It’s been a GREAT year for the Tulsa Amateur Radio Club!!!…
Let me count the ways…
Winter Field Day, Summer Field Day, License exam session, Weather Watch net, Bike rides, Maker Fair, Route 66 on the Air, replacing the 443.850 repeater, Portable operations days, HF Open House, ARES SET, Scouting events, Christmas parade. We’re still working on the Comm 1 trailer and it has already proved it’s a great asset to the club and to the events that we work. We’ve had some great presentations at our monthly club meetings and our club membership is up to 171!
Congratulations! Those accomplishments aren’t done by just one person or just a few, no way! With the increase in members there’s been an in-crease in activity and participation. So congratulations to the club mem-bers for making TARC a very active and fun club!
I want to take a moment to give a big shout out and an even bigger thank you to Bob W5RAB!!! He’s been the 2nd Vice President for as long as I’ve been President and for many years before that. He’s coordinated monthly club meeting programs, supported many, many events with his participation and ham radio knowledge. And he’s kept the Superlink Re-peater System up and running for many, many years. Bob is now step-ping down as the 2nd VP, however, he’ll still be maintaining the Super-link System and for that we are very grateful. Thank you, Bob for the years of support to the Tulsa Amateur Radio Club!!!
So now you may be wondering, who’s taking over as 2nd VP? Well, Ian Duncan KC9THI will be the new 2nd VP as of January 1st. Ian recently moved here from the Chicago area and with him he’s brought a boatload of enthusiasm and good ideas for the club. In case you didn’t know, Ian was the mastermind behind the HF Open House. He’s going to be a won-derful addition to the club officer team! Thanks Ian for stepping up and taking on an officer position for TARC!
All the other officer positions for the club will remain the same and thanks goes out to Steve KF5VCQ for handling the nominations and elec-tions.
Sand Springs Christmas Parade.
Many thanks to those that helped with the Sand Springs Christmas Parade on Friday, December 2nd. See the article form Andrew, W5AWS in this news-letter.
In case you missed it…
Gregg W5GGW gave a presentation of the Raspberry Pi (RPi) computational system.
https://www.raspberrypi.org/
Gregg had examples of the hardware, which is smaller than a deck of playing cards yet packs significant punch both computationally and in connectivity.
As a point of interest, W5AWS, received an email from Digi-Key advertising a new module from Ana-log Devices that is a DC to 5.5 GHz signal generator with ±0.5 dB calibrated output power. It is compati-ble with Raspberry Pi 3B+, 4, Zero W, and Zero 2W.
Gregg’s main intent was to wet our appetite for exper- imentation.
Despite the vast subject matter, Gregg focused on the General Purpose Input-Output (GPIO) pins, which can be connected to external devices to control larger hardware. All of these pins are ac-cessible from the command-line using built-in commands and user-written scripts.
Gregg drew our attention to a board similar to the RPi, “an ESP32-based core board with wired Ethernet connectivity and power over Ethernet (PoE) that was designed to help you quickly cre-ate zero-setup, single-wire-installation, connected devices.”
https://wesp32.com/
Gregg answered questions from the floor and concluded his presentation.
We have a club flag!
At the November club meeting Remell KA6DOY un-veiled our new Tulsa Amateur Radio Club flag. Remell had the idea for the flag so it was fitting that he should be the one to show it the first time to the club members in attendance. We’ll have the flag flying over the Comm 1 trailer at events and we can also use it as a banner when not flying.
Getting closer to replacing the 443.850 repeater…
Bob W5RAB, Paul WB5ANX and David N5DMK have been working on the varying parts of replacing the 443.850 repeater. They’re getting closer to the new repeater being on-line, possibly before the end of the year or early next year.
The ARRL Foundation Clubs Grant Program…
Bart N5TWB has submitted the club proposal to the ARRL and is awaiting approval. The ARRL grants can provide up to $25,000 to a club for any projects that they may be working on or would like to do. He’s currently writing a proposal that will be submitted to ARDC. Got an idea for a club project? Send it to us so we can add it to the list. https://w5ias.com/2022/04/20/tarc-grant-project
Coming events…
The Tulsa Amateur Radio Club Christmas Party will be December 20th at 6 pm. Location is the Gold-en Corral restaurant, 71st and Mingo. This will be our regular club meeting date however there will be no club business conducted, just Christmas fun and our usual raffle. Bart N5TWB has another line up of nice gifts for the raffle. No need to bring a gift.
The next regular club meeting of the Tulsa Am-ateur Radio Club is January 17th 2023 at TU’s Keplinger Hall room 3140. The presentation has yet to be determined.
As always, monitor the Superlink Repeater System when severe weather is forecast…
As we’ve seen recently, storm season can be year round, so please monitor the Superlink System for the Weather Watch net when severe weather is forecast. Frequencies for the repeater in your area can be found at W5IAS.com, click on Re-peaters and scroll down to TARC: Wide-Area Link System.
Coming to the Tulsa Amateur Radio Club in 2024…
2024 will be the 100 year anniversary of the Tul-sa Amateur Radio Club. I know it’s more than a year away, but we can start planning now. It’ll be here before you know it! Got any ideas about how we can celebrate? Maybe a special event station? Ham banquet? What’s your idea?
We’re still looking for Net Control Operators and Loggers for the Tuesday night TARC Net. We’re using NetLogger more now for check ins so if you’d like to give it a try let us know and we’ll be happy to show you how easy it is and how you can help your club stay strong and ac-tive. Start small and when you feel comfortable, move on up to other events. No pressure…just fun doing ham radio!
Every month is a contest month…
Pick a Contest…any Contest! Try POTA or SOTA! Call CQ! Go to a local park and get on the air! Go to ARRL.com, click Contest Calendar, scroll to Contest Corral, click on the month you want to check.
Be safe, Be a good friend, Get on the air!
Mark WA5MA
President – Tulsa Amateur Radio Club