San Antonio Hams

Over 70+ Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts attended the JOTA event held this past weekend out at the Canyon Lake Dam.  Members of GVARC and other hams came out to support this event which turned into a mini-field day event.Scouts got to try three modes of communications, Voice, PSK31 and CW.  Only 20 meters was really working well, the other bands seemed unresponsive, at least thru the morning hours.

W2IK was there with his boxes of antenna goodies, and he challenged one group of scouts to build something “MacGyver Style”.   He got lots of blank looks from kids who had never heard of MacGyver, until one scout popped up and asked “wasn’t that the guy who plays the part of the guy in charge of the teams on Stargate SG1?”Despite the generation gap, Bob was able to explain that in this large Popcorn canister, were parts. Lots and lots of parts, with some junk tossed in for good measure. 

The challenge was to build a working dipole antenna out of these parts.And the challenge was met after a couple of hours, and the first contact was from Oklahoma.

I’m expecting a full report from W2IK with photos since he was there the entire time, and I was only there about an hour around lunch time, since I had been working the Triathlon instead that morning.  I’ll correct any errors / discrepancies in this report at that time.

Answer… 2 Triathlons with overlapping courses at the same time!

8 of Hill Country REACT‘s members worked the Texas Triathlon, state finals, on the north shore of Canyon Lake last Saturday morning (10/18). They used the SARO 147.14 repeater with no problems reported. Only one medical problem was called in, a slight case of “road rash” by one rider.  Otherwise the medical team was rather bored, all in all.

Further east down the lake shore, about a mile from our starting point, at an area frequently used by the Army or Air Force for their recreation purposes, a 2nd Triathlon called the Randolph AFB Rambler 120 was started.  Fortunately their riders only overlapped our course by a few miles, and their riders were moving in the opposite directions, but we still had to coordinate with the deputy sheriffs handling traffic control so they knew which riders where which group.

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Hill Country REACT members voted on Monday, October 20th, to change their monthly meeting date to the THIRD WEDNESDAY of the month, and to keep on holding the meetings up north of San Antonio, at the Bulverde VFD on FM 1863 & Cougar Bend.

Previously, they had been meeting on the 3rd Monday of the month, but alternating with Teleconference meetings or northside San Antonio Restaurant meetings.  Members felt that a in-person meeting still had value despite the fuel and time costs to drive so far.  With members driving in from Seguin, Canyon Lake and San Antonio, and other member coming from New Braunfels or Boerne, it was felt that the Bulverde VFD was still the most centrally located meeting place to use.

More info found at their club web site, www.HillCountryREACT.org

By H. Milton Johnson – N5HMJ

It was hot and windy!

Well the 2008 Bike to the Beach has been come and gone. On the weekend of October 3rd and 4th, over three thousand bicycle riders left the start line at the AT&T Center in San Antonio and started an approximately 160-mile, two day trip to Whataburger Field in Corpus Christi.

Shepherding the riders like guardian angels, was a cadre of volunteers that included sixty-seven of your fellow amateur radio operators. An operation on this scale requires providing the riders with medical teams, safety teams, mechanical repair teams, the pre-positioning of large amounts of food and water, marking 160 miles of course, an army of support and gear vans and a communications system that can function efficiently over the 160 miles.

This is one giant logistical operation and at the heart of logistics is communications. In order to deploy your resources you have to know where your resources are, where they are needed and be able to direct them to the point of need. It is the amateur radio community that provides the communications infrastructure, equipment and man power to make this happen. We have every right to be proud of the service we provide to our community during this and other events.

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Tomorrow and the next day, October 4th and 5th, over 70 hams will work together, driving SAG vans, manning Break Points, riding in police cars (front seat) as shadows, riding with medical supervisors and first responders, and handling net control.

And one crazy ham, Royce KA5OHJ, will drive a street sweeper from San Antonio to Beeville on Saturday, starting out shortly after 5am, and then repeat the process on Sunday by driving it along the side of the highway from Beeville to Corpus Christi.

Photo shows Royce sweeping BP2 on Day 1, which was a VIA park and ride parking lot with lots and lots of loose gravel. Photo was inserted after the event, despite this article originally being posted before the event.  It’s called editing. Click on photo for larger view.

The reason?  Valero Bike to the Beach. 3,000 bicycle riders who are riding from San Antonio, down Hwy 181 to Beeville on Saturday, then continuing on down the highway to Portland and then over to Corpus Christi.  10 break points (counting lunch) on day 1, 6 break points (counting lunch) on day 2.

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BEXAR OPERATORS GROUP
TESTS NVIS ANTENNA THEORIES
DURING THE TEXAS QSO PARTY

A group of hams representing the Bexar Operators Group, and using the W5BOG callsign, drove over 100 miles to Garner State Park to operate during the 2008 Texas QSO Party (September 27-28) handing out contacts from Ulavde County.

While we were there, we also tested our camping/deployment abilities and did some tests of NVIS antennas at different heights.

Not wishing to get “soft”, we reserved a tent site to operate from rather than a cabin. Krissy, KD5YTN, set up the eight man tent while Bob, W2IK, began the station set-up using a 10×10 screened “EZ Up” as the main operating area.

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A Short Note On Hurricane IKE

de Bob Hejl W2IK – NNN0KSI – NNN0GBY2 Ecom STX

One of the advantages of preparing for a hurricane is that it may take a few days before it “concerns” your area. As the projected path of hurricane IKE became more focused on the Texas Gulf coast area, it became evident that I might be called upon to deploy as a MARS Ecom station to report conditions at whatever location I might find myself. I was, of course, going to use my station with one of my NVIS antennas due to it’s ability of having lower noise floor reception and wouldn’t be prone to too much of an increase in “static crashes” caused by distant lightening.

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Every year the members of the Boerne KARS Ham Club gather on the Saturday before Labor Day to work the staging area for the county fair’s parade.  KARS members coordinate the staging area, helping to direct entries to their proper line-up location, and figuring out what to do when someone put the entries too close together, or when they put the numbers on the wrong order facing the wrong way of the street.  Oops!

But sometimes “stuff happens”, and this year was no exception.  One street had the numbers in reverse order causing some confusion which was quickly straightened out by KARS.  And then there was that dead end street, E. Voygt, which had entries assigned to both sides, got filled up quickly, and this this huge gravel truck appears pulling a flatbed trailer with a backhoe on it, plus another huge semi truck.   Did they need to dig up the street?  No, they were one of the first time entries assigned to that block!  But they got there about 1 hour before the start of the parade, and there was no way possible to fit them into that dead end street and get them turned around facing the wrong way.  So we put them in a nearby parking lot, and simply inserted them into the proper order when the parade finally got started.

And then there was the taxi cab who was pretending to be a float.  Actually, she was pretending to have a dead battery, or was it real?  Boerne PD arrived with a patrol car and KARS members assisted with jumping the battery.  Shortly after,  a small pickup truck shows up and they changed out the battery in the taxi van.

Bottom line, fun event with a fun group of hams.

Keep the 147.14 Repeater On The Air!

Says the banner!

Fund drive started by REACT Team

Members of Hill Country REACT manned a booth at the 2008 Austin Summerfest event to raise funds to help with the anticipated repair needs for the 147.14 Canyon Lake Repeater. Water has been detected in the feedline leading up to the antenna which is 580′ up on the tower. At this time, it is unknown whether the existing feedline can be repaired and salvaged, or if it will need replaced. This repeater is owned by San Antonio Radio Organization (SARO) and REACT has been providing some funding for the past several years to help keep this important repeater on the air.

As of the conclusion of the Summerfest, REACT had raised nearly $750 from area hams, but this is only a fraction of what may be needed if the full 680′ of feedline needs replaced. All donations will be dedicated for this purpose, and you can use PayPal to make donations or mail checks to the REACT Team’s PO Box address.

Visit the REACT’s website for more details at www.hillcountryreact.org.

August 18 , 2008 – MOU Signed between Texas MARS and Texas REACT

August is hurricane season but apparently it is also the season for cooperation between various radio communications agencies as well.  On August 18, 2008, Charles Land, president of the local San Antonio based Hill Country REACT Team, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the South Texas Navy – Marine Corps MARS (Military Affiliated Radio System).  Minutes later, Texas State REACTCouncil Secretary, Lee Besing, signed a similar agreement with the Texas Navy – Marine Corps MARS. The MARS signature was NOT that of Bob Hejl, W2IK, but rather that of a MARS officer higher up in the chain of command for Texas. See links at bottom of this article for PDF copies scanned with signatures of both agreements.

{Photo Left – Right; Charles Land (KC5NKK) signing as president of Hill Country REACT, Bob Hejl, (W2IK, NNN0GBY2) representing MARS, and Lee Besing (N5NTG) signing as the secretary for the Texas State REACT Council.} Read the rest of this entry »