Kamloops Amateur Radio Club

Hi all,

If you look at the right hand side of the site here, you'll notice our new "KARC on social media" links. We now will be posting content on our new Google+ page, mostly sharing things we find interesting or useful, along with mentions of our posts here at karc.ca. The Google+ posts will auto-post over to Twitter and our Facebook pages.

We hope you'll join us via whichever social network you enjoy using! If you don't utilize any already, I personally would recommend having a look around at Google+ as a place to find people who share things on the topics you're interested in. It appears to be a quickly ever-growing community of people who care to share useful stuff (on a huge range of topics).

In doing our social presence I am calling on our community here to help contribute even if you're not part of these social networks. If you wind up with links to things that are of interest to the ham community, please email them my way. I will look to share them with the rest of the world and make the KARC more of a presence online.

Thanks, and enjoy!

73,
Adam

Myles VE7FSR has kindly provided reports on the issues we have had with the VE7RLO repeater, and on the resolution that is currently in place. Please see the attached reports (there are two versions of each report, one high-res and one low-res) to see what occurred up at Lolo.

Thanks very much for the work on this, Myles. This is fantastic to have a mid-winter solution to a pretty heavy (pun fully intended) issue.

The Kamloops Amateur Radio Club will be holding a course beginning in January which will certify you as an amateur radio operator. The course covers everything you need to know from electronics basics to radio operating procedure to safety, and more. The course will conclude with the Industry Canada examination to obtain your Certificate of Proficiency in Amateur Radio.

The course is set to run weekly for 10 weeks beginning Monday, January 14, 2013, and course fees will be $100, which includes the study guide manual (a $40 book on it's own) and the certification exam.

If you or someone you know would be interested in attending, please contact Bill Foster at (250) 828-0895.

Hello all,

The December KARC club meeting will be our annual Pot Luck Dinner. It will be on Friday Dec. 7th at 6:00 PM in the basement of the church. Bring some grub and most of all your appetite.

This year the RAC Winter Contest will be from 4:00 PM Friday Dec. 28th to 4:00 PM Sat. Dec. 29th. Once again we will participate from the QTH of VE7WWW using the club's call VE7UT. All are welcome to drop by and do a little operating and have a rag chew. We will be operating on all bands both SSB and CW.

We will be offering an Amateur Radio course early in the new year. (firm dates to be advised ) The cost will be $100.00 which includes the RAC study guide. If you know of anyone that would like to take the course have them get in touch with Bill Foster at 250-828-0895.

Hello all,

Don't forget that this Thursday Nov. 1st is our annual swap & shop meeting. Look forward to everyone dragging out their best bits & pieces!

We'll see you there.

73,
-VA7AQD

Hi all,

Our monthly meeting is this evening, 7:30pm at the usual location. If you have acquired anything new in your shack over the summer and can bring it along, by all means do so. It will add to the fun of the meeting!

Here on the website front, I've got a lot of updating to do as people have sent pictures from our various events over the past numerous months. I hope to have more added very soon, but for the moment I've just added the photos from the Greenstone shack painting exercise from September.

We'll see you at the meeting!

This update comes from Bill, VE7WWW:

A rather wet Field Day is under our belt. Now it's time for the RAC Canada Day contest. This year we will be operating this contest from my QTH. The operating period is from 17:00 Hrs. PDST Sat. June 30 to 17:00 PDST Sun. July 1. As in past years we will be operating in the single transmitter low power multi operator category both CW and SSB.

Canada Day can be a busy time for some and if you just have time to drop by for an hour or two by all means do so, even if it's just for a visit and a cup of coffee. If you can't make to the house please give us a call or listen for us on 2 meters 146.520 simplex. 2 meter contacts count in this contest. The exchange for this contest will be 59 BC.

Hi all,

Just wanted to post that the information in the last post is accurate for this year's field day, with regard to set-up and operation days & times, location, etc.

If you have an interest in amateur radio, please come visit us during the event and see what we're up to!

Also, I was on CFJC's Midday program last week to talk about the KARC and Field Day - here's the link to the video. Any discrepancies between what I say in the interview and what you've read elsewhere, please trust the 'elsewhere' answer. I was inaccurate on the Field Day operating hours, but I'm sure we'll be around and happy to demo/chat/etc. outside of our noon-noon contest operating period.

Anyhow, have a good weekend, good luck to all who are operating Field Day, and I look forward to updating again soon after.

Howdy all,

Don't forget about our monthly meeting coming up this Thursday, we'll likely be discussing some Field Day details among other usual business. I'd like to mention too that the meeting is open to anyone, so if you're interested or curious about amateur radio, or if you're new to the hobby and are not yet a club member, please come out and join us at our monthly meeting.

We also have to thank Myles, VE7FSR, again for heading up the hill and getting the VE7RLO (147.320+) back on the air (on the 26th of May) with Vern VE7VGO's assistance. I'm not sure if the voting controller and/or the links to any of the other repeaters are functioning yet, but at least VE7RLO's functioning well at this time.

Thanks Myles and Vern!

Speaking of Field Day, I wanted to remind everyone early where we go - the field day location is the Philip Ranch - 5380 Jackson Road in Knutsford. Click on the link to get a map with driving directions from Aberdeen Mall.

There will be Field Day signs at the intersection of Long Lake and Jackson roads, as well as at the entrance to the Philip Ranch. Look for the club trailer and other assorted vehicles on the right hand side of the road in to the ranch.

Last year's Field Day schedule was (this year's is likely to be identical):

Thursday - Free Camping
Friday - Most people will arrive and set up camping and start antenna set ups in the afternoon
Saturday - Contesting starts at noon. At 1700 hours we have our great pot luck dinner.
Sunday - Contesting ends at noon. After that, clean up of the site.

Look for more Field Day information soon, and if you would like more info. than what we're posting, please do drop us a line!

Hi all,

Website was starting to show a little dated information, so I figured we'd better get things up to speed here.

First, thanks to the quick actions of Myles, VE7FSR, the Greenstone repeater was back in action within a few days. The line feeding our main antenna was snapped, but another unused antenna was ready to be connected in and Greenstone's been happily operating on the smaller antenna since. Seems to be working great, too.

Our last club meeting at the beginning of May was our annual AGM and board elections. The majority of the members were re-elected, and we'll get the few updates to the positions posted on the Personnel page very soon.

Last, our next big item of business is Field Day, June 23-24. Mark it on your calendar and get your potluck dinner item dreamed up! We'll have more updates in the coming weeks.