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President's Message
Down to the wire again! I sure hope this makes it into the Circuit.
Well, I'm hip deep in bringing up 30 new boards at work. I'll try to bring one of them to the August meeting, to show you what I do for 3Com. It's been getting in the way of my FARA work, and I try not to let that happen too often. Consequently, the antennas are still not back up (though they are almost finished).
The good news is that the IC-251, which had an AC supply failure, is back on line with a new DC power cable. The web site is up to date, and the shack is relatively clean. I have started on the long awaited remote reset for the packet cluster node, and the doors to the shack have some nifty new frames for our nameplate.
September brings our annual picnic (on the 5th ). Get your picnic reservations and payments in to Bev, N1LOO. There'll be plenty of food, the usual beach and water sports, and, of course, a radio!
Also coming up in September is the state "Simulated Emergency Test" on the 11th. Volunteers are needed to work at the MEMA bunker for several hours (food provided). Talk to me or Marc, WA1R. I'll be there, and I have been told it's not hard work.
Finally, there's the Flea Market. This is when we make most of our money for the year, so tell all your friends, and pick up some flyers in the shack to hand out.
73,
Peter, KA1AXY
Field Day Wrap-up
by Dave Hoaglin, K1HT
This year was another successful Field Day for FARA. Setup went smoothly(especially with one fewer tower --- the VHF antennas were supported instead by a tower truck, recently retired from a certain local TV station!). The weather, though hot and humid, produced no thunderstorms. Propagation was good on several bands (but not all --- 15 meters was a disappointment). And, as usual, the food was excellent!
Altogether we made 2,946 QSOs (30 fewer than last year), and our claimed score (including 900 points in bonuses) was 9,434 (about 500 points below last year). So, for the first time in several years, we didn't set a new record for FARA; but we made a very respectable showing, in a year when we were taking a more relaxed approach to Field Day. From the scores that have appeared on the 3830 Reflector on the Internet, it looks as if we'll be #5 in class 3A. (The leader, K9RN in Illinois --- with 1,810 QSOs on 20, 1,019 on 40, and 981 on 15 --- must have had propagation very different from ours!)
It was nice to see solid improvements in three of our totals. The VHF station,
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