[PVRCNC] PVRC/NC - March Minutes and April right around the corner.

[W4KAZ]

Less than 10 days away, the April NC East Chapter meeting....March 
Meeting Minutes follow.  NO relation to March Madness.....

73 de w4kaz/el escribano inexacto



PVRCNC-East Chapter - March Meeting Notes
March 6th, 2008, Manchester's, Raleigh, NC, USA.

With the absence of AA4NC, chaos and QRM reigned supreme at the 
beginning of the March meeting of the NC/East Chapter. But that is a 
good thing, because we had another seams-bursting attendance, with a 
full house of 25(26?) members attending. Should the attendance trend 
continue, we may soon be faced with locating larger accommodations for 
the monthly food-fest.

There was lots of pre-meeting banter and BS'ing, and the occasional 
useful tidbit of advice could be heard circulating about the room. The 
good natured QRM was quelled by AA4NC's appointed second KA1ARB soon 
after his arrival. Rob is well acquainted with busting SSB pileups, and 
had been somehow bribed or coerced by AA4NC to substitute in his absence 
for the evening.

An anonymous call to "read the minutes" was met with derisive laughter 
from el Escribano Inexacto, who had already finished his monthly supply 
of 807's. Thereby fortified, el Escribano Inexacto girded himself for 
the appointed task of inventing a "record" of the evenings' 
prevarications while simultaneously defending a plate of french fries 
from the not-too-furtive predations of the yet-to-be served K2AV. With 
the scribes' pen firmly embedded in the hand of Carnac, KA1ARB 
intuitively determined the time to be ripe for member reports and the 
commencement of the meeting.

Around the Table - Member Reports

W4CE, Cliff: Cliff was attending his first NC Chapter meeting, and is a 
PVRC member recently migrated to NC from the N. VA area. (ed. note: 
Welcome to the area Cliff!, de W4KAZ). Cliff is working on pulling coax 
in the crawlspace, but indicates he will be "stuck in wire-land" (ed. 
note: Ha. Welcome to "my world" too, de W4KAZ) He enjoys VHF operating.

N4TL, Tom: Tom operated casually in the "all South America DX 
Contest"(i.e., ARRL DX SSB), noting the QSB and QRM were 'problematic'. 
He also made a few Q's in ARRL DX CW.

K4WES, Wes: Wes was unable to operate the DX SSB

NT4D, Jay: Jay re-iterated Tom's evaluation of conditions for ARRL DX. 
He went into ARRL DX CW with intentions of operating the whole contest, 
but was sidelined with a bad cold managing to operate only during the 
first part of the contest on Friday night. ARRL DX SSB was a M/S at NT4D 
along with W4KAZ. Poor conditions were obvious from the low percentage 
of EU in the log at the end of the contest, only about 40%. Part of the 
ARRL SSB weekend was spent tugging lines at N1LN, but that was more 
productive than the contest.

K4QPL, Jim: Jim was at N4AF for the NY4A operation during ARRL CW, and 
admits that there were indeed "1 or 2" QSOs logged. He noted the poor 
conditions on 15m and the nonexistent conditions on 10m. He spent ARRL 
DX SSB watching spots float by rather than operating.

W4KAZ, Keith: Thanks to NT4D for the chance to operate a 'real' station 
for ARRL DX, and the associated mentoring. Bad conditions during ARRL DX 
SSB, even at a 'real station'. Kaz made a few short attempts at runs, 
but was unable to pull the weak signals from the QRM, so rather than 
annoy the DX stations calling, he went back to enjoying the novelty of 
having "packet spots". Noted that it pays to 'check the QSX!' when 
clicking on spots..... :o Due to the poor propagation conditions, Kaz 
had more fun helping out at the N1LN/N1YXU antenna hoist.

K2AV, Guy: ARRL DX CW with the NY4A crew. Guy greed that the conditions 
were indeed, "unusual". Spent time listening during ARRL DX SSB

W0UCE, Jack: Jack is a CW-a-holic suffering from CW withdrawals. He was 
able to copy only WPTF in the last CW contest. Jack did manage to get a 
rejuvenating jolt of CW at N1LN/N1YXU, and enjoyed spending a weekend 
with Bruce and Laurie. Also had thanks for K2AV, who has been lending 
advice on station possibilities.

N1YXU, Laurie: Laurie and Bruce had several members of the Orange County 
club in to operate during the NC-QSOP. During the QSO party, Laurie had 
a long QSO with a central FL station who later QSL'd with party favors 
from MouseLand.

N1LN, Bruce: Bruce reported that the N1LN/N1YXU station had hit a few 
milestones. The 20m tower/antennas are 'done'. The 15m tower/antennas 
are also 'done'. Bruce is hoping to complete the 40m/10m tower project 
during the coming spring. Noted that there is a potential for an 
additional K3 commission due to K4TMC, as a 2nd has been put on order(ed 
note: His and Hers K3's. Better add that idea to the sales pitch Henry! 
de W4KAZ :) .

KE4GY, Frank: Frank operated the NC-QSOP casually, and operated ARRL SSB 
on 10m and 15m only(ie: "not much!")

NX9T, Jeff: Jeff had a great experience during the CQWW 160 SSB. His 
first hour showed 187 QSO's logged, his best ever. Although the rate 
cooled off after that, Jeff is now looking forward to more high rate 
action, as he really enjoyed it while it lasted. Jeff did a bit of 
plinking in both ARRL DX contests as time and lack of propagation allowed.

W4TMO, Jim: Jim has reached the conclusion that operating SSB into 
verticals with 100w is "no good". He operated his first RTTY contest at 
N4CW and sys he's 'hooked', and has hardware on order(USB interface) to 
get his home station RTTY ready.

N4YDU, Nate: Nate put in 32 hours for the ARRL CW DX contest as a low 
power all band effort, and nabbed 820+ QSO's. He played around in the 
NC-QSOP, but decided the conditions were too poor to put an effort into 
a LP DX SSB entry, so he made a few casual Q's and observed that 
conditions had indeed exceeded his low expectations.

KI4ZWQ, Jeann; KI4GUO, Jordan; K4CZ, Barry: Jeann reported that she and 
Jordan operated the ARRL DX SSB Multi-single, and had accumulated 400+ 
QSO's. Jordan provided the bulk of the QSO's, but since it was a family 
effort, Jeann and Jordan let Barry make a few of them too. Barry chimed 
in that the rates seemed to plummet when the ladies handed off the mike. 
Jordan had fun running stations, and this is the first score she will 
submit as a PVRC member. Barry also reported that W4MY had made 500+ 
QSO's in the NC-QSOP, but Barry's own plan to operate was derailed. He 
also offered thanks for the help he has received from K4GU and K2AV with 
antenna modeling and building a matching network.

K4TMC, Henry: Despite the reports of numerous K3 orders, Henry is still 
waiting for the commission proceeds to show up in his bank account. 
Henry operated the CQ 160 SSB. Seeking a new source of imaginary 
commissions, Henry had his ASUS mini laptop along for the evening for 
members to get a look-see.

K4XD, Rowland: Attending in-corpus, Rowland reported a nice 900+ QSO 
ARRL DX CW showing, and a more difficult 600+ QSO ARLL DX SSB effort. 
He's currently doing some SO2R experimenting.

AE4MN, Paul: Paul has been experimenting with RTTY, but has not been 
having much success yet.

AD4L, Pete: Pete was attending his first meeting after a long dry spell, 
professing aspirations to "operate radio again". He reports that his 
trees have been busy elevating his antennas during his hiatus, adding a 
few extra feet of elevation to the wire farm.

K3KO, Brain: Brian has been operating a bit in many contests since his 
last meeting, working as many mults as possible for fun and DX. He 
expects that Henry can add a notch to his Wouff-Hong, or to whatever 
totem he is using to tally his K3 commissions, as there is yet another 
of Elecraft's finest due for a local home.

K4CIA, Bill: Bill operated ARRL CW as QRP again, and if the 3830 
postings are both accurate and complete, is expecting a 4th place finish 
in that category. He will be doing DXCC card checking at the Charlotte 
hamfest.

N4CW, Bert: Bert was part of the NY4A effort down at N4AF, and had fun 
as always, enjoying the privilege of operating a station with such good 
ears. Beyond that effort Bert has 'dabbled' in contests here and there. 
He hosted W4TMO for his first RTTY contest outing. Bert gave a few words 
of encouragement regarding participation in the upcoming Russian DX, a 
"very good contest", noting that it was one of the DX sponsored contests 
eligible for accruing PVRC 5m Award points.

KA1ARB, Rob: Rob sat in the 'chairman's chair' for the evening, making a 
fine attempt at the evening's cat-herding. He reported operating the 
ARRL DX SSB with old friends at the N1FD station. He agreed with the 
consensus opinion, noting that 'conditions stunk-up there in New 
Hampshire too!". Rob says that the operators stayed well rested, as 
there was plenty of time for snoozing during the operation, and one of 
the ops' 7-year old had one of their best runs.

KA1ARB Announcement:
Rob announced that he is working on a project to document the members' 
stations(i.e., station profiles). The idea is to spread ideas about 
layout, setup, secret weapons, etc. N4YDU volunteered to help with the 
effort, and a couple of volunteers to be the first interviewed were 
lined up.

Paper Contest: N4TL, Paper Contest Meister Pro-Tem, despite heckling by 
W0UCE administered the evening's figuritive caning to the assembled 
captive audience. Tom announced that the April flogging will be 
administered by a "volunteer" guest author, KI4GUO. The results of the 
contest, when tabulated, determined K4QPL to be the high scoring 
contestant. For his efforts, 'QPL was rewarded with the hefty first 
prize, a fine set of "Hardcopy Google"(i.e., surplus 2007 Yellow Pages). 
W0UCE promises litigation will result due to copyright/patent 
infringement from the use of the trademarked "W0UCE Special Wrap" used 
to enclose the award.

Program
K4QPL discussed his "SO2R-sort-a" home brew switching project, and the 
importance of wiring polarized relays with the correct polarity if one 
expects the desired result. :o

Next meeting of the NC-East chapter is April 3rd.

73, Keith W4KAZ

Scribe's DISCLAIMER!  The accuracy of these notations is suspect, and 
creative license has been applied where the scribe's notes are 
incomplete, his memory is fragmented, or when reality was just less 
interesting. Perception IS Reality. Corrections to the permanent record 
will be made upon request, if the scribe is reminded often enough to 
make the corrections.

Updated 03/25/2008, Amended 03/26/2008
W4KAZ, El Escribano Inexacto