January Officer Elections

The annual election of officers of the Loudoun Amateur Radio Group, Inc. is coming at our January meeting. All members present may vote, so please be prepared to pay your dues prior to the start of the meeting if you have not already done so, and you must be present in order to vote. Remember, too, that the dues for the 2020 calendar year are (generally) $25.00.

As our Constitution and Bylaws require, the Board of Directors of LARG met in November to identify and recommend a slate of Officer candidates for the election coming at our January meeting. Following our established practice, we will open nominations from the floor to permit write-in candidates in addition to the nominations offered by the Board. We will use written ballots, to be distributed at the meeting. As in the past, immediately upon completion of balloting and counting, we will announce the results.

It is my pleasure to announce the candidates nominated by the Directors.
President – Doug Coulter, K4AIU
Vice-President – Mike White, N4PDY
Treasurer – Steve Edwards, KN4HOZ*
Secretary = Jim Babcock, N4FAF*
* incumbent

We have accomplished many good things during the concluding year. I look forward to many more in 2020. To all of our members, families, and friends I bid you a joyous holiday season and prosperous New Year.

For the Board of Directors,
Dave Putman, KE4S
Chairman

Thursday SSB Net Report Dec 12, 2019

80m – 3675 KHz on 13 DEC 2019 Open 0100Z
Listening 3810 KHz for General class ops to check-in

QNI:
KoZR Jeff
WoMPM John
K8SYH Bill
N4PD Paul
K3WD Bill
KE4S Dave, net control

Closed 0121Z

10m – on 28.405 MHz
No net tonight
KE4S Dave, ncs

Tuesday Slow CW Net Report Dec 3 2019

Net convened on 3544.5 KHz at scheduled time. We were down from the normal frequency to avoid traffic on 3545. Only two of us tonight – Bill K3WD and Dave KE4S. Had a nice chat about our equipment before closing at 8:20PM. Please join us next Tuesday at 8:00PM. 73 de Dave KE4S

Sorry I was unable to join in tonight. I’m out of town again. Looking forward to seeing you as well as others at our upcoming party event this Saturday night. K0ZR

Net Report: Tuesday Slow CW Net, Nov 12, 2019

Called the net schedule at 8:00PM with KT9N, W5ODJ, and KE4S in the conversation. Good signals from all, and I was happy to report I have put my SteppIR back in service after 6 months of making repairs and upgrades. Now I need to start work on my 160/80 meter inverted L – it still is giving problems, but at least I can get on the air on 80 with a G5RV. Chris reported some heavy QRM in northern Leesburg, but John and I had good copy on him. Thanks for checking in – others are welcome to join us each Tuesday evening, and we operate at the speed of the slowest participant. 73 de Dave KE4S

Vienna Wireless Winterfest 2020

As per tradition, we reserved a LARG table at WinterFest!

Table D3, right at room entrance, and a very good spot!

Feel free to bring your stuff, er, treasures. And if you have any big items or large loads, please let me know early, JIC?

As usual, you will want to label and oversee your stuff, although you can often share with other LARGies.

Please advise, and Thanks!

—– Forwarded Message —–
Subject: Early Registration for Clubs at Winterfest 2020

The Vienna Wireless Society (VWS) hamfest, celebrating our 44th year, will once again be held in the Gym at the Annandale Campus of the Northern Virginia Community College on Sunday, March 29, 2020. We hope your Club will again participate in our hamfest.

Early registration is now open! You can register on line here.

If you wish to snag the same table(s) as last year, and if don’t remember your 2019 table location, you can view last year’s table layout here. Please be aware that we will open general vendor registration on December 1st, so I am hoping that you will lock down table(s) before general registration opens.

Table rental prices remain the same as last year. Early bird registration price is $20 per table plus $10 per vendor attendance pass. Early bird registration closes on January 31, 2020. Starting February 1st, 2020, the table rental fee is $25.00. The indoor venue opens at 8:00 a.m.; vendors can enter for last-minute setup at 6:30 am. Of course you will also set up on Saturday, March 28th in the afternoon.

We are expanding Winterfest this year. Besides our radio license testing program, VWS is sponsoring special educational programs on Emergency Communications during Winterfest 2020. This addition will bring a new focus to our hamfest, and hopefully attract a new group of participants. Attendance last year was 500 attendees. We have increased our advertisement effort, which began in June and combined with our special educational programs, we expect to increase over last year’s record-breaking attendance level.

More details can be found here.

Tuesday CW Net Report Nov 5 2019

Called the net at 8:00PM with K3WD checking in. His signal was barely readable, so with no further checkins, I closed the net. Please join us next week on our normal schedule. 73 de Dave KE4S

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.

Ashburn Fire Station Engine “Tower 6” made short work of getting the heavy items to the roof!

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:

L-R: KN4QPI, KS1G, and KF4TJI. Photo by Nancy H.

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

Thursday SSB Net Report Oct 17 2019

80m – 3675 KHz on 18 OCT 2019 Open 0000Z
Listening 3813 KHz for General class ops to check-in
QNI:
W0MPM John
W5ODJ John
KE4S Dave, net control
We discussed our current progress on antenna projects, software upgrades, and vagaries of telecom company provisioning and billing. We closed at 0032Z.

Please join us next week or any Thursday at 8:00PM.
73 de Dave KE4S