Feb 25

The Bexar Operators Group will be “Flying Pink” with a 9 foot pink weather balloon with an attached pink (ok, reddish pink) 260 foot vertical wire antenna during the 160 meter contest this weekend to show our support for breast cancer awareness.

We had a choice of balloons to purchase and chose the pink colored ones (boy, do they look small un inflated) and even chose the pink topped helium tank when offered a choice of others.

Pictures of our contest operation at Choke Canyon State Park’s “Calliham Unit” will be posted next week.

If you can hear us on 160 meters (probably around 1.85 – 1.9 mhz after sunset until dawn), please either post us on “DX Summit” or other internet resources or make a QSO with us!

A large, stamped -self addressed envelope, sent to the QRZ address of W5BOG will net stations contacting us a special QSL certificate showing our support for breast cancer awareness.

Bob W2IK – W5BOG

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Feb 21
There may be some of you who’ve never operated on 160 meters. The upcoming CQ WW 160 Meter SSB contest (Feb. 26 – 28th) is a great chance to get your feet wet. Usually operating on 160 meters requires a great deal of real estate to run an antenna. Sure, you can use a smaller antenna with a tuner but you sacrifice signal efficiency for the sake of keeping your rig happy by “load matching”.
 
Will you make contacts? Yes!
 
Will you make a ton of contacts? No!
The only good way is to use a full size antenna. It’s simple physics. I don’t care what mis-information you might have read or been told or what “miracle” antenna companies might claim.
 
The length of a 160 meter dipole is about 260 feet long! That’s a lengthy antenna. You could make a full size loop antenna, like I have at home, which works nice. You could also make a 1/4 wave vertical with 1/4 wave radials at the base. The problem with using a vertical is that it also tends to pickup man-made electrical noise. So, why not take that vertical out of the urban area and into the rural areas of Texas?
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Feb 18

HAITI: ECOM Operatoins appear to be slowing down somewhat.  The hospital ship USNS COMFORT is no longer accepting trauma patients, at the request of the Haitian government, and is preparing to return to the U.S.

The University of Miami Mediashare Operation has beem moved from the International Airport to another area, so that the airport could open for regular commercial traffic.

Our MARS volunteers continue to provide support to the effort and will, for a while yet.   Keep them in your thoughts, as they are in a less secure area now that they have moved off the International Airport.

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Feb 10

Title: Chaparral ARC License Test Session
Location: Seguin
Description: Chaparral Amateur Radio Club a.k.a. Guadalupe County ARES will be holding a License Test session on the evening of May 11th, after our normally scheduled meeting. Currently we are planning to have available test for Technician and General. If you would like to test for Extra, please notify Ray Mueller – AE5HN, so we can plan accordingly. The session will start a 19:00 hrs (7:00 p.m.)
The address is 415 E. Donegan – Seguin, TX 78155
Chaparral ARC holds its monthly meeting on the 2nd Tuesday each month at 18:00hrs! All licences Amateur Radio Operators and those interested in becoming one are invited to attend!
Start Time: 19:00
Date: 2010-05-11

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