Greetings, welcome to "Dale's Tales" for
January 2019.
Best wishes for a happy and safe New Year. As we move into 2019 let me offer my thanks
to all of you in the Great Lakes Division for your outstanding service to
amateur radio. As I have been fortunate
to travel around the division to meet with you at club meetings and hamfests, I
am always pleased to discuss your ideas and suggestions for improvements to our
great hobby. Thank you for those
contributions. I frequently find it a humbling experience. To those who hold elected and appointed
positions in our Field Organization: you gals and guys are the movers and
shakers that make this all work - a thousand thanks to you all. Everybody - keep your creative juices flowing
in 2019.
A MESSAGE FROM Bart W9JJ:
To: ARRL Contest Clubs
Re: RTTY Roundup and more update
All,
... follows are a couple updates for contest clubs.
- FT8 and the ARRL RTTY Roundup (http://www.arrl.org/rtty-roundup)
is just a couple weeks away (January 5-6, 2019). This is an event, since its announcement in
November 1988 QST, that not only promotes RTTY, but in this new event it also
promoted using all digital modes that existed at that time, and those that
would follow. As we enter 2019, now some 30 years later, our newest popular mainstream digital
mode (FT8) is poised to bring activity to new levels. In January 2019 QST (p.72-73), Joe Taylor,
K1JT, presented an article as a how-to for ARRL RTTY Roundup (now with and FT8)
to assist participants. As your club
members head into the holidays, here's a link to that article that they may
review as they prepare for the event
(see http://www.arrl.org/files/file/ContestResults/2019/January%202019%20QST%20-%20Taylor%20-%20FT8.pdf).
- National Contest Journal (NCJ) and New Contester
Learning / Training Tools: Per the
email below, NCJ is asking clubs to talk-up the myriad of tools available to
the contest community, and to discuss and share with NCJ what additional
learning content may be of interest to your clubs and members. See the email that follows. Be sure to provide any thoughts/suggestions/follow
up to NCJ Editor Scott Wright, K0MD at drscott.wright@gmail.com
Wishing you, your club and its members warmest wishes for
the holidays!
73,
Bart Jahnke, W9JJ
Contest Branch Manager
ARRL - The national association for Amateur Radio™
SCOTT K0MD's EMAIL TO W9JJ:
From: Scott Wright [mailto:drscott.wright@gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, December 17, 2018 4:29 PM
To: Jahnke, Bart, W9JJ
Subject: Request to send to contest clubs via your
reflector
Bart
The NCJ is asking major North American contest clubs to
consider expanding the learning and training tools available to help new and
mid-skill level contesters learn and raise their skills to the next level.
In 2007, the NCCC published a video series on So2r which
I personally found very helpful. They are going to re-post it to their website
so all of us can learn from the series.
Contest University also posts its lectures to the web and the power
point slides - both extremely helpful to new and mid-skill level contesters.
We would like contest clubs to discuss with their members
the need to develop additional video based and power point-based training tools
on the following topics:
1. How to do the Sprint contest - CW and/or RTTY
2. How
to set up and be a Mobile rover in state QSP.
3. Optimization of SO2R techniques in SSB/CW/RTTY
contesting
4. How to do SO2V contesting
5. Advice on planning for a 48 hour
contest - what are the techniques the winners use?
6. Setting up n1mm+ or Win-test with a rig - a basic how
to video or power point set.
The video recordings might record both sides of a QSO,
and in the example of the Sprint contest, slow it down enough to show beginners
how to “Sprint” when you are done with the QSO, what to do if you lose a “jump
ball” and other techniques. It might
involve recording, then narrating what to do and listen for in the right and
left audio channels.
These are only ideas for what we believe is currently
lacking for up and coming contesters. There are probably plenty more issues
that our major contest clubs can identify and create training films to help all
of us.
You Tube is full of videos describing rigs and other
things like building a ham shack table.
Perhaps we can post some helpful videos on contesting to You Tube also?
If there is enough interest in this, we can have an
inter-club competition and I will award an “Editor’s Cup” to the club that
makes the best or most innovative video in 2019. It can be awarded perhaps at the 2020 Dayton
contest dinner (if the organizers agree).
Thanks for considering!
Scott Wright, K0MD
NCJ Editor
IN OTHER NEWS: With the ARRL Board meeting in mid January
and an already full agenda, I am carrying along a pocket full of ideas and
suggestions from you all in the Great Lakes Division. Some are continuing discussions and others
new offerings. Several will presented to
committees for their initial consideration.
To provide you with a brief summary, included are a request to return
the Rag Chewers Certificate, add a list of new licensees to appear in QST,
continuing a down-scaled version of the OO program, increasing the point value
for new hams participating in Field Day, adding a point value for GOTA contacts
and consideration of a video Amateur Radio training program. There is much to cover in considering each
and every proposal, despite how simple each may appear. We probably won't see any decisions related
to these items for a few months.
For you FT-8 fans, don't forget to check out the MSK144
mode on January 4th as the Quadrantids meteor shower comes about. "Quads" normally has about one
meteor per minute, so it should offer some reasonable MSK144 activity on both 6
and two meters. There is a pretty neat
Android app
(free) called "Sky Map" that will let you
easily spot the constellations and just about anything else in the heavens,
making antenna aiming a breeze. There is
a similar app available for iOS called "Sky View Free".
The effort continues to contact all of the inactive local
hams in my community. As to the plan to
send letters, so far no replies, despite the inclusion of my phone number and
e-mail address. Some may be truly
inactive. Interesting.
TOM'S COMMENTS:
Happy New Year! As with any
change in the calendar, we can look forward to a combination of successes, some
disappointments, and some changes during the coming year. That applies to ham radio, as well as in our
personal lives.
You know, I remember it being a big thing to make “New
Year’s Resolutions” as the year changed.
Probably because they were too simple and too vague (“I want to do
better next year,”) I gave up doing that a long time ago. But as I thought about the potential changes
coming to amateur radio, I realized that while vague thoughts don’t get us
anywhere, good strategic planning can outline a good future, one that can
actually happen.
So in spite of what I think of “resolutions,” I realize
that throughout my business career, and now as part of the board for ARRL, I
really do think in terms of objectives and goals, and they do work. I want to share with you, if you haven’t read
them in a while, the strategic plan for ARRL.
Here’s a link to it on the website: http://www.arrl.org/arrl-strategic-plan
We have a simple mission statement: To advance the art,
science, and enjoyment of Amateur Radio.
That is followed by a vision statement, and then by specific goals for
ARRL. I hope you might take a minute or
two to read through all of them.
If I were to pick out just one part of the goals
statement that everyone could work on, it might be this one: Initiative 2.3:
Encourage members to get involved, get active, and get on the air. Of course, every one of the goals is
important, but I think getting or staying active and turning on those radios,
whatever mode or frequency you most like, is very important and actually fairly
easy to achieve. Warm up those inactive
repeaters. Get on the magic band. Go digital.
Hunt DX. Be active!
Looking forward to seeing lots of you at meetings,
hamfests, conferences, and other gatherings during the coming year.
--73, Tom W8WTD Vice Director, Great Lakes Division
OUR GREAT LAKES DIVISION web page does carry news from
some of the recent events in the Division, useful links and information as well
as some neat photos supplied from around the Division. Check it out: http://arrl-greatlakes.org/
HAMFESTING: Here
is the current Great Lakes Division ARRL Sanctioned Hamfest Schedule covering
the next few months. These swaps have
received their sanctioning approval from ARRL HQ at the time of this
publication. If you plan to request ARRL
Sanctioning, please be sure to do it well in advance of your Hamfest date, as
this allows adequate time for QST Listings.
Be sure to invite your ARRL Officials as soon as your date is set.
With 52 weeks and 65+ hamfests, things do double up a little. Plan ahead for requesting your ARRL Officials
to attend.
1/20/19 S.C.A.R.F.
Hamfest Nelsonville, OH
1/27/19 Hazel
Park Hamfest Madison Hts, MI
1/27/19 Tusco ARS Hamfest Strasburg,
OH
2/2/19 HARA
Swap Negaunee, MI
2/8/19 Cherryland
Swap Traverse City, MI
2/17/19 Livonia
Hamfest Livonia, MI
2/17/19 Mansfield
Hamfest Mansfield, OH
Be sure to check your Section's news pages for the latest
local happenings, club and net information.
73, Let's go light up the bands!
Dale Williams WA8EFK
Director
Great Lakes Division
