News from the Sterling Park Amateur Radio Club (SPARC)

SPARC's monthly meeting was held January 4th at the Eastern Loudoun Sheriff's Office. There were 18 members in attendance.

During member introductions, Charles, K3SR showed some QSL cards collected from Thule, Greenland while he was stationed there. Paul, K4PDF, mentioned that he has obtained amateur radio handbooks from the year he was born and also from the year that he graduated high school. Also, new member Don Scipioni, KC4RCG successfully passed his general class exam. Congratulations Don!

We had a brief business meeting and had a discussion on our station category for Field Day 2012. A final decision was not reached and will be discussed again at a future meeting.

This meeting brings our annual gift exchange and it's always fun to see what kind of nifty accessories, books, and/or junk can make its way into a SPARC holiday package. A good time was had by all.

Our next meeting is Wednesday, Feb 1st, 7:00 PM, at the Eastern Loudoun Sherrif's Office. See you there.

73,
MARK KI4OBT

Hi,

Another month has one by and it is time for our monthly meeting.

I had a great month. I worked three contests: ARRL RTTY RU, NAQP SSB, and BARTG RTTY Sprint. Had fun in all. In addition, a neighbor gave me a few of his old computers and I now have a few more running in my basement. I also has the opportunity to give a presentation on the Virginia QSO Party to a group of 14 in the Rappahonnock ARA and will be giving a presentation on our meeting night at the Peninsula ARC in Newport News.

Ray, KD4RSL, has volunteered to lead the meeting. Both Mark, KI4OBT, our secretary, and I may not be there.

Refreshments for meeting will be provided by Dick, W2YE.

For an activity, Henry, K2BFY, volunteered to give us another lesson on "Learning CW." I found the last one to be interesting and it renewed my interest in learning CW. This one should be interesting also.

Our technician license class and examination is coming up on Saturday and Sunday, 11-12 Feb. We have 8 students signed up so far. Red, N3TG, reports all is ready to go with the examination. Even if you are not directly involved, please stop by and meet the aspiring hams.

73, Gordon, NQ4K

SPARC held their monthly meeting on Dec 7th at the Eastern Loudoun Sheriff's Office. There were 19 members at the meeting.

We had a brief business meeting and finalized plans to activate the W&OD caboose in Herndon on Dec 10th. SPARC hosts visitors to the caboose and operates a 2-meter station in conjunction with the Holiday Model Train Show.

Preparations are continuing for the 2012 Virginia QSO Party. Don, K7CS, stated that he has received commitments for sponsorship of all of the plaques. Payments have started to arrive from the sponsoring clubs and individuals.

We had two excellent presentations at this meeting. Dick, W2YE, provided a briefing on the various options for sending and receiving QSLs. Although electronic QSLs are becoming more popular (through eQSL and Logbook of the World), there is still a lot of activity with paper QSLs. Outgoing QSL cards can be sent direct, and those for DX stations can be sent through the bureau with a significant savings in postage. Although the cost is less, cards sent through the bureau can take up to a few months to reach their destination. Dick manages the incoming bureau for the "4" call district (two-letter prefixes) and stated that we have processed just under 90,000 cards so far in 2011. This is lower than normal and it could be due to the growing use of electronic QSLs or the recent low in the sunspot cycle. The bureau has 1 vacancy for a letter manager; see Dick if you are interested.

Don, K7CS, presented an overview of band plans and how they are used. While only a portion of the band plans are mandatory, they do provide a common framework for use of the bands. Don reviewed and commented on several of the plans and showed how most of them allocate specific portions of the band for CW, digital, repeater operation, and DX contacts. An important point to note is that the band plans differ in other ITU regions. The band plans for the US (Region 2) differ from those in Europe and Africa (Region 1). The band plans can be found online and in many ARRL publications.

Our next meeting will be Jan 4th, 7:00 PM, at the Sheriff's Easter Loudoun Station. In addition to the business meeting, we'll have a holiday gift exchange and a ham show-and-tell. See you there.

73,
--MARK KI4OBT

Hi,

It is time for our first meeting of the new year. This coming Wednesday at 7PM at the East Loudoun Sheriff's Station.

I had a great month. Helped out at the Herndon Caboose Special Event station. Thanks to Henry, K2BFY, and Bill, W1FL. We had a great time and several club members showed up. See our web page at http://www.qsl.net/sterling/OSE/2011_Herndon_Caboose_SES/2011_Caboose_SES_Pics/2011_Herndon_Caboose_SES_Pics.html for pictures.

Refreshments for this month are by Red, N3TG.

As usual we will start the meeting with introductions and comments on ham related activities during the past month.

We will follow the introductions with a "Show and Tell." If you have something ham related, please bring it in and you can talk about it for a few minutes.

Our activity for the month is the "Ham Gift Exchange." Please bring a small, hopefully ham related, wrapped gift. We do a white elephant git exchange (see wikipedia article).

We also have a few items of club business.

This is our annual dues collection month. Dues at $10. Please pay our secretary, Mark, KI4OBT, who keeps our member list.

In addition, we can discuss the status of the VA QSO Party and Field Day.

See you at the meeting!

73, Gordon, NQ4K