The Society was formed in February 1947 at the Y.M.C.A
Torquay, with about 20 members. Mr Walt Sydenham G5SY was made President,
Mr Frank Wadman G2GK the Chairman, Mr Ken Grimes G3AVF the Secretary, (sadly all 3 are now Silent Key).
Regular meetings were held once a month on Saturday evenings. In 1958 the Society moved to its own Headquarters
in Bath Lane,
Torquay, remaining there until 1985 when they moved to Headquarters at the Highweek Family Social
Club in Newton Abbot.
Since the move to Newton Abbot the Society has gone from strength to strength with a membership peaking to about
230.
The current Headquarters are at the Teignbridge District Scout Headquarters,
Wolborough Street, Newton Abbot,
the first meeting there held on August 5th 2005
A Society Quarterly Magazine, ’ TARS
TALK’, is produced which informs the
Membership of future happenings,
reports on past events and also articles of
general interest. Members run Morse classes mostly in the winter time, to
enable newcomers
to gain the necessary proficiency to tackle the test.
Classes for both the Foundation License and the Radio Amateurs Examination
have been completed with success and are available for anyone wishing to become an
operator on Amateur Radio.
The Society caters for most aspects of
Amateur Radio, Transmitting and Receiving on the HF, VHF, UHF bands,
Packet
(digital communication), Television,
Computing are among some of the different forms of communication available.
The Club has a very keen Contesting group, with several major national field
contests entered each year.
These involve spending the weekend in tents with
radio equipment in an attempt to contact as many different stations as possible.
They have had several successes in the past four or five years, on two occasions
have won the section of the contest entered
and several second and third places.
There are many inter member
competitions that can be entered each year ranging from contacting different
Countries on one or all
Amateur bands using any of the various Modes available,
also for constructing a piece equipment for use in an Amateur Radio Station.
There are 2 special Trophies awarded to non Licensed Members.
The awards and
trophies are presented to the successful members at the Annual Presentation
Evening in March.
The Society has sponsored an
International Award, known as the TARS 30, for any Radio Amateur or Shortwave Listener
who has made contact
with the prescribed number of Society Members.
Details of this award can be
obtained from the Awards Manager. - Derrick Webber G3LHJ -- contact him at
[email protected]
OR G3LHJ P.O.Box 155 Newton Abbot TQ12 6XP
They also run and maintain a remote VHF repeater station, located
near Torquay.
This unit enables poorly sited VHF stations to make contact, which
would otherwise be impossible.
Special Event stations keeps the Society
busy during the summer months, with regular attendances at several outside
events.
The Club (if possible) will also attend other similar events if
requested by the organizers.
The Society’s own radio station is
active each Friday Evening from Club HQ, the Call Signs being G(X)3NJA and
G(X)8NJA.
The Friday evening meetings are mainly social events, where members
chat with each other on many subjects, with the
occasional demonstration or
‘Technical Workshop’ taking place.
On the penultimate Friday of each month the
‘official’ meeting is held to discuss Society business with the membership.
This
is usually about half an hour, after which a guest speaker is invited to talk to
the membership.
Talks are very varied, with about 50 percent split between radio
subjects and general interest.
All members and partners, and visitors are made
very welcome at any of the meetings. Refreshments (Tea and Coffee) are
available.
Each year on August Bank Holiday Sunday,
the annual Mobile Rally and
Communications Fair is staged.
This event first started back in 1963 when it was held at Britannia Royal Naval
College Dartmouth, and has been an annual event ever since.
For 2006 the Rally will be held at Newton Abbot Race Course.
Commercial Traders are invited to attend, along with many private individuals,
offering bargains in Amateur Radio and associated equipment.
With the ongoing success of the Society,
they have acquired a comprehensive range of equipment which means that the offer
of loan
of equipment by members for contests and exhibition stations is not
quite so necessary as it was a few years ago,
Amongst the equipment available
are tents, aerials, transmitters, receivers, computers, generator and even a
trailer mounted 40 foot mast.
Some of the equipment owned by the Society is
available to loan by members.
Members meetings an the air (NETS) are
held three times a week, Monday, Wednesday and Saturday mornings
and also on
Sunday mornings when contact is made with the Radio Clubs in Torbay’s twin towns
of Hameln and Tulbing.
Full details of all the nets are published in the
magazine.
There are no restrictions on membership,
in fact many members live away from the Torbay area but want to maintain contact
with the Club,
this being well assisted by the Society Magazine.
Members are as
far afield as the USA, Canada and New Zealand, as well as in other parts of the
UK, many of which
have joined the Society as a result of hearing and talking to
members on the air.
There are six classes of membership, these being Full, Joint
(member and partner), Family, Junior, Associate and Life
For further information on joining the
Club, come along to one of our meetings and chat with one of the committee
members,
or the Membership
Secretary, Ged Coker, G6CLD who attends most meetings.
The following article was published in Radio Communication,
The RSGB monthly magazine, in April 2006
