Metrocrest Amateur Radio Society
News
President’s Corner
June 8, 2020
Here we are with the temperatures easing up past 100 degrees. That reminds me it’s time for ARRL Field Day!
Ron Reeves, NN5R, has been working on Field Day for us. He has a great location – two large air conditioned room where we can set up stations far apart, with screens, to establish social distancing, two large open spaces for antennas and a pecan grove for wire antennas. Plus, access to the roof for verticals.
I fully understand that due to Covid-19 you may wish to do Field Day from home. That’s fine! You will probably operate as a 1D station. In the past, 1D stations didn’t earn points but this year they do! And, Ron is working to take advantage of a new ARRL rule that if you operate 1D under your call sign, but list KB5A (the MARS club call sign) as your affiliated club, the club gets credit for your points too! If you use the same logging software as the club, you will be able to see the running totals for everyone and for the club as the event proceeds. Ron will be providing more details.
If you do plan to come to the site, we will have surgical masks donated by Mark Little, KG5RPX, or you can bring your own. We will have sanitizer and baggies for the microphones. Or you can bring your own rig and operate it exclusively and take it home when you leave. We’ll have some club rigs as well if you don’t want to lug your 120-pound Collins.
You should have received your ballot for the annual election. If you have not mailed it in, please do so now or arrange to bring it to Dave Lane so that it can be delivered to the Nominating Committee for counting before the meeting. We will have a video meeting again this month so there will be no meeting place to attend but the Nominating Committee will have a location where you can – according to bylaws – drop off your ballot right up until the meeting is called to order.
If you have been on the air, you know that 6m and 20m went wild this past week. One day the sunspot number was twelve! As we go into the next sunspot cycle, we can hope that HF conditions will continue to improve. Now might be the time to blow the dust off the old amplifier tubes or invest in a new HF SDR rig. See you on the airwaves!
73
—Kevin N5KRG