RADIOACTIVITIES Newsletter of the Argonne Amateur Radio Club
Volume XLIII, Number 3	March, 2002

Longtime CQ magazine “VHF-Plus” Editor Joe Lynch, N6CL, will be editor of the new quarterly. The first issue is due out in May. In announcing the publication’s return, CQ Communications noted that the “overwhelming majority” of US hams have license privileges that primarily permit operation above 50 MHz. “However, the prime focus of the current ham magazines remains HF,” CQ Communications said in a news release announcing the change.

CQ Communications said the revived CQ VHF was designed with marketplace realities in mind and “will rely primarily on subscription revenues to meet expenses.” CQ Communications said CQ VHF “will retain the friendly, conversational, look and feel of the original, but its technical content will be somewhat higher-level.” A subscription will be $25 per year in the US.

A GOTA station is intended for operation by Novice and Technician operators or by generally inexperienced or inactive amateurs as well as by as-yet-unlicensed or “under-licensed” operators working under the privileges of a licensed control operator (third-party traffic rules apply — see the International Third Party Traffic page on the ARRL Web site http://www.arrl.org/FandES/field/regulations/io/3rdparty.html).

Under the revised rules, any Class A Field Day entry operating at least two transmitters may include a GOTA station, which will not count as an additional transmitter for the purpose of entry category.

The GOTA station may operate on any Field Day band and mode, but only one GOTA transmitter may be in use at any given time. The GOTA station may complete up to 400 QSOs to be counted toward the group’s total Field Day score. A Field Day group can claim 100 bonus points if its GOTA station successfully completes 400 QSOs. The GOTA station does not affect the additional VHF/UHF station provided under Field Day rule 4.1.2.

Field Day 2002 will mark the first in which stations throughout the Americas have been invited to participate. As approved at the July 2001 ARRL Board of Directors’ meeting, all International Amateur Radio Union Region 2 countries — North and South America — may take part in Field Day starting this June.

Complete Field Day rules and information packet will be available on the ARRL Web Contest Forms and Rules page http://www.arrl.org/contests/forms in early February. Field Day 2002 pins and T-shirt may be ordered now via the ARRL Web catalog http://www.arrl.org/catalog/?category=&words=Field+Day+Pin.

--...   ...--,   -.. .   -.- .- ----. ....

*#813nn	Set code speed to nn words per minute.
*2580	Send 3 minutes of random 5 letter char groups.
*2587	Send 3 minutes of random words.

Repeater Problem: We discussed that the timer on the repeater was currently not working. The control is not responding to telephone control commands. Probably the control is either locked-up and needs a reset or has failed. Bruce and Dennis would check it after the meeting.

Membership Survey: Joe distributed copies of the membership survey results. The survey hadbeen e-mailed to full members who have renewed their membership for 2002 and are current employees at ANL-E or ANL-W. We discussed some of the more interesting results. We will wait until results are in from the surveys being mailed to remaining members outside ANL and recent former members before drawing any final conclusions.

Skywarn Meeting: Bruce stated that the annual Skywarn meeting will be held on February 26. We need to start as soon as possible after 7:00 p.m. because we must finish and leave the park and fieldhouse before 10:00 p.m.

Field Day: Dale brought in the ten ARRL official Field Day T-shirts we had ordered. Bruce mentioned that we have a need for tents and/or pop-up trailers. We discussed possible locations on-site where we might be able to store the club’s equipment. A large enough space, key arrangements, convenient access, and ease of taking equipment in and out are factors we must consider. Bruce and several others will follow-up on this issue.

On December 15, Justin, operating W2SZ/4 in Virginia, made contact with Gordon Howell, WA4RTS/4, on the 322-GHz band “over a whopping distance of 0.05 km (about 164 feet),” he said. Both stations were located in FM07ji.

“I know it’s not much as far as DX is concerned, but it’s on par with DB6NT’s 411-GHz DX record and is a North American first for the 300-GHz band, excluding light,” he added.

About an hour later another QSO was made between W2SZ/4 and WA4RTS/4 on 241 GHz over a distance of 1.1 km (approximately 3609 feet). “This is a North American first for the band and a new NA record at the same time,” Justin said.

Both contacts were made using modulated CW and wideband FM receivers. The power output on 322 GHz was estimated to be just a few microwatts, while the power on 241 GHz was measured at 0.75 mW. The stations were constructed of 80.6-GHz free running Gunn oscillators driving GaAs diode triplers. Both setups used homebrew six-inch parabolic dishes with hyperbolic sub-reflectors.

Justin said the next step is to phase-lock the Gunn oscillators to crystal oscillators in the future to permit using narrowband modulation, “thus resulting in better DX.” WA1ZMS estimated that over the span of his ham radio career, he’s operated at least once on every available Amateur Radio band.

The account says that 21-year-old Steven Long of Brazil suffered third-degree burns over half his body in the incident, which also burned the tree to which he was attaching the antenna.

When emergency workers arrived, they found the antenna draped across the power line, the tree charred from the fire and Long hanging onto a lower branch. Brazil firefighters had to wait for utility workers to cut power to the line before they could rescue Long.

See the Electrical Contractor Network Web site http://electrical-contractor.net/ubb/Forum14/HTML/000146.html for additional details. — submitted by George Corron, AF4JH.

1873 James Clerk Maxwell published A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism, which he compiled from work he began in 1855. He showed that electromagnetic waves propagated at the speed of light and suggested that light was a form of electromagnetic waves. This work was the foundation for the development of Radio and all electromagnetic devices.

1888 Radio (transmission and reception of electromagnetic radiation) was first shown to be possible by Heinrich Hertz. Hertz generated RF using a spark generator. The receiver consisted of a loop of wire with a small gap, which displayed a visible arc when receiving RF from across the laboratory. This proved Maxwell’s Electromagnetic Theory and practical radio was not far behind.

1895 Guglielmo Marconi built a transmitter and receiver, which operated near his home in Bologna Italy. On December 12, 1901 Marconi was successful in communicating from England to Newfoundland.ⁱ

1898 Nikola Tesla was awarded his first patent on transmission of signals and data.ⁱⁱ

1900 Reginald Fessenden discovered Amplitude Modulation and invented a wireless telephone.

1904 Sir John Ambrose Fleming used the “Edison Effect” to rectify RF signals and invented the “Fleming Valve”ⁱⁱⁱ the first electronic detector. Detectors prior to the Fleming valve consisted of electromechanical devices such as the “Coherer”^iv, the Marconi magnetic detector,^v and inefficient electrolytic and carborundum detectors.

1906 Ernst F. W. Alexanderson built a 2 kilowatt “high frequency generator” (100 kHz) capable of transmitting voice signals at the Fessenden station at Brant Rock, Massachusetts. On Christmas Eve 1906, Reginald Fessenden broadcast Violin music, and read passages from the Bible to ships at sea.^vi

1906 Lee Deforest added a third electrode between the plate and filament of the Fleming valve and invented the “Audion” vacuum tube. This enabled circuits, which could detect and amplify weak RF signals and vastly improve receiver sensitivity.

1910 The “cat’s whisker” detector was invented by B. F. Miessner. This inexpensive detector enabled many radio experimenters to build their own crystal set radio receivers.

1912 Major Edwin Howard Armstrong invented the regenerative detector. He used an Audion and coupled a portion of the output signal back to the input to invent the first oscillator and regenerative Detector. The sensitivity of the regenerative receiver was orders of magnitude greater than the simple triode detector.

1918 Armstrong invented the Super Heterodyne circuit for the Military.

1920 October 27^th the first licensed broadcast station KDKA, in Pittsburgh, PA began regular broadcasts and commercial radio was off and running.

01		N9JFW		Robert		Plainfield, IL
03		W9TUD		Phil		Des Plaines, IL
03		WD9GOL		Robert		New Lenox, IL
05		WA9KPI		Robert		Lockport, IL
13		KA9BUL		Scott		New Lenox, IL
14		KB9WLV		Robyn		Carol Stream, IL
15		W9SKD		Dick		Plainfield, IL
16		WD9AGR		Jeanne		Plainfield, IL
17		W9TIE		Bob		Glen Ellyn, IL
23		K9RJ		Jim		Downers Grove, IL
24		N9JAI		David		Naperville, IL
27		KA9MAM		Jeffrey		Summit, IL
28		KA9H		Bruce		Downers Grove, IL
29		-		Ken		Winfield, IL
30		KB9UMF		Chuck		Clarendon Hills, IL
30		WA9ZBW		John		Dwight, IL
31		N9NWA		Randy		Downers Grove, IL

Ken’s introduction to radio, like many “senior citizens” (he was 80) came through a hunk of galena, a cats whisker and ear phones. Yes, the crystal set. The magic of that radio influenced his career choice and future life. After graduation from high school in 1939 he continued his education at the U. of I. in the department of electrical engineering World War two however interrupted his plans and after graduating OCS as a second lieutenant he studied radio at Ft. Monmouth. He was eventually assigned to the army’s European Theater communication center. The powerful transmitters there were his responsibility. It was there, in Germany, after cessation of hostilities, that Ken received his first amateur radio call and with a home brew station was on the air as D4AAK. He was one of the first on the air and a popular DX catch.

After getting his degree, he eventually returned to his primary interest of radio and for the next thirty years was an engineer at N.B.C.

It was not till 1957 that Ken again returned to amateur radio as K9KPM. He was active in many nets and had skeds with old friends and co-workers.

In addition to the Argonne Radio club he was also a member of the Wheaton and the Elmhurst clubs.

Ken’s presentation of his HB Tesla coil was the best of his offerings to our lunch time gatherings. He was always an experimenter, building An X-Ray machine, SSB transmitters, receivers and more. He converted the original Peanut transmitter to SSB and to RTTY and built a small linear for it. Old radios and the parts therein were a constant fascination to him.

Though Ken is gone, K9KPM will live on in his family. His granddaughter, Terese Bangert has undertaken study to get her ticket and apply for Kens call. Be sure to listen for her....