Welcome to:

A little preamble:

I’ve been involved in Amateur Radio (or “ham” radio, as it’s frequently called) on and off since I was a young teenager back in the early 1960s.  At the present time, I’m the vice-president for one area ham radio club, treasurer for another, president of a third.  I also am the ARRL's Public Information Coordinator for the state of North Carolina.  It keeps me busy!

Here I am as Net Control during an exercise at the Orange County EOC.

I was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland (which is why there's that “3” in K3VSA--it’s my original callsign, now reissued to me through the FCC's “vanity” program).  I moved to North Carolina soon after my hitch in the US Air Force ended and plan to stay here for the rest of my life.  It’s a beautiful state. My wife Lisa, was born and raised here in Orange County, and she also has her ticket (KG4PFB).  She’s an awesome teaching chef, and she makes a killer peanut butter pie.  We have a homeschooled, teenaged daughter who swims like a fish and is learning piano.  She keeps us both busy!

My wife and daughter at an overlook in Virginia in 2009.

Orange County is a great section of North Carolina.  We have Chapel Hill and the University of North Carolina, historic Hillsborough with its colonial charm, and all the rural parts including the section in the north of the county where we live.

Canada geese on the pond in front of our home in Orange County.

We're active on our club’s blowtorch repeater on 442.150MHz, and we also are blessed with a pair of vintage Kenwood TS-520S transceivers which are...

A vintage Kenwood TS-520S with its matching DG-5 digital display unit.

...thirty-five years old and still going strong.  These radios are available, affordable, reliable, and a great way to introduce yourself to operating on HF.

Future projects include better antennas (using a G5RV now) and getting on the air with HSMM, Narrow-bandwidth TV and free-space optical communications.

This is the Remco Crystal Radio kit.  The circular loop on top of the cabinet did nothing and was merely for show.

My first radio project was this Remco Crystal Radio kit, which I obtained when I had single digit years of age.  It “tuned” by means of a slider on the coil.  It received the same station, WBAL 1090kHz (called “kilocycles per second” back then), regardless of where the slider was set.  I still have a fascination with crystal radios today, and they can be amazingly good performers if well designed!

Here are the other websites that I administer:

• Carolina Flashers Photonics Group - hams interested in free space optical communication
• NB4TV - Narrow-bandwidth TV over Amateur Radio
• NC ARES Area 10 - the six counties in central North Carolina
• NC ARRL PIO - statewide website for Amateur Radio public relations info
• Roxboro Bible Church - you can't spend all your time playing radio
• Triangle ATV Association - area club that is interested in ham television

Other websites that I like:

• ARRL - the national association for Amateur Radio™
• Antique Wireless Association (Carolinas Chapter) - appreciating and preserving old radio-electronics
• Ashokan Farewell - the hauntingly beautiful “Civil War” song written by Jay Ungar in 1982
• The Babbage Analytical Engine - the world's first programmable mechanical computer (at last?)
• The Babbage Difference Engine - a working mechanical computer built from 153 year old plans
• Central Carolina Skywarn - the eyes and ears of the National Weather Service
• Cheap QSLs - inexpensive, great service and made in the USA
• Christian Amateur Radio Fellowship - fellowship and service via ham radio since 1966
• CQ - a ham magazine focusing on people and the practical aspect of Amateur Radio
• Crystal Radio Plans and Circuits - an exhausive list of xtal set projects from “Stay Tuned”
• The Curta - the ingenious “pepper mill” mechanical calculator from the 1940s
• dBj Radio and Electronics - ham radio gear from the home boys in Jamestown NC
• Earth’s Children™ - Jean M Auel’s series about Ayla and Jondalar, a fictional ice age heroine and hero
• Edwin Howard Armstrong - source documentation on the greatest inventor radio has yet known
• Electric Radio - an excellent magazine for those who appreciate vintage ham radio gear
• Friends of the Hunley - the first successful combat submarine
• Getting Started in Electronics - an excellent beginner’s book by Forrest M Mims III
• Girl Scouts NC Coastal Pines - wife and daughter are both involved in this group
• The Ham Band - a couple of Danish hams and their accompanists make music about Amateur Radio
• Hillsdale College - what an American liberal arts school ought to be
• Historic Hillsborough NC - welcome to our town!
• Jon Gnagy’s “Learn to Draw” - an American original
• Kenwood Hybrid Transceivers - great website about these excellent classic radios
• La Patrie Guitars - great nylon stringed acoustics made in La Patrie, Quebec (left-handed models available)
• Maker Faire NC - the awesome annual tech DIY event, sponsored by Make Magazine
• N4MC’s Vanity HQ - Michael Carroll’s vanity callsign website makes getting that special callsign easy
• NC ARES - the North Carolina section of the Amateur Radio Emergency Service
• NC ARRL - statewide chapter of the American Radio Relay League
• OCRA - our local Amateur Radio club here in Orange County NC
• Orange Community Players - our local theater group, in which we're involved way too much
• Poplar Forest - Thomas Jefferson’s personal retreat
• QSL.NET - connecting hams around the world with free websites
• Quarter Century Wireless Association - for hams licensed 25 years or more
• Rob’s and Dave’s Aircooled Volkswagen Pages - step-by-step procedures to keep that beetle running
• Victor-Victrola Page - comprehensive info about early Victor brand “talking machine” phonographs
• Visit NC - the official travel and tourism website for the State of North Carolina
• Walden Media - specializing in family entertainment
• WCPE - great classical music 24 hours a day
• Weaver Street Market - our community-owned grocery stores in Carrboro, Hillsborough, Southern Village
• The Xtal Set Society - an organization devoted to passive receivers (crystal radios)

Last updated on December 25, 2011.
Thank you for visiting!  As they say, “Come back, now, you hear?”

Thanks to the good folks at  qsl.net  for providing cyberspace for the Amateur Radio community.

-73 de Woody K3VSA
k3vsa@arrl.net