Today’s meeting presentation by Henry, K2BFY, “Virginia QSO Party Logging & Scoring” is now available on the LARG website. Link . Video on You-Tube (unlisted, link required)
Video from February Meeting posted
The video of Kevin, KM4ACK’s presentation on building VHF antennas has been posted to the presentations page and is available direct here (YouTube).
All available videos of LARG club meeting presentations are accessible via this YouTube playlist.
73 Steve KS1G LARG VP
January Meeting Program Posted
Thank you to everyone who braved the cold and ice spots to come out this morning. The presentation and video from today’s January LARG meeting are posted!
(scroll down to the bottom of the page)
Thank you to Gary, N7BRJ, for his informative talk on Amateur Radio Astronomy.
Good luck to everyone participating in the ARRL January VHF Contest, the North America QSO Party, or chasing the TX5S Clipperton Island DXpedition!
“See” you all on the air and at next month’s meeting. 73 Steve KS1G, LARG VP.
November Meeting and Program
We had a great turnout with many old faces and several visitors! Today’s presentation from Steve, KS1G, “Yet Another Go Box”, has been added to the Presentations area.
ARISS Final Set-Up
Today was a busy day finalizing the video production, re-checking audio levels, and practice, practice, practice with the full radio & production crew and FSMS faculty. A big thank you to everyone who helped today, including LARG members WA4TXE, KG4TIH, K0ZR, N0JSD, and N4PD (my apologies if I missed anyone) and Paulson’s friends Dave, Gary, and Parker.
We made a QSO via AO-91, and monitored a successful school contact with a ground station in Maryland using the primary and backup stations. My home SATNOGS station captured much of the transmission from the ISS. You can listen to it here. (Use the audio tab. The full contact was closer to 11 minutes; the audio becomes decent about 90 seconds in. I’m sure other SATNOGS stations did as well or better.)
Tomorrow (Tuesday 10/29) is CONTACT DAY! The main crew will be arriving at the school ~7:00 AM. If you are planning on helping (we can use a few more ham-hands and friends of hams backstage) please arrive at Farmwell Station MS by 9:00 AM and check in at the office to get your visitor badge. The program starts around 10:00. CONTACT TIME is currently 11:00:41 (may change a little by tomorrow morning). Contact will finish about 11:11, and students will be dismissed before 11:30.
Live Stream: https://live.myvrspot.com/player?udi=bG91ZG91bg==&c=ZmFybWlzcw== starting about 10:25AM for the pre-contact program. [The program may be several seconds up to 30 seconds delayed from live radio.]
Listen from home: 145.8 MHZ, FM. An HT (orient sideways to the ISS location) can receive much of the pass. You may need squelch off. More info at ariss.org, amsat.org. https://www.heavens-above.com/main.aspx and https://www.n2yo.com/?s=25544&live=1
RF QUIET REQUEST: If on school grounds, please, avoid transmitting on 2M, particularly anywhere near 145.80 MHz, during the contact period to not impair our reception of the ISS. We are using UHF simplex for local coordination.
We will need help with tear-down. If you can help with tear-down, please try to arrive about noon. (Later arrivals welcome!) If you cannot arrive until later, we can probably still use your help to remove the equipment and get it back to the KS1G or KG4TIH QTHs. In particular, a pickup that can handle the antenna base (a 6x6x1 angle iron frame, can be stacked on-edge) is needed.
I’d like to thank again everyone for their assistance. This has been a big effort, and we getting a huge amount of publicity for LARG and amateur radio!
73s, de KS1G
ARISS Station – Antenna Setup
After yesterday’s very soggy delivery of all the gear to the school, today began setup. The Ashburn Fire Station had to respond to a call, so their tower truck was delayed. To make progress, a bunch of us relayed all the items that would fit through the hatch and carried them to the antenna site above the auditorium. We pulled the antenna base (oof!) and 2M antenna with rope. The the tower truck arrived and made quick work of getting the ballast for the antenna base (several hundred pounds of concrete blocks) onto the roof. THANK YOU ASHBURN STATION FD.
We quickly assembled the antenna, mast, base, and supporting electronics and cables and just managed to get everything together before sundown. The results are very satisfying:
Thursday, we complete set-up and be ready for rehearsal with the faculty and students that afternoon after school.
THANK YOU to everyone who helped with set-up today!
73 de KS1G
AMSAT Journal 50th Anniv. Edition Free Download
And on the heels of John W5ODJ’s 1st satellite QSO (congrats!), AMSAT-NA has made their special 50th Anniversary Edition of The AMSAT Journal available to all. Some wonderful satellite history in this issue – a keeper! If you enjoy this issue, please consider joining AMSAT today!
The .pdf is here.
See you on “the birds”! 73 de KS1G