List of Updates I Want to Make
Friday, November 30th, 2012 2:30pm Friday
Sometimes I get behind and feeling scatter-brained, and it’s hard to make clear posts. Plus I’ve slept poorly this week and that gets me sideways.
What I do then is make a list of topics and try to follow up with a more detailed post when I have time. Hopefully I’ll have a good half hour later tomorrow. (What a joke, I see the list of things I want to update and it’ll take me at least an hour or two)
1) Wed’s net reports — Lots of activity with K8TQK taking 30 check-ins and N9OLT taking 14. Both N9OLT (144.240, 7pm central) and K8TQK (144.252, 8:30pm eastern) will be ON next Wed. WB9LYH is back on 144.240 on Dec. 12th and 19th.
2) Variety of nets within tropo range of WI and the Great Lakes are moving around. Some are moving soon, others later. Biggest news for this blog is that K8TQK’s 144.252 net will be moving to Monday nights, effective Jan 7th, 2012. Same start time of 8:30pm eastern. Same antenna pattern — starts N, then NE, E, SE, S, SW, W and NW over the next hour or so.
3) Another net that will be moving to Mondays is out of EM84, the NOGA net — (Northern GA). This net will move effective this Monday, Dec. 3rd. W4TMW is your net control Start time is 8:00pm eastern. The antenna pattern is to start *South* then go clockwise from there, or SW, W, NW, N, NE, E and SE. You will notice that the antenna patterns and start times for the K8TQK and W4TMW nets are offset by design so that VHF’ers will be able to try for either net. Bob and Tom should have great coverage over many states and Ontario. Glad that they are making the move back to the traditional 2m night — Monday night. (I should make a post sometime about the old tradition of Mondays being 144 night, Tuesdays 222 night and Wednesdays 432.)
4) Want to mention the W5VHF net from OK has moved to Monday nights. It’s called by KD5ZVE or K5SW from EM26, eastern OK. This net is on 144.190 at 8pm central. I don’t know the antenna pattern. This will help fill in part of the gap left behind by the former N0PB net from EM29, northern MO.
5) I should also mention that on Monday nights, there are several other nets out of EN93, FN12 and EL98. I’ll try to post details when I have time. All this info is available every morning in KA1ZE’s .205MorningReport. You can access Stan’s amazing newsletter (really, it’s a magazine!) via his website — www.ka1ze.com.
6) The 144.240 net from WI will stay on Wed. nights. WB9LYH would like to see how the Wed. net does on a night where there are no other competing nets within several hundred miles of WI.
7) Will also want to mention N4PZ’s 432.100 activity on Monday night, at 8pm central, from EN52gb, about 70-80 miles west of Chicago.
8) K0SIX wants folks to know about Sunday night nets out of MN on both 6m and 2m.
K0SIX in EN35 (about an hour north of the Twin Cities) gets on 50.175 at 8:30pm Sundays and calls around. Vince has a very big signal on 6m, so he should be able to work guys out to 250-400 miles via groundwave (no special enhancement or sporadic E skip) He’s also one of the nicest Viking fans I know, so make sure to say hello to the K0SIX 6m net on Sunday nights.
There may be times around the holidays where K0SIX is unable to call the net, and if that happens, just look for him the next Sunday. You could also confirm whether he’s on by asking at the ON4KST.com real-time ham chat. Many of these net controls are using the ON4KST.com chat to type updates in real-time. The chat is free, no BS and available 7/24/365. Over 3500 VHF’ers have joined by now. Read this post http://kc9bqa.com/?p=6309 to learn more. Or click on the permanlink called “ON4KST.com Ham Chat Rooms” under ESSENTIAL POSTS on the lower right of this page.
The 2m net out of MN is called by KA0PQW Matt in EN33, far southern MN. It’s on 144.260 at 9pm Sundays. Matt also has a nice signal; I can usually work him on a 250+ mile path.
9) A new beacon is on the air from EN84gq. It’s the WB2LHP/B on 144.285, up on a TV station tower, near Traverse City, MI. It transmits 1 watt via a vertical antenna. I think this net must be from EN74, not EN84. Traverse City is on the NW side of Lower MI, and it’s squarely in EN74-land. I’ll see if I can get the straight scoop on this, but if it’s Traverse City, it’s EN74.
10) I will want to share some promotional material about the exciting rule changes in the ARRL Jan VHF contest. These changes should make it more enjoyable for newcomers and those with limited stations. The ARRL Jan VHF contest is Jan 19-20th, 2012. See this post for more details — http://kc9bqa.com/?p=6262
11) The VHF CONTESTING SCHOOL ARTICLES are also at that link http://kc9bqa.com/?p=6262 Don’t know how to “do” a VHF/UHF contest? No worries, these articles are designed to help someone get comfortable with calling CQ contest. Spread the articles to your ham buddies and improve VHF/UHF Contesting in your area.
Good grief, am I really up to 11 different topics? Well, I gotta let it go, because I’m out of time for now. What I will try to do in the next several days is break these nuggets up into different posts. For now, you have the outline.