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Archive for March, 2013

An Easter Contest

March 28, 2013 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, Contest, Fun, News

New PictureIf you are tuning around on the 2 metre band in the Birmingham area or further afield and hear some stations exchanging numbers, you just might have stumbled upon the Wythall Radio Club Easter Contest.

Just as at Christmas, we hold an event to get our members on air and working each other. Points are given for each member worked and each discrete member worked across the period also counts as a multiplying factor (or multiplier) to attain a final score.  It sounds complicated but we have a clever Excel spreadsheet which keeps score for us!

The best 3 days of the 5 days of Easter are adjudicated and the top 3 winners in each category get Easter Eggs as prizes. No wonder so many Wythall RC members are getting larger!

The Magic of Circuits…

March 24, 2013 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, News

Being involved with radio in any way inevitably means that at some point, one has to face up to the technical side of the hobby. However, it would be true to say that this aspect of the hobby does not always come easily to all of us. Circuit diagrams, for example, are not always easy to read – trying to see exactly understand how a circuit works can be quite daunting for many of us.

Circuitwizard

These days computer software is a big help in helping our understanding of circuitry and this Tuesday, Wythall Radio Club is proud to be presenting a talk on one particular type of software which can assist us in this.

Chris G0EYO is doing a presentation for us on the “Circuit Wizard” range of software. Chris uses this in his training sessions for our students and is just the man to explain how it works and how we as radio enthusiasts can use it to help us in our hobby.

Interested? Then come along this Tuesday at 2030 to Wythall House, Silver Street Wythall B47 6LZ. You will be very welcome!

The Magnificent Seven! (updated!)

March 18, 2013 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, News, Training

Exam time again at Wythall Radio Club and tonight it was the turn of the Intermediate Licence students. And our largest ever single class of Foundation licence holders are now all celebrating Intermediate success!

Ints

Paul, Howard, Howard, Andy, Tom, Darren and Rob show off their pass certificates

Seven students (pictured) successfully passed their exam with flying colours this evening and now lead instructor Chris G0EYO is looking to headhunt them to step up and have a go at the Advanced course which starts at Wythall in September.

Meantime the members of Wythall Radio Club send their congratulations to Paul, Andy, Tom, Darren, Rob and the 2 Howards.

UPDATE! We hear that Rob is now 2E0MEX, Darren 2E0LPD, Howard H 2E0TBR, Howard K 2E0KWH, Tom 2E0GSW, Andy 2E0VAZ and Paul 2E0ULC – Congratulations on the new callsigns, lads!

Radio Sport?

March 17, 2013 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, Contest, Fun, News

There is a section of the Ham Radio hobby, the fastest growing we are led to believe, which is known as “Radio Sport” or “Contesting”. The idea is to make as many contacts (exchanging the correct information of course!) within a specified time period. It is a very big part of the hobby of many a Radio Amateur!

To get Wythall Radio Club members in the mood to have a go at a big contest, our “top gun” Radio Sportsman, Lee G0MTN, is putting together one of his famous presentations to enthuse us to all to have a go at the next worldwide event, the CQ Magazine World Prefix Contest (known as CQ WPX) on the last weekend of this month.

OH8X

There will be plenty of big gun stations like OH8X on the air!

You could try it out from home or even from our well-equipped club shack.  It is not too difficult to achieve a DXCC award (100 countries contacted) in one weekend during this contest!

So if you have little or no idea what the “contesting” bug is like, why not come and catch it at Wythall House, Silver Street, B47 6LZ this Tuesday at 2030?  Lee will be giving an introduction to all-band HF contests in general as well as this contest in particular.

There is even a rumour, that to encourage participation within the club, there may even be a “contest-within-a-contest” that we’ll run, just for fun, to encourage members’ activity in the WPX contest.

I wonder if there will be a prize in the form of a liquid refreshment for the winner? :-)

Facebook “Like” button for Wythall articles

March 14, 2013 By: M0MCX Category: Club, Fun

Facebook_iconWe’ve integrated a cool Facebook Like button for your delight. If you like one of our articles, just click the Like button.

If you are already logged into Facebook, your Like will be reflected in your status and your profile picture will also be picked up from Facebook and displayed under the Like button.

Give it a go and hit Like now :)

73, Callum.

Leading the way?

March 14, 2013 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, Fun, News

Nice to see the national journal of the Radio Society of Great Britain is catching up with us here at Wythall Radio Club! :-)

Plaque

“RadCom” is published monthly and Wythall RC member Dave G3YXM is one of their regular columnists, writing the LF (Low Frequencies) column.

In his column for April, which has just been published (page 48), is a mention (and photo) of an item that appeared on our website here just over a month ago. Click here to see it!

Amusing that, at least this time, Wythall RC’s website is setting the trend! :-)

Thank You, Everyone! (Rally 2013)

March 10, 2013 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, Hamfest, News

DSC_0140-1000

2013 Wythall Radio Club Rally

What a fantastic day! Traders, club members and well over 500 visitors combined to overcome some minor obstacles to make the 2013 Wythall Radio Rally one of the best ever!

So a huge thank you to all involved; to our traders, many of who travelled long distances from the middle of the night to get to us early; to all our club members, who were involved in the menial tasks from putting out road signs to printing leaflets and humping tables and traders’ wares in and out of the halls; and to you, our visitors, for turning out in force in very cold weather, on Mother’s Day to boot, and having to cope with a few parking issues that were, thankfully, not of our making.

Pictures follow (click the link below)

(more…)

We’re nearly there…

March 09, 2013 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, Hamfest, News

Bringnbuy

David G0ICJ prepares the Bring And Buy stall for tomorrow

Yes friends, the Wythall Radio Rally 2013 is almost upon us!

Members have been busy this afternoon preparing the halls at Woodrush School, Wythall, for the annual event that is the highlight of our year!

Called “Hamfests” by our cousins across the pond, radio rallies are an important part of UK club activities.  The modest fee (£2.50 in our case) that you pay on our door goes towards keeping our club going, and without the club there would of course be no rally next year, so to some extent it is self-perpetuating; come to our radio fair and there will be another one next year for you!

Colinear

It takes 3 people (Steven 2E0SDD, Callum M0MCX and Dave G3YXM) to erect the antenna for the talk-in station!

As we half-expected, parking may be a small issue this year.

The school fields where we normally park are waterlogged after the massive amounts of rain and snow we have experienced this winter, so visitors will need to find on-street parking in the vicinity and walk a short distance to us.

We would ask that, since the school is in a primarily residential area, visitors remain aware of this and park with consideration for our local residents. Use talk-in on 145.550 MHz and watch out for our helpers as you approach for further assistance.

We can’t wait to see you tomorrow! We hope you have a great day!

Planning for the Wythall Radio Rally

March 04, 2013 By: Chris G7DDN Category: Club, Hamfest, News

Wythall Radio Club’s annual radio and electronics fair (known to Hams in the UK as  a “rally”) takes place this coming Sunday 10th March.

Members are pulling out all the stops to make sure that, whether you are a trader or a visitor, you enjoy your visit to us. This Tuesday, our weekly club meeting will be taken up with our final preparations for the big day. Visitors are, of course, welcome on Tuesday, though be warned, you may end up with a job to do on the day! :-)24

The Wythall Rally itself takes place at Woodrush School, Shawhurst Lane, Wythall, (B47 5JW for those who have SatNavs!) and doors open at 10.00am.

It is worth noting that we may have less room for on-site parking this year, depending on the waterlogged state of the school playing fields where we normally are allowed to park. We will try to update you via the website nearer the time so that you know in advance if you need to park a little further away than normal in order to get to us. Talk-in will also advise you on 145.550MHz FM on the day.

Whatever the case, we look forward to welcoming you to one of Ham Radio’s best days out in the Midlands!