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UPARC

May 2023 General Meeting Recap

By Jack Kinney, N4KIN on May 12, 2023

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 … Read the rest

Honeymoon Island Activation April 2023

By Tom Schaefer NY4I on May 2, 2023

On Saturday, April 29, 2023, UPARC members set out to Honeymoon Island State Park to operate in the field for a Parks on the Air (POTA) activation. Being a Florida State Park, Honeymoon Island is POTA park K-1880. Normally, this means we setup antennas and radios and sit back and work the pileups. But this day, the HF propagation gods took their time showing up. Initially, contacts were hard to come by on SSB. FT8 started off OK but 20m SSB was quite tough. But with perseverance, Team Luria (Charlotte KO4WNK and Joshua KO4VVX) made the majority of the SSB contacts with Olev KO4WUB and Rob WB4IFT making the FT8 contacts.

All total we worked 61 stations with 36 SSB … Read the rest

UPARC in the Park is coming on Saturday, April 29th!

By Tom Schaefer NY4I on April 20, 2023

UPARC will again be activating Honeymoon Island State Park for a POTA activation on Saturday April 29th, 2023 starting at 8:00 AM.

Honeymoon Island State Park is POTA park K-1880 located at the end of the Dunedin Causeway. In case you have not been there before, there is a fee for each car to get into the park so carpooling with others would allow you to share the entrance fee. Pavilions are first come, first serve but we plan to get there early to grab a location with power. Ask on the club’s repeater (147.12 + PL 100 Hz) or on the club’s Slack channel. You can also look for all the antennas in the parking lot near … Read the rest

April 2023 Meeting Recap

By Jack Kinney, N4KIN on April 1, 2023

President’s Award

Alan Streitman W4UB

Need an antenna? Alan. Need a balun? Alan. Radio isn’t working? Alan. MARS mod your Icom 7300? Alan. I could keep going but it’s probably easier to list what Alan hasn’t done for the club or club members since he got his ticket and joined the club. Not one to sit still he’s always helping someone or working on a project. The author likely wouldn’t be on the air without him. Congratulations on receiving the President’s Award this month. Well earned!

Presentation

QSLing

What is a QSL? Why do you want to QSL? Who do you QSL? When should I QSL? When should I send a QSL? All important questions that could be asked about … Read the rest

March 2023 General Meeting Recap

By Jack Kinney, N4KIN on March 5, 2023

President’s Award

Tom Schaefer NY4I

One of the founders of the Upper Pinellas Amateur Radio Club, Tom is an Extra Class operator who loves all things Amateur Radio. An Elmer who has helped the club and many of it’s members not to mention hams throughout the county. Congratulations and thank you for all you do for the hobby and for UPARC Tom. Keep it up!

Presentation

March Mobile Madness

After all of the “business” stuff concluded, we moved on to a presentation about Mobile Installations presented by Ryan KO4KGP. We’ll steer clear of the rabbit holes but suffice to say Ryan has spent more than a little time working on his mobile install. From VHF/UHF to HF, WinLink, APRS, scanners … Read the rest

Why People Say “This Is” when Checking into a Net.

By Tom Schaefer NY4I on February 20, 2023

You may have listened to a local 2m net and heard people saying “This Is” before they give their call sign during check-ins. An alternative is they may say “Net Control” instead of “This is”. Plus there is the combined effort of “Net Control, This is”. Why are they doing this? If you have wondered about that, here is the answer…

One problem when the net control station calls for check-ins is that stations all try to check-in at once and thus can double. Doubling is when two or more competing stations transmit at the same time, one station captures the receiver and gets through rendering the calls of other people transmitting moot since they are not heard. Another … Read the rest

The Joys of Being a Member of a Club

By Tom Schaefer NY4I on February 20, 2023

For those that may not know me, I have mobility issues. While I used to be able to climb ladders to work on antennas, drive ground rods and generally do my own work to setup my ham radio station, unfortunately those things are not possible for me now. That being said, I now depend upon the kindness of friends in UPARC to setup my antennas and sometimes the bigger projects inside the shack too. The point of this post is not only to thank all the wonderful hams in UPARC but also to point out this is one of the benefits of being a member of UPARC.

Of course, UPARC is a club of many interests. We have Field Day, … Read the rest

February 2023 General Meeting Recap

By Jack Kinney, N4KIN on February 4, 2023

President’s Award

Mike Branda KH4N

Mike is an Extra Class ARRL Volunteer Examiner. He has been serving the amateur radio community guiding hams thru the license testing and application process since 1994! If you’re counting that’s 29 years so far. He helps not only our club, but most of the amateur radio clubs in Pinellas County. He is a terrific ambassador for the hobby. Congratulations and thank you for all you do for the hobby Mike. Keep it up!

Presentation

 

Winter Field Day

Fred W2SUB gave the group an update on the results of Winter Field Day. The UPARC and CARS teams did a great job with a calculated (not yet certified) score of more than 35,000 … Read the rest

Winter Field Day 2023

By Jack Kinney, N4KIN on January 29, 2023

 

 Winter Field Day LogoWinter Field Day in West Central Florida is a misnomer. However, it doesn’t stop Upper Pinellas Amateur Radio Club and Clearwater Amateur Radio Society clubs from having a great time!

Antennas

The most important component are the antennas. Without them nothing matters. The antenna team and “The Band Boss” ensure antennas are installed, tuned and ready for contesting. I apologize. I meant to say an Emergency Communications exercise. That’s what we are doing. Absolutely NO competition at the event. None!

The primary antenna is a hex beam antenna. It handles the 10m, 15m and 20m bands. Installed on the top of a five story fire training tower it is higher than everything in surrounding area.

If you have never … Read the rest

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