Wide Area Amateur Radio Network An Open Network, An Open Club

Field day 2009 has come and gone. Boy they just come so fast that it seems like weeks. The weather cooperated somewhat and we all had a great time. Pictures and videos are available at my website. Feel free to visit http://w1mwb.no-ip.org/fieldday.html to view the videos and photos. It's nice to do things together as a club like this. I had just as much fun sitting out there talking with everyone as I did doing the operating. Events like this bring a renewed excitement and pride in being a ham. God bless all & talk to you all soon. By the way, anyone within 20 miles of my QTH is welcome to tune to 147.420 and join the fun on my echolink system. Link commands are on my website w1mwb.no-ip.org. I'd like to see more people using the system on RF. There is no PL and everyone is welcome. There's a roundtable session between 10 and 11 pm so if you're up that late, join in!.

Mike W1MWB.

The repeater trustees would like to express their thanks to Clarence, AA1PN and Dave, KQ1L for their help today (Thursday) at the Sanford radio site. They traveled several hours (again!) to give us a hand and we really appreciate it!

Before the rain started (allowing us to only get some of the objectives accomplished for the day) we were able to troubleshoot and ultimately replace a length of coaxial cable critical for proper operation of the 2 meter systems on Mt. Hope. This coax had been troublesome for quite a while, and after extensive investigation into it's intermittent performance, today it was determined that at some point in the past is had sustained some damage, possibly from a lightning strike. Burn marks were discovered at the grounding point near the building entrance.

A new length of coaxial cable was installed, and the performance improved dramatically. This has allowed all of the two meter repeaters (.210, .180, .805) to return to nearly normal operation, and the D-STAR 2 meter repeater will be back online within the next 2-3 days.

The rain started while the new cable was being secured on the tower, so that stopped the progress for the day. Still to be done is some work on the existing antennas, and installation of additional antennas and cables for links and new repeaters.

In cooperation with Dave Hawke, the WAARN Trustees have installed an APRS node at Mt Hope in Sanford.

The node is available at 144.390 and it's station ID is KQ1L-8.

You can view maps of stations heard by this node and others on KQ1L's web site by going to http://www.kq1l.com.

Hi all. Hope everyone has survived the winter for the most part. I know I'm looking forward to spring. I didn't make the last club meeting unfortunately but am looking forward to April and also to Field Day. Along with getting on HF these days, I've been spending a lot of time on EchoLink. I have my own simplex link on 147.420 which many club members can probably hit if you have a good mobile or base station. I've met a lot of great hams throughout the country and am now hosting a christian net on Sunday afternoons at 3pm on the *KC4QLP-C* conference server (node #290251). Anyone who can hear my signal is invited to use the node and check into the net if so inclined. If you can't acess my node via RF, my node # is 195040.

If anyone is interested in setting up a link at their home QTH, all you need is:

1. an interface, either homebrew or purchased. I use the Rigblaster No-mic.

2. Link radio that can stand a lot of usage. I'm using my TS-2000.

3. If you're linking to a repeater, make sure tone decode is on so courtesy tones and IDs are not transmitted over the link.

4. Also, make sure DTMF is set at Auto-Mute.

It is a lot of fun and we can use more RF links around Maine.
73 de Mike W1MWB