February WARS Meeting

WARS (Willits Amateur Radio Society) will hold a meeting on Saturday,  Feb 21, 2015, at 11:30 am, at Old Mission Pizza in Willits. All hams and their families are welcome to attend. This is a great time to visit with old friends, or meet face to face with folks you have only ‘met on the net’. The club will buy the pizza and you buy your drink(s) and anything special like a sandwich or salad bar. Mike Stephens, a local wildlife biologist and owl specialist, will be speaking on “Radio Technology Used for Studying and Surveying Wildlife”. He will be talking about the tracking of Spotted Owls and Marbled Murrlets using RADAR (in a van) for studies deep in the woods. Mike will also have photos and sample radio transmitters for inspection.

May 17th WARS Pizza Meeting

WARS (Willits Amateur Radio Society) will hold a meeting on Saturday, May 17, 2014, at 11:30 am, at Old Mission Pizza, Willits in lieu of our spring seminar. All hams and their families are welcome to attend. This is a great time to visit with old friends, or meet face to face with folks you have only “met on the net”. The club will buy the pizza and you buy your drink(s) and anything special like a sandwich or salad bar.

A speaker is being sought and will be announced shortly. We will also take ideas for activities that members are interested in for future meetings so, bring your ideas and be ready to share with the rest of us.

Dues for 2014: $15.00 each or $22.50 for two in a household are now due and payable, either at the meeting or by mailing a payment to:

WARS, PO Box 73, Willits, CA 95490.

Donations are always appreciated.

Annual St Patricks Day Luncheon

WARS (Willits Amateur Radio Society) has a social lunch coming up  Monday March 17, 2014  at the Willits Senior Center, 1501 Baechtel Rd.  Plenty of Corned Beef and Cabbage will be served along with lots of great conversation and  fun. $6 ($5 for seniors) and parking is limited, so it is suggested that arrival time should be no later than 11:45.

Announcement: WARS Meeting Feb 15, 2014 in Willits

WARS (Willits Amateur Radio Society) will hold a meeting on:

Saturday, February 15, 2014, at 1130 am, at The Old Mission Pizza in south Willits.

The club will buy the pizza. You buy your own drink(s).

We will have a speaker and will take ideas for activities that members are interested in for future meetings.

Dues for 2014: $15.00 each or $22.50 for two in a household are now due and payable, either at the meeting or by mailing a payment to: WARS, PO Box 73, Willits, CA 95490. Donations are always appreciated.

In the meantime, Wednesday evenings, check into the Willits local simplex net, 146.445 at seven and then the county wide net at seven thirty 147.390 (plus offset with a PL of 103.5). The Walking Repeater net gets started at about eight on 145.555 simplex.

Thursday evenings at seven the YL net, for ladies only is held on 147.390 (the county wide linked repeater system) followed at seven thirty by the Swap net, a good place to sell/trade or just give away unused radio equipment or make your “wants” known.

Pass the word to other hams that you think might be interested in attending.

Joyce KJ6ZVS

Mendocino County Ham Radio Nets

If you’re new to ham radio in the Mendocino area, there are several weekly VHF amateur radio networks that are worthwhile. Most (but not all) of the nets are held each Wednesday evening. There are local city-area nets followed by a county-wide linked-repeater net at 7:30PM. That’s followed by a county-wide simplex net, Walking Repeaters, at around 8:00PM.

The up-to-date list of Mendocino area nets can be found at McARCS Net Page.

WARS – Willits Amateur Radio Society – May 2013 Meeting

WARS  (Willits Amateur Radio Society)  will hold a meeting on:

Saturday May 18,  at 1130  am,  at The Old Mission Pizza in south Willits.

The club will buy the pizza. You buy your own drink(s).

We will talk about what we have been doing, and a few of the things we plan to do.  We will take ideas of things to do that members are interested in.

Lake County hams have some upcoming events and we will pass the word about them as soon as we get additional information.
In the meantime, besides this e-mail, check into the local Willits simplex net  146.445  at seven pm on Wednesday nights.  Also the county wide net on 147.390  plus offset with a PL of 103.5.  This is on Wednesday nights also at seven thirty pm.  Also for information, there is the Walking Repeater net, about eight pm Wednesday nights.  This is on 145.555 simplex.

Pass the word to other hams you think might be interested in attending.

TNX   Len  WA6KLK   CEO  WARS 2013

March 9th – Willits Amateur Radio Society (WARS) Seminar

WARS  Willits Amateur Radio Society  will host a seminar on saturday March 9 at the Mormon Church in south Willits.  It will start at 10:00 and will last about four hours.  This will be for new and not so new hams, or anyone interested in amateur radio.

Tim  WB9NJs will host and moderate.  The subjects will be announced shortly, but an ARRL represenative is scheduled to be there also to talk about ARRL.    Cookies, juicies, and water will be available.  NO tobacco or coffee please.  No charge is made for this but a small donation would be appreciated to help cover costs.  In the fall a seminair will be held that will be for all folks again, but pointed more at the general class.

Reminder: WARS meeting Nov 24 at Old Mission Pizza

WARS meets this Saturday, 11.24, at 11:30 a.m., Old Mission Pizza, South end of Willits.

Carl, KB6ZST, and George, K7WWA, will present short antenna programs/info.

We need to have elections of new Officers for 2013.

Hope to see you there,

73, Jim

MCARCS and WARS Holiday Dinner 2012

Calling all Mendo-Lake Hams!

The Mendocino County Amateur Radio Communication Service (MCARCS) and Willits Amateur Radio Society (WARS) annual Ham Radio Holiday Dinner is just around the corner.

You don’t have to be a member of either club to attend, as this dinner is open to all hams in the Mendo, Lake, Somona, and southern Humboldt counties.

This year’s dinner will be held at the Broiler Steakhouse in Redwood Valley on Friday December 14th.

Happy hour (no host bar) starts at 6:00 PM, with dinner seating at 7:00 PM. The price this year is $30 per meal, all-inclusive.

73,

Tim – WB9NJS
Sharon Sue – KE6YKY

 

Ham Club Meetings for Feb 2012

MCARCS – Feb 2, 2012

• Where: Round Table Pizza, Ukiah (downtown)
• When: Thursday, Feb 2, 5:30PM
• Who: Guest speaker Dan Grebil, WD6FKJ, Chief of Ukiah Valley Fire, will cover the county-wide communications system — how it’s used and how it works.
• Also: Upcoming community events and recruiting for March licensing course and test.
• Food: Pizza by the slice ($2 each)

WARS – Feb 11, 2012

• Where: Old Mission Pizza, Willits (near Ray’s market)
• When: Saturday, Feb 11, 11:00AM
• What: Ham radio equipment, then and now. Bring your old tube gear or cool new gear, photos, and favorite memories.
• Also: There will be a raffle prize, $1 per ticket.
• Food: Pizza provided (contributions welcome, put them in the jar)

McARCS and WARS Holiday Dinner 2011

Calling all Mendo-Lake Hams! The Mendocino County Amateur Radio Communication Service (MCARCS) and Willits Amateur Radio Society (WARS) annual Holiday Dinner is just around the corner. This year’s dinner will be held at the Broiler Steakhouse in Redwood Valley, on Friday December 16. Happy hour starts at 6:00, with dinner seating at 7:00 PM. The price is $25 per meal, all-inclusive.

All hams in Mendocino, Lake, Northern Sonoma, and Southern Humboldt counties are welcome to attend. No need to be a member of either club. This is a great time to visit with old friends, or meet face to face with folks you have only “met on the net”.

To help control costs for the sponsoring clubs, guests are asked (but not required) to bring a present to donate to the raffle. No need to wrap the gift, and please keep the value at $15 or less. Each club will be providing a special “grand prize” for the raffle.

Seating is limited, so RSVP soon to reserve your seat. Payment is not needed until the night of the event. Please provide the names and callsigns of everyone in your party, as we will be making nametags. You may RSVP to Tim WB9NJS or Sharon KE6YKY by email, by phone (707 459-4116), or if you are a Facebook member, by visiting our Facebook event page at: Ham Radio Holiday Dinner.

Hope to see you all on the 16th!

73, Tim – WB9NJS

 

WARS November Meeting and Seminar

Yesterday the Willits Amateur Radio Society (WARS) hosted another meeting and seminar in Willits. Many thanks to Len Gwinn, WA6KLK for putting this together once again.

Several topics were presented:

• Brian, K6FTY, was not able to make it due to a last minute hydroelectric power plant obligation, but Len described Brian’s radio setup, and his success at getting a signal out from the remote mountainous terrain of Trinity County. We’re hoping Brian will be able to attend the next meeting.
• Bill Hillendahl, KH6GJV, the San Francisco ARRL Section Manager, gave us an update on news and related topics. This included the status on legal cases involving topics like neighborhood CCRs being challenged for exterior antennas, tower configurations, and even describing a “ride along” with the FCC for hunting down an “open mic” signal on a Northern California repeater.
• Tim, WB9NJS, made a very interesting presentation about mountain signal propagation and showed maps of signal paths and elevation profiles between various stations he has contacted. This all came about when he got his new VHF Yagi operational and discovered that the direct path to other stations wasn’t always the best. Propagation was often made possible along non-line-of-site paths by knife edge diffraction and reflections over and between mountain peaks. (We’re hoping to add a short article about it to MendoRadio soon.)
• WARS officers were elected for 2011. Jim Cline, W6JRC, stepped up as the next CEO, and many thanks again to Len Gwinn for revitalizing and reorganizing WARS over the last couple years. The meetings/seminars, pizza gatherings, St. Patrick’s day lunch, and picnics have been appreciated by all of us Mendocino hams.

Hamfest — April 30, 2011

The Valley of the Moon Amateur Radio Club Hamfest will be April 30. This is a half-day event, open to the public, to demonstrate ham radio and meet other hams in the area.

This year’s event includes:

• Pancake breakfast (fund raiser)
• Swap meet for new and used radio equipment
• Demos of fox-hunting
• VE session for ham licensing or upgrades
• A display of station gear and emergency vehicles

Place: Sonoma Veterans Memorial Building, 126 First Street West, Sonoma
Time: 8 AM – 12 Noon
Admission: Free, but there is a charge for breakfast ($6)
Talk-in: 145.350 MHz (88.5 pl)

A 2 Meter J-Pole Jig

Last week’s McARCs meeting/workshop in Mendocino was a lot of fun. The turn-out was good too — better than anticipated. I’d like to thank all of those who made this meeting possible and who helped out with the antenna workshop.

One of the interesting demonstrations was Alan’s (WA6JBK) j-pole jig which he uses to rapidly construct 2 meter J-poles from ordinary copper pipe (same as used for home plumbing).  Notice how Alan decouples the coax by passing it within the lower segment of the antenna pipe.

WA6JBK's J-pole jig for building 2M antennas

I use a similar J-pole made by Len, WA6KLK, and they’re strong, easy to setup antennas that work quite well. Here’s how to make a J-pole — but note the difference in how the coax is attached. (It would be fun to electrically compare the difference in the two decoupling methods: wire loop vs. Alan’s copper sleeve.)

Another antenna construction project presented by Steve, KJ6EIF was a hands-on build your own super cheap 2M Yagi-Uda antenna (for only $5). The design is based on WA5VJB’s cheap yagi. Steve made one about a year ago and it tested out pretty well.

We made the Yagi antennas from lengths of ordinary #12 house wiring attached to wooden garden stakes. The feed method was a simple half-folded dipole (no gamma match or balun needed.) All-in-all it took about an hour to build each antenna.

Unfortunately… after construction, we discovered that our antenna resonance rang up around 143-144 MHz, quite a lot lower than we had intended. We experimented around a bit with shortening the driven element and shunting its folded-side, but neither changed the frequency by much (although the shunt did give better control over SWR.) We suspect the culprit to be the insulation we left on the directors. We kept it on to make the elements stronger in the wind, but insulation will affect the velocity factor, making those elements electrically longer than they should be. On a Yagi-Uda, you can get by with directors that are a bit too short, but if you make them too long, the phasing of the array is quickly spoiled.  Well, not a problem… we will try snipping down the directors to see if we can get the Yagi where we want it. (We’ll let you know how this works out.)

Thanks again to all of those who made this workshop a fun and educational McARCs meeting.

McARCs Coast Meeting – April 2, 2011

Don’t forget the special McARCS meeting in Mendocino on April 2.  Note the somewhat relaxed schedule of events and pot luck, “bring your own lunch and some to share”.

Date: April 2, 2011
Time: 10am-2pm
Place: Mendocino High School Multi-purpose room, 10700 Ford Street
Talk-in: 146.820 –103.5

Relaxed agenda:

• Getting Acquainted & Introductions
• Tsunami Event and Exercise de-briefing
• School District Exercise Evaluation
• Future Public Service Communications Opportunities
• Lunch – bring your own and something to share

Workshops as requested:

• Getting Started for New Hams
• FLDIGI Communications (bring laptop)
• Copper J-Pole Antenna Construction
• 2 meter Beam Construction

Holiday Dinner Was Good

The holiday ham radio dinner was enjoyable this year. Many thanks to the hosts, Tim and Sharon Hanna, and all of the others who coordinated behind the scenes to make the dinner memorable.

And also thanks to those who brought raffle prizes. For those of you who won a 10M dipole built by Len, WA6KLK, please be sure to check into the 10M net on 28.405 MHz each Wednesday night at about 8:20PM (following Walking Repeaters on 145.555 MHz.) Let’s make sure the antenna is working well!

It’s sure been a rainy fall (and now winter) and there’s not been much time to construct any new radio or antenna experiments and articles. But, I’ve continued to think about new ideas, and I hope to be posting more soon. Antenna puzzle #2 coming up soon.