Tag Archives: Education and Training

Activities, Antennas, Education and Training, Featured, Homebrewing, Newsletter, On The Air, Youth Activities

Tape Measure Yagi Build

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Our next Tech Night will be on Tuesday, April 9th and we’ll be talking about the basics of Radio Direction Finding (aka Fox Hunting). During this session, we’ll also be building a 2-meter tape measure yagi using Joe Leggio’s, WB2HOL plans. I have built 2 of these tape measure yagis and they are pretty easy to make and I have had very good success! You can use these antennas for fox hunting, summits on the air or just hitting a distant repeater.

Here is a list of equipment that you will need to bring to the class to build your very own 2-meter tape measure yagi!

  1. Metal Tape Measure – 1″ wide and at least 10′ in length
  2. 6′ RG8x cable with a PL-259 connector attached to one side
    • You can buy one cable with a PL-259 on each side and cut it in half if you would like to share with someone else to cut costs – You may want to go with 8′ – 10′ if you are going to make two cables
  3. Pigtail for connecting RG-8x (PL-259 connector) to handheld (sma)(sma female)

Optional:

  1. Sandpaper for sanding edges of the tape measure and removing coating to solder on coaxial cable
  2. Wire strippers/cutters
  3. Soldering iron
  4. Shears or scissors for cutting tape measure
  5. 2 Meter SWR meter
  6. Rubber Bands or Bulldog clips for securing the elements when folding up

I will bring all the PVC pipe pre-cut to the proper lengths along with the T and cross connectors.

After we all successful make our tape measure yagis we can celebrate the following Saturday as we have our first Summits on the Air (SOTA) and Parks on the Air (POTA) activation of Mount Pack Monadnock. This is a fairly easy summit and members can hike or drive up to the summit to test out the new yagis!

If you plan on attending or have any questions please let me know so I can plan for the right amount of equipment. You can reach me by email at [email protected].

Jamey, AC1DC

Education and Training, Featured, General, Newsletter

ARRL Technician Enhancement Proposal – How to Comment to the FCC

The FCC has invited public comments on ARRL’s 2018 Petition for Rule Making, now designated as RM-11828, which asks the FCC to expand HF privileges for Technician licensees to include limited phone privileges on 75, 40, and 15 meters, plus RTTY and digital mode privileges on 80, 40, 15, and 10 meters. Interested parties have 30 days to comment.

Source: ARRL Article FCC Invites Comments On ARRL Technician Enhancement Proposal dated March 15, 2019.

We encourage our members to comment in support of RM-11828. Expanding Technician Class License privileges to include digital and SSB phone options on more of the HF bands is just what we need to make the first level Amateur Radio License more fun, a better learning experience, and a more effective bridge to upgrading to General Class privileges. We believe this will encourage New Hams to get active on the air and after a taste of HF, will encourage them to upgrade to General.

The referenced ARRL article provides more information on the proposal along with instructions on how to comment to the FCC.

Education and Training, Featured, General, Newsletter

Hamvention® Club of the Year Award

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The Nashua Area Radio Society has been recognized as the 2019 Hamvention® Club of the Year.  Below is the video of the announcement from the DX Engineering facebook page.  The Club of the Year announcement starts at 10:00 into the video and don’t forget to click on the speaker icon to hear the sound.

The theme of this year’s Hamvention® is “Mentoring the Next Generation” and we won the award for our mentoring and youth outreach activities including:

Here are some photos from some recent mentoring activities:

Teaching Amateur Radio Licence Classes
Rookies and Elmers who joined the weekly repeater net.
Rookies and Elmers who joined the weekly repeater net.
Students and the NARS Operator Team
Students and the NARS Operator Team
HAB-3 Students Testing the HAB's Radios
HAB-3 Students Testing the HAB’s Radios

Thanks to all of our members who have put their time into helping the club to carry out these activities and for helping us to become Club of the Year.  Thanks especially to Scott Andersen, NE1RD for getting us through the application process.  Here is the writeup that we sent to the Hamvention® Awards team.

NARS Club of the Year 2019

Here is the award announcement that has been published on the Hamvention®  Website: https://hamvention.org/event-details/awards/

A special Thank You to the Dayton Hamvention® team for this recognition of our efforts.

Anita, AB1QB

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