[SMCARA] SMCARA amateur radio club meeting this Thursday evening

[petebutt at comfac.com]

Folks,

  I'd like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that we will be
holding our MAY meeting of the St. Mary's County Amateur Radio
Association (SMCARA) tomorrow (Thursday, 27 May 2010).  The meeting will
begin at 7:30 PM in the board room of the Patuxent River Naval Air
Museum, located just north of the Pegg Road/Maryland Route 235 (Three
Notch Road) traffic intersection in Lexington Park.

  EVERYONE is welcome including club members, newly licensed hams, guests
and visitors alike.  If you are already a member, please bring along a
family member, work associate or neighbor who might like to experience
the fun and enjoyment of this fine hobby so they can see what this is
all about for themselves.  The club station, K3NHK, will be open at
approximately 7 PM if anyone would like to get on the air for a few
minutes before the meeting or you can sit down after the meeting.  We
just installed the first of several new HF antennas last week... a B&W
3.5 MHz to 30 MHz folded dipole which is centered on the new 50' tower
we put up several months ago. The HF radio is an ICOM IC-746 that we
installed last week and it has been interfaced to the new LDG antenna
tuner so everything is working now.

  If you have an item you'd like to demonstrate to your fellow hams,
please bring it to this meeting.  I will be bringing a new ICOM IC-7000
HF radio that you can play around with and it will be connected to the
new LDG IT-100 antenna tuner for ICOM radios so you can see how it tunes
up.

  We will be finalizing our annual FIELD DAY plans at this meeting
including reviewing who will be bringing what to make this a successful
event.  We also will be discussing the status of several of our planned
summer activities including a hidden transmitter hunt and a new local
awards contest.

  Finally, we will discuss the time line for getting the new antenna
rotator and cable installed on the tower as we get ready to procure and
install a new multi-band HF yagi beam antenna on the tower for the
summer.
The meeting will close out with our 50-50 raffle.

  Please make arrangements to come out to the meeting this week and
participate in YOUR club for the support of amateur radio in southern
Maryland.  I hope to see all of you there!

  Very sincerely,

  Pete Butt (WA3UMY)
  President, SMCARA