[AReU] Recap of March & Feb AReU meetings

[Terry Petrash]

Hello again everyone,

If you haven’t noticed I took off last month, February, and
didn’t send any meeting recap.  However, this month, March, I
will make up for it by combining both months into this one
recap.

Members attending the last two meetings were:

AI4CR	David	Peek
K4NWW	Fred 	Crowson
K4PPK	Jim	Smith
KA4INM	Ron	Youvan
KA4WNZ	Art	Gibson
KA4ZAF	Bobbie	Petrash
KC4MMR	Rod	Clark
KE4VDJ	George	Collier
KF9EY	Paul	Nerger
KI4EPN 	Walt	Knights
KI4ILP	Lou	Pomales
N2MFT	Tony	De Angelo
N3BUL	Fred 	Hendershot
N4DLW	Dave	Welty
N6ZUE	Gregg	Britton
W2NDP	Dan 	Manfre
W4TAS	Tony	Stone
W4UOO	Mike	Sprenger
W9YGD	Bud	Aydelotte
WA4BYK	Terry	Petrash
WA4HTZ	Ken	Mac Neill
WB4AKA	Bob	Haynes

We had some good information and attendance was really up at the
last two meetings.  New faces or those missing for a long time
were W9YGD, Bud Aydelotte, N3BUL, Fred Hendershot, N2FMT, Tony
De Angelo and KA4WNZ, Art Gibson.  I believe Bud just came into
the area recently.   Hopefully we will see more of him in the
future.

OK, in February’s meeting Ron, KA4INM, and Tony, W4TAS put on a
nice demonstration of frequency calibration and synchronization.
 Several old and new ways to calibrate our junk (equipment) were
demonstrated.  The old standards of using oven tempered crystal
units were shown along with the new standard technology of using
a GPS calibration receiver synchronized to one master world time
source were demonstrated for all to see, feel and set their
watches by if needed.  

The latest March meeting had Ron talking about anodizing and
preserving aluminum.  Anodizing seems to be the Cadillac of
aluminum protection however the more economical and practical
way seemed to point to the use of clear epoxy paint to preserve
our little (and big) ears in the sky.

Tony put on a good demonstration of linear output harmonics and
how a pass filter can be used to tame that linear into FCC
compliance.  He showed the various harmonics that are generated
on the spectrum analyzer for a single active device amp running
class A or AB and a dual active device amp running class B.  The
analyzer really paints a clear picture of what is going on.  A
filter was then put into the circuit and results read and
calculate.  Some of the math present went flying over my head
but I hope the more I hear it the more it will sink in in the
future.  

KI4ILP, Lou, brought in a new dual band antenna that he was
having some problems with.  Tony and Rod, KC4MMR gave it a
through going over to see what the problem might be.  I’m not
sure what the prognosis was but I think a replacement or fix is
on the horizon.  We will have to check back with Lou next
meeting.

Along with those highlights a lot of other conversation and
camaraderie then took place. 
One other little tid-bit.   Tony passed down this Internet link
for a download of an audio spectrum analyzer program you can run
on your home PC.  It is relatively small and easy to load.  

The download link is:
http://digilander.libero.it/i2phd/bin/specpakv2_216.exe

The main web page is:
http://www.weaksignals.com/

The main page has other programs that are neat and of interest
also. I don’t know any of the ins and outs of these programs but
you can try them and report back at our next meeting.

Next meeting’s topics are still open.  So, if you have any
mysterious unanswered questions of radioactive life bouncing
around in your head, bring them up and we will try and find an
answer for you. 


Until then,
73
Terry
WA4BYK




__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com