President’s Award
Ryan Rager AF4O
Has anyone known Ryan to not be doing Amateur Radio? Anyone? Ryan is always ready, willing and able to deploy for anything Amateur Radio related: Need help putting up a wire? He’s there. Need help pouring concrete for the base of your new tower? Done. Need to dig into something obscure. He’s there. He is always ready to help anyone when it comes to Amateur Radio. UPARC is fortunate to have him!
PS. We need to remind Ryan he isn’t in the Air Force any longer and doesn’t need to stand at attention!
Presentation
Home Brew
This month’s presentation was all about things club members built themselves. Gerry WR6N started us off by showing us a radio he built in the 1970s from a kit. Apologies but I do not recall the make and model of the radio.
Moving on to antennas, Alan W4UB started off with a copper j-pole he built. Originally started as a project by Jack N4KIN, Jack realized it was going to cost more to finish as he didn’t have the tools for soldering the antenna so Alan took the parts, completed the build and it was donated to UPARC.
I’d like to see a show of hands…How many people in the club are on the air with an EFHW wire antenna with one of Alan’s famous Alan’s Baluns (TM)?!?! The author has one and I’m willing to bet there are more than a dozen people using them. Mine works great on 80-6!
Next, Ray W8RD showed us how easy it is to build a 10M antenna from that scrap coax you have laying around the shack.
Then came Dee W4DCH with the same concept but for VHF/UHF.
Finally there is our President, Fred W2SUB. Fred was telling us about an EFHW antenna kit from the ARRL. Of course what he’s using isn’t what he bought as the Balun was upgraded by Alan at Alan’s Baluns. In a contest of which works better, ARRL as shipped or post upgrade by Alan, the author’s money is on the later.
Meeting after the Meeting
After a morning of updates on the club and learning something new, some of us head down the road to continue the fellowship over lunch at Sonny’s BBQ in Clearwater. We had a good time, ate good food and NO adult beverages were consumed. We cannot prove this since the author forgot to take a picture of the gathering. Anyone is welcome to join us so come on down after the general meeting!
