December 2005 Ground Wave

The Marinette and Menominee Amateur Radio Club
      GROUND WAVE

Repeater Frequencies 147.00 MHZ & 444.075 Mhz
Club Net: Sunday 7PM 147.00 MHz
Simplex DX Spotting and Ragchew Frequency 146.55
Web Page: http://w8pif.com
                   Officers
                   President: Jim Callow, K8IR
                     Vice President: Bob Schrader, AA9GZ
Treasurer: Paul Drees, WC9E
Secretary: Valerie Hallam, KC8WAI

The MMARC Newsletter December 2005

There will be no regular club meeting this month. The annual Christmas Party will be held on Sunday December 4^th at Schusslers in Peshtigo. The deadline for reservations was November 28^th. The next regular club meeting will be January 12^th at 7pm at Spies Public Library.

A VE session has been scheduled for Saturday December 17^th at the Stephenson Public Library in Marinette. Registration will be at 12:30pm, with testing beginning at 1:00pm. If you or someone you know wants to test at this session, please contact Paul Drees, WC9E. VE’s should also contact Paul if you can attend.

I am pleased to report the club successfully auctioned the Ten-Tec Orion donated to the club by Tanya Parkansky. The winning bidder on eBay was Kevin, N2AM who lives west of the Quad Cities in Iowa. His winning bid was $2700, which, after subtracting eBay and PayPal fees, resulted in $2564 for our repeater fund. The radio arrived at Kevin’s QTH in good condition, and after hearing the story of Tanya’s generous donation and the club’s repeater project promised to give Lou AA9JH’s radio a good home. Thanks again, Tanya, (and Lou)!

A reminder that December 31^st is the deadline for paying your dues for the current club year. The cost is $15 for individual members and $22.50 for families. Please send your dues to:

We are pleased to announce donations by John, KB9VXJ, and Ed, KG8CX which will help new hams get on the air.

John had already donated a Kenwood TM-241A 2 meter rig, and now has donated an Astron RM-35 power supply to go with it.

Inspired by John’s generosity, Ed has donated an Icom IC-2100 2 meter rig and an Astron RM-20 power supply.

So the club now has two complete 2 meter setups that will be made available to new hams on a short-term basis to help get them on the air.

Ed also has a personal Yaesu VX1-R 1 watt dual band transceiver in the box with manual that can also be loaned out.

It was purchased new in May of 2005, and includes the "wall wart" plug, antenna, and manual. Contact Ed if you are interested.

SKYWARN RECOGNITION DAY…

Skywarn Recognition Day takes place on Saturday December 3rd. Most NOAA offices around the country will participate with stations active on the HF bands. The Green Bay office will be active on 2 meters. The ham station at Green Bay will work a number of area repeaters, including the 146.880/.835 link and the 147.000 looking for individuals wanting to work them. Listen for WX9GRB, and respond when you hear them call. They will identify and ask for ham operators to respond. You answer by giving your callsign and the current temperature and weather conditions. The event starts at 6pm Friday (0000 UTC Saturday.) and continues through 6pm Saturday (2400 UTC). Just one contact will get you a very attractive certificate.

At the November meeting, Pete, AB9PJ offered the following motion to amend the club constitution and bylaws to add an elected position of Quartermaster. The proposed changes are as follows:

ARTICLE IV would be amended to add the elected position of “Quartermaster” which will be an elected position but not to be considered an officer of the club. The “Quartermaster” will not have any officer-related responsibilities of the club and this elected position will be a one-year term.

6. QUARTERMASTER. The Quartermaster shall secure in their possession and maintain a written record of the club’s equipment (herein referred to as quartermaster log) and related assets to include but not limited to repeater systems not in use, radios, antennas, ham gear, feedline, coax, tools, etc. The Quartermaster will not need to secure repeater systems that are in use, but shall maintain a written record of the whereabouts of all repeater systems that are considered in use and on air. The Quartermaster shall maintain a detailed log of all items checked out by individual club members. The Quartermaster shall only allow items to be checked out upon an approved motion with 51% of the club membership present with the exception of club approved sponsored events and activities.

Elections for the officers of the club and for the quartermaster will be held annually in September with new officers and the quartermaster taking office by the first meeting in October.

QUARTERMASTER: It shall be the duty of the quartermaster to keep the quartermaster log of the M&M Amateur Radio Club and have the same with him/her at every regular meeting. He/she shall cause all amendments, changes, and additions to be noted thereon and shall permit the same to be consulted by members upon request.

By ARRL Great Lakes Director Jim Weaver, K8JE

LoTW is a log matching program developed by ARRL to reduce the cost of QSLing. It is fully operational for all awards in the DXCC family. With QSOs matched through LoTW, it is not necessary to mail cards between stations to confirm contacts; thereby saving postage and printing expense.

LoTW is scheduled to become accessible for the WAS (Worked All States) family of awards by early January at the latest. It is anticipated that still additional ARRL as well as non-ARRL award programs will be available through LoTW later this year.

To learn about using LoTW, go to: http://www.arrl.org/lotw/. There is no charge for entering QSO data into LoTW. There is a small fee for redeeming credits through it.

BIRTHDAYS/WEDDING ANNIVERSARIES...

...Anniversaries: Cheryl & Eric Janssen, 8th
....Birthdays: Eric Janssen, 5th, Cindy Armstrong, 18th; Steve Mellenthin, 20th; Nancy Buchholz, 21st; Noel Beardsley, 22nd; Al Grenier, 23^rd, Jim Voss. 30th.
Congratulations to all !