Serving Wayne County Ohio since 1972

Monthly Meeting • Third Thursday Wayne Co Communication Center • Corner of Burbank & Oldman Rds • Wooster, Ohio

W8WOO Repeaters

147.21 Mhz (PL 88.5) • 443.175 Mhz (No PL)

NOVEMBER MEETING The regular meeting of the Wayne Amateur Radio Club will be on Thursday at 7;30 p.m. on November 19, 2015, at the Wayne County Communications Center at the corner of Burbank and Oldman roads in Wooster.

MARCS Radio Training The Wooster Amateur Radio Club has taken on the task of manning the new MARCS radio system stationed in the EMA, Wooster Hospital, Orville Hospital and other locations within Wayne County. The radio equipment has been installed at these locations by the state. This system is operated by the Ohio Dept of Health (ODH) and covers all counties in the state. It involves EMA offices, fire and police agencies. In the event of a disaster of any kind where other forms of communication are disabled the MARCS radio system will be activated in the local area, the North East Region or state wide if necessary. The systems are closely related to the amateur radios used by our local “hams” , making “us” the most logical persons to step forward and assume responsibility for the operation of this equipment. We are asking for “a few good men” (and ladies too) to step forward and provide support for this endeavor. The initial training is not complex and will be offered at the November WARC meeting. Sub-sequent hands-on training will be held at the EMA and Wooster Hospital at dates to be an-nounced later. Please give this call for support your serious consideration. Send an E-mail with name and E-mail address to ….John Lilburn@AOL.com ……. We will be monitoring the W8WOO repeaters:147.21 Mhz, PL 88.5 • and • 443.175 Mhz, no PL Should you need directions, give us a call. See you there.

A NEW HEATHKIT! SO, WHY AM I NOT EXCITED?

By Dan Romanchik • KB6NU A couple of weeks ago I got an e-mail from Heathkit. Yes, the NEW Heathkit. you might remember that a couple of years ago, there was all this hype about a “new” Heathkit and how they were going to start designing new kits as well as revive popular old designs. Then, nothing. They went completely quiet-—until a couple of weeks ago. In an e-mail sent to their “insiders,” they say: "Dear Heathkit Insider, 'What I really hope Heathkit will produce,' a Silicon Valley colleague recently told me, 'is a new radio kit with a beautiful finish, maybe in rosewood.' Something great to enjoy building and learn from, and also visually stunning, so he could put it in his living room and keep it forever. "Today, my friend gets his wish. They then go on to explain all of the work they’ve been doing in relocating Heathkit to Santa Cruz, CA, acquiring a second company, and securing all the intellectual property rights to the old Heathkit man-uals and logos (meaning no more bootleg copies on the Internet). The e-mail continues: "That’s a lot, but there’s more. We’ve designed and developed a wide range of entirely new kit prod-ucts. We authored the manuals for these kits, complete with the beautiful line art you rely on, preserv-ing and respecting our iconic historic Heathkit style. We developed many new inventions and filed patents on them……We built the back office infrastructure, vendor and supply chain relationships, systems, procedures, operations methods, and well-thought-out corporate structure that a manufac-turing company needs to support its customers, to allow us to scale instantly the day we resume ma-jor kit sales. All this effort enables us to introduce a fleet of new kits and helps ensure Heathkit can grow, prosper, and continue to bring you great new products for a very long time." So, what’s the exciting news? A new QRP transceiver? Maybe a shortwave radio? A new 100-in-1 ex-perimenter kit for Makers? Uh-uh. Sorry. The "exciting" news is a tuned radio frequency (TRF) AM band (yes, I said AM band) ra-dio kit that costs $150 (https://shop.heathkit.com/shop/product/explorer-jr-trf-am-radio-receiver-kit-black-case-gr-150-bk-16). Not only is that crazy expensive for an AM radio, it doesn’t even come with a speaker. On top of that, there’s no soldering. You screw all of the components to the board. I’m speechless (well, figuratively, not literally). I’m not sure what the target market is for this product. It’s certainly not amateur radio operators, who expect a lot more (in terms of both functionality and “fun”) for their money. Nor is it the "Maker" folks, who want something more challenging than an AM radio. I think that if I took this to show off at the local Ann Arbor Maker group, they’d laugh me out of the place. I really hope that they have something better up their sleeves. A strong Heathkit would be good for the Maker movement and for ham radio. When not thinking about what kit to build next, Dan, KB6NU, operates CW on the HF bands (mostly 40m and 30m). His #1-rated amateur radio blog can be found at KB6NU.Com, and you can e-mail questions, comments, or complaints to cwgeek@kb6nu.com.

Wayne Amateur Radio Club Minutes of Oct 15, 2015 Meeting

President Tom Zilko (N8JBC) opened the meeting at 19:34 hours with 8 members present. Secretary’s Report – John Lilburn (KF4UTY) The minutes for the last WARC meeting held on Sep. 15, 2015 were reviewed, having been sent to the members in the notice of Oct. meeting via E-mail”. A motion to accept this report was made by Stan Kinney and seconded by Russ McQuate. The motion passed. Treasurer’s Report – Russ McQuate (K8RMC) The club’s treasurer presented a report detailing the current finances of the WARC. A motion to accept this report was made by Stan Kinney and seconded by Dave Balint. The motion passed. Repeater Trustee’s Report Mike Brugger (N8CEY) not present The order for the Yaesu 2 meter/ 440 digital repeater has been approved and we are awaiting delivery which has been held up due to a production backlog. The Diamond # 300 antenna order will be held up awaiting the arrival of the Yaesu.

Emergency Coordinator Mike Brugger Skywarn Spotter Class was held on Oct 24th at the Rittman High School. 46 people attended the class which consisted of a power point presentation by Mike. Ham Fests - Fulton County – 12/5/15 Strasburg – 1/24/16 Mansfield – 2/21/16 DX Group – Russ McQuate The September meeting was held at the home of Elmer Steingass (W8AV) on Sept 22. The October meeting will be held at the home of Dave Balint (N8IW) on Oct 22 Old Business The Xmas tree lights were installed at the Cemetery on Oct 14th Two strings were fitted with 40 watt LED lights which show improvement in illumination. Final decision on future use of LED’s will be made after use through the Christmas season. New Business

The 147.345 repeater is now up and running. There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 19:52 hours Russ McQuate made a presentation of Antenna Modeling. Submitted by John Lilburn, KF4UTY WARC Secretary E-mail – jlilburn@aol.com

LET’S TALK • from Scott Yonally Hi Gang, Wow, fall has definitely arrived!!! The Leaves are falling fast and furious and it won’t be long now that we will be in winter. Yes, I said that ugly word, but let’s face it, some portions of our state have even seen some “snow”.. I wanted to pop into your email boxes just for a quick update.. As some of you know the scores are out for “Field Day.” Yup, and Ohio did really great this year. In the overall scoring throughout the country with all classes figured in, Ohio’s own DELARA scored in the top 10 stations with a whopping 15,766 points. They were 2nd in the county for (4A) stations losing out only to the Huntsville Alabama group K4BFT who had 17,038 points. All in all, Ohio did really GREAT and everyone should be proud, not because of your rankings (yes, that’s always something to show-off about) but moreover, the weather was absolutely terrible, the bands were terrible and yet, even though all these things were factors, the public got a chance to learn something about us. We also got a learning lesson from it. Yes, it was raining, but guess what, when that time comes and we get the call to help in a disaster, the sun most likely won’t be shining. It won’t be the greatest of temperatures, and the band conditions won’t be the greatest either, yet throughout all of these adversities, we’ve shown the public (and ourselves) that we can do it. We can get the messages through “when all else fails..” Within Ohio here’s how the rankings went.. 1 K8ES 15,766 4A DELARA 2 N8BC 11,044 6A Lake County ARS (LCARS) 3 W8DXA 9,162 2A Northern OH DX Assn (NODX) 4 K8BF 8,990 4A Portage County ARS (PCARS) 5 K8PI 7,826 3A Dial RC Now quickly onto another couple of subjects.. ** Are you getting those emails from the Great Lakes Director or Section Manager? Now, for those of you who may not want to go to all the bother of checking your account with the League, or you are just not League members, you still have a chance to get these important emails. All you have to do is to “Opt-In” to receive them. There’s a link to do this on the Ohio Section website, it’s on the bottom left corner.. For your convenience, here’s a direct link to it: http://arrl-ohio.org/forwarder/forwarding.html I urge all of you to make sure that everyone, regardless of whether they are a League member or not, get signed up for one of these options. You can always “Opt-Out” at any time if you feel this is not what you were expecting. But, who in their right mind would want to miss out on anything coming out of the Great Lakes Director or the Ohio Section Manager? ** The Amateur Radio Parity Act of 2015 bill in the US House (H.R. 1301) now has 108 cosponsors with Representative Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania just signing on! ARRL President Kay Craigie, N3KN, credited ARRL members “who understand the importance of the legislation” with making it possible to reach that milestone. Remember - a big bag of letters from the constituents is always more impressive than ones trickling in day after day. The Ohio Section Website.. You can find the Ohio Section Website at: http://arrlohio.org If you don’t have this website set as your home page, I urge you to do so. This website is one of the exceptions to the rules.. It changes all the time. It’s never stagnating, and I would highly rec-ommend that you check into the website at least 3 times per week or more if you can. Yes, it does change that much! Now, how do I know so much about the website?? I’m the webmaster for it! ** HEY, did you see that there’s another NEW – one question – questionnaire on the Ohio Section Website. I’ve been changing the questions about once every couple of weeks or so. It only asks one question and it will take all of about 2 seconds for you to answer it, and you can see how your answer stacks up with oth-ers instantly. If you haven’t done it yet, please do.. I really want to hear from you.

** Are you a member of the ARRL?? If you aren’t a League member, this is a great opportunity to become one. Want more information on how to join? Here’s the link: http://www.arrl.org/membership-levels.

There’s even a 90 day FREE trial that you can apply for if you’ve never been a member.. Got questions about being a member or what the League is all about? Send me an email.. n8sy@arrl.org I’ll be happy

to call or write to you or even call you if you’ve given me your phone number. ** Hey, and don’t forget to turn your clocks back one hour this Sunday, November 1st.. This is when we get to gain that hour back that we lost early last spring.. and it’s a really neat birthday present for me.. I get to sleep in an extra hour!! 73, for now.. Scott..

• DX GROUP • The group meets on the fourth Tuesday of each month. The next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, November 24, 2015, at the home of “Goose” Steingass (W8AV). If you like to talk radio, work DX, or just need a night out …. this is your place. Among other things, we will be discussing recent con-testing activity, upcoming contests, recent DX contacts and activities. In oth-er words, “good ol’ Ham Radio”.

The WARC DX Group also promotes and participates in a weekly DX Net every Thursday be-ginning when you hear someone talking. The net will be on 147.48 (simplex). Listen in, par-ticipate and work some DX. You’ll find everyone very friendly and helpful.

NEW DXCC CARD CHECKER “Goose” Steingass (W8AV) has recently been appointed as an official DXCC QSL card checker. If you want to obtain credit towards a DXCC award or endorsement, visit the ARRL website and make an on-line ap-plication. Then take your QSL cards and paperwork to “Goose” for verifi-cation and checking. It’s great to have a card checker in our midst. You

may email “Goose” at w8av@aol.com

HAMFESTS A listing of area hamfests can be found towards the end of “Dales Tales” above. For details on other upcoming events and hamfests, please visit the WARC web site at w8woo.com.

Every Wednesday evening at 9:00 PM local time (0100Z), the Wayne Amateur Radio Club

sponsors a n et on 2 meters using the W8WOO club repeater. The frequency is 147.21+ (PL

88.5). Tom Zilko (N8JBG) handles the check-ins and net activity. It is a general information

net and everyone is welcome to participate. Give it a try.

ANYTHING TO ADD? If you have any announcements that you want to put in a newsletter or you feel inclined to write an article, let me know. You can email me at K8RMC@arrl.net and I’ll do my best to get it in writing.

WEEKLY CLUB NET