 | Join us this Friday, May 17th, for our May general meeting at the VA Hospital Building 1 Auditorium. Our presenters, James Downs KM6ASJ and Antonis Papatsaras AA6PP will present an introduction to digital DMR VHF/UHF radio. We will cover the theory behind this digital mode, the equipment available, how to program your radios, how to get on the air and of course this will be a hands on show and tell session. Can't wait to see you all on Friday at 7pm. For directions click here |
 It is official! On Saturday, May 18th will be our second, annual "San Francisco Radio Club" SOTA activation. Antonis AA6PP will be leading this effort. We are planning to combine hiking and nature trailing with setting up radio stations (both VHF/UHF & HF) and making contacts! We will lead two groups of hikers (novice and advanced) to the top of Mt Tamalpais West Peak on that Saturday morning. If you don't want to hike, don't worry. There is parking on the top so you can still participate (little walking will be required though). If you can't make it then you can be a chaser and help us out! What is Summits on the Air (SOTA)? SOTA is an award scheme for radio amateurs that encourages portable operation in mountainous areas. SOTA has been carefully designed to make participation possible for all Radio Amateurs and Shortwave Listeners - this is not just for mountaineers!
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 Please join us this Friday for our General Meeting. We are planning to do a show and tell session. We are brining lots of HTs, FM, Digital (C4FM, DSTAR, DMR), Antennas, SWR Analyzers and planning to talk about features, repeater operation, PL, DCS, APRS etc. If you are looking for a radio to buy this is your chance to play with a few during the session and get a feel. If you have an HT bring it over and talk to us about it.
Just a quick note to remind everyone that the 2019 ARRL International DX Contest is happening right now! Get your radios ready, listen and participate. DX Contests are not just fun but also a great opportunity to train your ear!
When an emergency happens and all hams jump on the air. Your ability to tune your ear and listen to important messages is critical. DX contests are generally very busy. It is a challenge to pick certain operators in a pile up. Thus a great opportunity to a) see how far your station setup can get you and b) to advance your listening skills by writing down callsigns, RST reports and locations, messages that operators from around the world exchange. The 20 and 40 meter bands are crazy active today. Your antenna setup (whatever that may be) won't stop you from hearing stations, don't hesitate. Tune in and have fun!
 Back in the news this month; We generally assume some things about the Earth will always be the same. In the paper, published in January 2018, the researchers presented evidence gathered from southern Africa that could help us get a better idea of what the heck is going on the South Atlantic Anomaly, which spans from Chile to Zimbabwe. The fact is that Earth’s magnetic field reverses polarity relatively often — on average, every couple million years. The good news is that In a paper published five months later, an international team of researchers provides evidence that the current disturbance in Earth’s magnetic field does not indicate that it’s about to reverse polarity, contrary to what some experts have recently suggested. What would happen if Earth's polarity reverses? Here is a great article by the National Geographic on the topic. This is a super fascinating topic. If such an event could happen in our lifetime what would you think the consequences on HF propagation would be? Would love to hear your thoughts on our mailing group
 On Feb 8th, ARISS run another one of their popular Slow Scan Television (SSTV) experiment events. Transmissions began on Friday, Feb. 8 at 18:25 UTC and run through Sunday, Feb. 10 at 18:30 UTC. SSTV operation is a process by which images are sent from the International Space Station (ISS) via ham radio and received by ham operators, shortwave listeners and other radio enthusiasts on Earth.
When an event becomes active, SSTV images are transmitted from the ISS at the frequency of 145.80 MHz using the SSTV mode of PD120 and can be received using ham radio equipment as simple as a 2 meter handheld radio or a common shortwave or scanner receiver that covers the 2 meter ham band. After connecting the audio output of the radio receiver to the audio input of a computer running free software such as MMSSTV, the SSTV images can be displayed. In this transmission hams received eight NASA On The Air (NOTA) pictures and 4 ARISS commemorative ones. Did you get any? With 18 contacts (3 on 20M, 15 on 40M), the club has a claimed score of 4572 points. The log has been submitted to www.winterfieldday.com for verification. Stay tuned.....
Both 20m and 40m are booming this morning. Propagation is awesome and QRM low. Its a raining day so what better than turning on your HF rig and checking out how far you can get!
20m - ANT1 - AlphaDelta Single Band Dipole40m - ANT2 - AlphaDelta Single Band Dipole |
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