field> IN COLOR:  The  October newsletter is available.

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BVARC   GENERAL MEMBERSHIP MEETING
Thursday OCTOBER 12,  2017  7:30pm, 421 Eldridge

Program 1 – “The History of the Yagi-Uda Antenna Array”

The Radio Hotel will present “The History of the Yagi-Uda Antenna Array” in slides and song.  A short eight minute Power Point ‘show’ highlighting the invention, the inventors and the Radio Ham’s practical implementation and refinement of this mid-1920’s antenna discovery.
If you saw “Here Comes the Sun” a few years back, then you will not want to miss this new fun and informative short from the Smoking Crow Productions studio.Hope to see you at the meeting.

Rick Hiller, W5RH

Program 2 – “Introduction to surface mount assembly”

Bali Educational Programs will have general discussions surface mount assembly. The program will start with an explanation of why surface mount assembly is easier and faster than through-hole assembly. Even though there not be any surface mount soldering, the program will have description of the process and techniques with boards that were assembled. Descriptions will be discussed on what can be done differently when designing and building with surface mount components. The program will cover resources for designing boards and getting them fabricated cheaply.

Some of the points that will be covered are

• Sample boards

–    Equipment recommendations

–    Soldering and de-soldering techniques

–    Design recommendations for specific components

–    Board design resources

If there is enough interest, a program will be held in the near future covering the following:

Controllers, program and designs from a low level for PIC and Atmel to Arduino to Raspberry Pi using modules and code libraries and other Linux options. Information will also be present on highly-integrated system-on-chip modules like ESP8266 and ESP32. Information will be presented on various inputs and outputs like sensors, relays, MOSFETs, stepper and servo motors, etc.

Love to have you at the presentation,

Donovan Bali, KG5BDZ

I hope everyone can make it to the meeting. Both Donovan and Rick have really worked getting information together for their programs.

Hope you can make it to the meeting.

Mike

XN5VCD

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LAST MONTH:
BVARC SEPTEMBER  GENERAL MEMBERSHIP MEETING
SEPTEMBER 14, 2017  7:30pm, 421 Eldridge

The presentation for the club meeting Thursday, September 14 is An Introduction to DMR – Digital Mobile Radio, which is the hottest and fastest growing Amateur Radio mode. All club hams will want to catch this meeting, but it especially appropriate for the Technician Class, or anyone want to work DX on a HT! (Deed restrictions don’t phase us!)

There is a bit of technology involved, but nothing you can’t handle. After all, it is an introduction to the topic, with live demonstrations planned.

As always, plenty of free parking available in the church lot across from the Masonic Lodge.

Hope to see you there.

BVARC AUGUST GENERAL MEMBERSHIP MEETING

Thursday, August 10, 2017 7:30pm, 421 Eldridge

It’s been a hot, humid and rainy summer, typical for Texas. It’ll be time to cool off with some creamy frozen Blue Bell and desert snacks (brownies, cookies, etc.) at the August BVARC meeting. Come hungry! A welcome and longstanding BVARC tradition, the Ice Cream Social!

Also, the newsletter name will be announced along with the winner of the $100 DX Engineering gift certificate. If you haven’t to the notices to date to got your entry in, you have through July 31, 2017 to get it to the Editor.

Report on the July General Membership Meeting

At the July General Membership Meeting, we had a great turnout with 33 members and guests.

We were all entertained by Nizar Mullani’s (K0NM) tales of growing up in Tanzania, and the pictures

he shared of his recent trip “back home”. Somehow he managed to mention a bit about amateur radio

and the German friend who accompanied him. At no time did he mention meeting Crosby, Hope or

Lamour on the Road to Zanzibar!

Mike (TDX) shared pictures and results from the four club Field Day event. We’ll have to wait for

ARRL to publish the results to see how well we did. If you did not attend any of Field Day, mark your

calendar for the last weekend in June, 2018. No excuses.

Newsletter Naming Contest

Last chance

Museum Ships Weekend

BVARC had about 20 people on board for Museum Ships Weekend. All in all, everyone seemed to have a good time. The Undersea Warfare folk were very appreciative of our presence. We did have a scout troop aboard Saturday night. We were able to show the scouts a bit of our operation.

We had the SS Selma station, inside the back part of the USS Stewart, in the bunk and kitchen area. We were comfortably able to run in transmission lines for the trailer mounted tower and also for an EFHW wire antenna. Power was available here, so generators and mosquitos were absent.
HF SSB and Digital stations were set up (see photo). The USS Stewart HF station with an Elecraft K3 and inverted V antenna proved to be the stalwart operation, with those on it putting in yeoman’s service through Saturday night. We also participated in a 2m net Saturday afternoon, including Galveston’s Elissa and solicited local contacts on the Tidelands ARC repeater

We found that 20 meters was the most active and conditions on the other bands were marginal to poor. We did get a South American station on 17 meters though. Operations were interrupted several times by passing storms (especially Sunday morning) We made close to 200 QSOs despite the conditions.

We had pizza delivered on Friday night, with a hearty BBQ dinner (from Leon’s) on Saturday afternoon. Sunday morning, during the extended storms, we munched on Kolaches.

We had about 8 people sleep aboard the Stewart in the “Officer’s Country”, both Friday and Saturday night.
Many thanks to all the volunteers and YL’s that attended.

We’re developing a lessons learned and wish list for next year. There are several significant items we’ll want to work on for the next event, including getting the Cavalla’s antennas in ship shape condition.

NOTE: Dates for 2017 Board of Directors Meetings have been set as follows:

July 8
August 5
September 9
October 7
November 4
December 9
Meetings are open to all, and Club Members are encouraged to attend and be engaged in Club governance.