Club Meeting: The UCARS annual meeting and election will be held on November 15th at 7:30 PM at the Red
Cross building on East Franklin Street in Monroe. Those nominated for officers positions at the last meeting
are: Ron Lawrence KC4YOY for President, no nomination for Vice President or Secretary, George Chakhtoura
N4NGC for Treasurer, and Steve Patterson WA3RTC for Activities Manager. Nominations for all positions will
also be accepted at the meeting.
Club Dues: The dues for the coming year are now due. The dues are: $20.00 for an individual or $25.00 for a
family. You can bring your dues to the November meeting, or mail them to: UCARS, P.O. Box 4016, Matthews,
NC 28106.
Jim Moncrief WD4LTB: I recently was in contact with Jim. You old time members will remember Jim and his
wife as being very active club members. Jim lives in Charlotte now and doesn't have a rig set up but he
remembers all his UCARS friends and I told him we would be sure and say hi for him.
Activities: The State and Union County SET (Simulated Emergency Test was conducted on November 3rd and
the club was well represented on both HF and the club repeater. Taking part in the Union County ARES Net
were: Steve WA3RTC, John KF4OYT, Bob (Elmo) KB5WY, Rick KD4FXA, Brad KF4VTB, Robert KT4TF, Chris
KG4MGO, Mike KF4UVO, Robert KD4HSH, Jerry N2HV and Bob K4RLD.
UCARS Nets: The nets are being held each Monday and Wednesday night at 20:30 local time. We would love to
have you check in and take part. Taking part in the local 2 meter nets is great training for emergency
communications
HF Nets: Last month we mentioned the phone nets here in North Carolina and this month we will detail the CW
nets for those who like to have their fingers do the talking. The CSN (Carolina Slow Net) is on 3.695 Mhz every
evening at 20:00 local at 10 wpm. CNE (Carolinas Net Early) is on 3.573 Mhz every evening at 19:00 local and
the CNL Carolinas Net Late) is on the same frequency nightly at 22:00 local. The code speeds for the Early
and Late nets is higher but they will slow down for those building their speed.
Packet lives: From Uncle Elmo (Bob KB5WY)... Just a reminder that packet still exists in the area. MON7NC is
a Ka-Node on 145.010 and MONUHF is a TheNET node on 446.500. Both have good local 1200-baud coverage and
access to CLTBBS (Charlotte's full service Packet Bulletin Board). Locally, over the past several months, Bob
(K4RLD) and myself have been handling National Traffic System (NTS) traffic into and out of North Carolina via
the local network. During the SET exercise (mentioned earlier) last week traffic was passed between here and
Raleigh via HF packet. This was done via a �on demand� HF gateway which exists at KB5WY-8 for special needs.
On the downside, as we no longer have a full service BBS, a smaller PBBS is now available at KB5WY-1 on
145.010 and offers automatic forwarding of properly addressed messages. The biggest "wide area" news is
that LOCUST (145.010 and LOCUHF (446.500) are back. We welcome the "missing links" back and thank you
Derek!! I did hear a rumor the other day that other new nodes might be on the horizon to give coverage into
Boone and Fayetteville. Yet another nasty rumor says that testing on a 9600-baud "A link" into Charlotte is
in the not too distant future. Last and least, APRS (144.390) is now infecting (chuckle) the area.
APRS repeaters now cover most of the county During the recent set, information was exchanged with
stations as far away as Raleigh. Another one of those dirty rumors has it that a local APRS weather station
might appear down the log. Editor's note: Bob forwarded this information via packet on the MON7NC node.
More Packet: On one of the UCARS nets this past month, Bob (KB5WY) notified everyone that the International
Space Station was going to be working packet later that evening. Bob also detailed for everyone how to configure
their TNC's before attempting to make contact. Rumor has it that Steve (WA3RTC) set up his TNC and then
thinking he had waited until the correct time without hearing the station, went to bed. The next morning he saw
in his buffer that a friend of his had worked the station ten minutes after Steve had gone to bed. (Editor's note:
Would someone care to send Steve some No-DOZ?)
E-mail addresses: We are still trying to make sure that we have all of the e-mail addresses of members,
former members and Union County hams. If you can help in this regard, please get in touch with me.