Central Alberta Amateur Radio Club
CAARC sponsored classes to obtain your Amateur Radio License
Nov 15th
CAARC Membership
Oct 14th
Jul 5th
Provinces and states worked.
Apr 14th
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Feb 21st
As I was watching Paul VA6MPM’s very interesting Zoom presentation about Summits On The Air the evening of February 17, Ken Smith VE6AGR caught my attention by mentioning that CW is commonly used for SOTA and that he is using the internet to practice. What? Another group using CW!
I had made an earlier post to this site about the CWCOM system for practicing Morse Code via the internet, and I am interested what applications Ken is using. I got Paul VA6MPM to ask Ken on my behalf how he is practicing CW on the internet. I have edited Ken’s responding email a little, I hope without destroying his message.
The internet-based learning aid that he mentioned in the Zoom meeting is VBand which allows Practicing sending solo or sending & receiving with a few buddies, on the internet, with no embarrassment of actually transmitting on the air
Find it at https://hamradio.solutions/vband/  . You can make certain keys on your computer mimic a key or paddle but by far the best way to use this site is to buy the optional interface dongle they sell, which enables you to connect a proper iambic paddle to the computer. Some people have trouble with latency, though, so it’s not foolproof.
Other Learning Aids:
Android apps with no data connection required
For listening rather than sending practice:
Morse Machine — good tool for initially learning the characters and main punctuation signs
Morse Mentor – a next step from the above, adds prosigns & generates random-length groups of random characters. Is great for call sign practice, because you don’t get to infer things by anticipating the rest of words. Has Farnsworth timing options as well as the usual adjustable character speeds.
QSOSender3 — generates 2-minute or so messages with content from typical QSO’s – call signs, signal reports, QTH, rig info, 73 & other pleasantries, etc.
Downloadable Windows applications,
no internet connection required to actually use:
G4FON Koch Morse Trainer
Web site resources requiring an internet connection
ARRL Code Practice files (Code Practice Files (arrl.org)) – are great to practice receiving long blocks of actual text from old QST magazines. Various speeds available.
LCWO on-line (https://lcwo.net/) and Rufzxp.net seem to get good reviews in lots of places but Ken hasn’t used them. The latter apparently allows you to inflict noise and interference on yourself to really hone your skills.
Practice sending and receiving anywhere, anytime
Build the code trainer kit from QRP guys:   https://qrpguys.com/qrpguys-code-trainer Ken says, “This kit was so easy I even built one and it worked on the first try – which is something I cannot say about ANY of my other pathetic forays into electronics.†Use whatever paddle you like with this tiny keyer kit (great for travel):
Ken wishes us good luck with our CW learning exercises.
Thanks to Ken Smith VE6AGR for all this information!
John VA6SJA
Apr 16th
04/15/2019
The US astronaut who pioneered the use of Amateur Radio to make contacts from space — Owen K. Garriott, W5LFL — died April 15 at his home in Huntsville, Alabama. He was 88. Garriott’s ham radio activity ushered in the formal establishment of Amateur Radio in space, first as SAREX — the Shuttle Amateur Radio Experiment, and later as ARISS — Amateur Radio on the International Space Station.
“Owen Garriott was a good friend and an incredible astronaut,†fellow astronaut Buzz Aldrin tweeted. “I have a great sadness as I learn of his passing today. Godspeed Owen.â€
An Oklahoma native, Garriott — an electrical engineer — spent 2 months aboard the Skylab space station in 1973 and 10 days aboard Spacelab-1 during a 1983 Space Shuttle Columbia mission. It was during the latter mission that Garriott thrilled radio amateurs around the world by making the first contacts from space. Thousands of hams listened on 2-meter FM, hoping to hear him or to make a contact. Garriott ended up working stations around the globe, among them such notables as the late King Hussein, JY1, of Jordan, and the late US Senator Barry Goldwater, K7UGA. He also made the first CW contact from space. Garriott called hamming from space “a pleasant pastime.â€
“I managed to do it in my off-duty hours, and it was a pleasure to get involved in it and to talk with people who are as interested in space as the 100,000 hams on the ground seemed to be,†he said in an interview published in the February 1984 edition of QST. “So, it was just a pleasant experience, the hamming in particular, all the way around.â€
Although Garriott had planned to operate on ham radio during his 10 days in space, no special provisions were made on board the spacecraft in terms of equipment — unlike the situation today on the International Space Station. Garriott simply used a hand-held transceiver with its antenna in the window of Spacelab-1. His first pass was down the US West Coast.
“[A]s I approached the US, I began to hear stations that were trying to reach me,†he told QST. “On my very first CQ, there were plenty of stations responding.†His first contact was with Lance Collister, WA1JXN, in Montana.
ARISS ARRL Representative Rosalie White, K1STO, met Garriott when he attended Hamvention, “both times, sitting next to him at Hamvention dinner banquets,†she recounted. “Once when he was a Special Achievement Award winner, and once with him and [his son] Richard when Richard won the 2009 Special Achievement Award. Owen was unassuming, very smart, kind, and up to date on the latest technology.†Garriott shared a Hamvention Special Achievement Award in 2002 with fellow Amateur Radio astronaut Tony England, W0ORE.
Richard Garriott, W5KWQ, was a private space traveler to the ISS, flown there by the Russian Federal Space Agency, and he also carried ham radio into space.
Oct 14th
A free workshop about ham radios will be held in Sackville on Oct. 22. (Nicole Williams/CBC)
A ham radio probably isn’t the first form of communication a person thinks about in an emergency, but sometimes, it’s the only one that works.
Ham radios can use wireless transmission to send messages to battery-operated radios.
And they can be useful when large storms knock out telecommunications, says Mike Johnson, the Cumberland Regional Emergency Management co-ordinator.
He is partnering up with EOS Eco-Energy and the West Cumb Amateur Radio Club to hold a free workshop in Sackville to try get more people interested in ham radios.
Johnson, who is also a member of the WestCumb club in Amherst, N.S., said that when we lose essential communications such as cellphones, landlines and the Internet — a ham radio can come to the rescue. Hurricane Michael, which struck Florida this week, devastated normal channels of communications.
Storms that knock out telecommunications for long periods of time create more problems for co-ordinated emergency response, he said.
He said he’s already seen how ham radios could help in New Brunswick.
In January 2017, a massive ice storm knocked out power to thousands in the northeast for days.
“It became very difficult,” said Johnson.
Today, ham radios are considered a hobby more than a necessity, and not many people know how they work.
“Our numbers are dwindling,” Johnson said of the amateur radio clubs.
But younger members are needed, especially since the clubs’ services may be needed even more as the climate changes.
“We still use Morse code to this day,” he said.
Johnson said there are a few steps to becoming a ham radio operator.
“You need to study, take the test, once you pass it’s a one-time cost,” he said. “It’s good for life.”
After that, it’s just buying the equipment to use. Equipment for amateur radio costs between $300 and $5,000.
The workshop will be held at the Sackville Royal Canadian Legion on Monday, Oct. 22, at 6:30 p.m.
Sep 26th
A good one for the web. Its for Calgary but the laws are federal.
Rick
VE6RAK
This message for our members in Calgary, Forwarded from Wally:
Hello all,
I was asked to help find some info on what exactly the rules for towers were within the City of Calgary. I finally tracked down the brochure from the City regarding towers and it is attached.
Bottom line is they do not have direct authority over towers but encourage some protocols be observed (kind of a good neighbour policy). There is a City phone number to call if needed as well.
Basically, towers that do not exceed 15m, and with associated antennas that do not exceed 18.75m, do not require any consultation but Amateurs are encouraged to follow the notification guidelines in the document.
There may be restrictive caveats in some neighbourhoods though, and those should be listed in the property documents.
This would be a great document to have available to all hams via their respective club websites. If anyone sees that there are other clubs that are not represented in this email please forward a copy to them or send me their contact info and I can pass it along.
Thanks,
Dave VE6GAD
73 de VE6LK/AI7LK
..Vince
city-of-calgary-protocols-concerning-amateur-towers-1
Note: You need to be a RAC Maple Leaf Operator Member (present or future) to register for this course. See below for information.