not yet be fully aware.   It is easy in our modern connected world to think everyone already knows about the many resources available at the click of a mouse or press of a button, but this is not always the case. You are also encouraged to contribute by bringing along useful links to sites that you may have discovered which might enhance the hobby for us all.

Last time out, a can of worms was uncovered! Several members discovered the delights of webSDRs which has enhanced the hobby for many of us. What will Tuesday night bring this time around? 2030 in the Club Shack.

It’s always worth entering a contest!

November 14, 2012 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Contest, News

Imagine your correspondent’s surprise when he received a large A4 size letter postmarked from the USA recently!

Not expecting anything from “across the pond”, it was opened with a mixture of anticipation and wonderment.  It turned out to be a certificate for a placing in the 2011 CQ Worldwide Contest for CW.

Now this was a surprise! I had forgotten entering this event, probably as I only operated for a short time and made just 19 contacts on just one band, 80 metres.  It turned out that I had won 1st place in England in the Low Power section for a Single Operator on 80 metres. OK, so I was about 4th from the bottom in the world, but as no-one else from England had bothered to enter that section, I won it! Rather a nice piece of wallpaper for the radio room, methinks!

See, it’s always worth submitting an entry to a contest. You never know what can happen!

Club Calls 2012 (G7WAC)

November 11, 2012 By: M0MCX Category: Club, Contest, Fun

We operated as G7WAC from 1,000 feet in the Cotswolds at about 2.5c. It was very cold but very amusing and great fun. A picture tells a thousand words so perhaps you might skip to the sequence below.

125 QSOs, FT1000MP, Full size inverted V 160m Dipole at 65 feet AGL. Dipole legs were cut at 37 metres each leg giving us a tune-up at 1.850. Ideally, the maths told me to cut another metre off, but we ran out of time to become operational just 6 minutes before the off at 19:54.

Operators, Stu M0NYP, Jon, M0JMM and myself Callum, M0MCX. Thanks for working us.

Are you an “Antenna” Dummie?

November 02, 2012 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, News

A strange title admittedly, but then not every radio ham is adept or as knowledgeable as they might be about antennas. That’s why, this coming Tuesday 6th November, Callum M0MCX will be telling us more about the basics of wire antennas for shortwave.

On another tack, this week’s offering is a good example of how being in a club like Wythall Radio Club can work for you. Someone posted on our internal email reflector that they needed help with an antenna and apart from getting that help, it prompted Committee Member Callum to offer one of his famous “short talks” so we could all benefit.

Most members know what we mean when we say Callum’s approach to presentations is… well… “unique”. Hence this week’s talk title, “Wire Antennas for Dummies”!

So why not come along to the Club Shack this Tuesday at 2030 to Wythall House on Silver Street and find out more? You will be made most welcome!