Coyote Amateur Radio Club

Attending: KF5EJX, W5DUH, AB5JK and K5WW.

The meeting was not officially called to order because the fairly small gathering was behaving nicely already. But we got started at 7:09 PM CDT.

Our brand new treasurer reported no changes to the content of our vault.

President Jason KF5EJX (*) got a really great deal on a used server rack for our repeaters and controllers and everything in between. Spur of the moment thing; but at $60 he just couldn’t pass on it. He will be reimbursed; just because he spent hours to install everything and clean up after himself. Motion motioned, seconded and thirded, and approved.

A work in progress!

Before the weekend we were notified by Norm Fusaro W3IZ (Assistant Manager, Membership & Volunteer Programs Department) that we are now officially an ARRL Affiliated Club. Thanks to everyone involved!

The TX QSO Party is coming up, and so is the CQ Magazine Worldwide RTTY contest. Things will be buzzing and humming at KN5S this weekend. Volunteers welcome! 🙂

The meeting was adjourned. After that we all went to admire Jason’s formidable job.

(*) for now.

The September meeting will be on Tuesday the 22nd. The President said he’d be making Belgian waffles (with whipped cream!) so y’all better show up 🙂

Jorge N5UMJ still has his aluminum tower for sale; and has just lowered the price tag. Please see the For Sale page!

(Disclaimer: if you’ve never attended a meeting and don’t know us then a healthy sense of humor may be required to fully appreciate the minutes)

Attending: Charles KG5IHJ, Jason KF5EJX, Jim AB5JK, David W5DUH and Erik K5WW.

The meeting was called to order at about 7:05 PM CDT, after the lazy secretary arrived.

We started off by administering the General test to Charles. He passed the test; so now we have to call him “General Waller”. New callsign not known at this time, if he chose to get one.

Oops, he did it again!

Items discussed after that: the meetings will be held at the same location, ie. the education room where we are housed now. The member list at the shack is in dire need of an update. The club’s equipment inventory list needs a few revisions, including the addition of the generator outside of the shack.

The treasurer’s report reports a zero Dollar change from last month. We’re broke 🙁

The president invited everyone to participate in the Texas QSO Party at the end of September; show up at the shack! (please?)

The meeting was adjourned at 8:17 PM CDT, after which we all went back to the usual disorderly conduct.

It is time to get ready to apply for that callsign you have wanted for close to 2 years now!!!

It’s coming close: the August meeting. Bring your brain if you want to be tested for a new license or a license upgrade!

Also, and much more important: former President David W5DUH has amassed so much money that he has no other option than to retire from his “job”; and is throwing the party of a lifetime. If you don’t show up for this meeting you’ll be sorry for the rest of your life! 😉

Same time, same place. Well, hopefully.

Meeting was called to order at 7:40 PM. Mainly because the lazy secretary was 30 minutes late!

Attending: new licensee Charlie KG5IHJ (congrats!), Jason KF5EJX, Gary K5QOW, David W5DUH, Jim AB5JK and Erik K5WW.

Items discussed: we had Field Day in a comfortable 70 degree Fahrenheit shack, giving Mary KU5Z the opportunity to do some RTTY again. We had “standard contesting food” (the President’s words!). We made several great QSOs on 6 meters; and altogether logged about 400 QSOs.

We got a nice certificate for our efforts in the 2014 CQ WW WPX Contest, where we got 1st place in the SSB Multi-Two category in the 5th call area, 13th place in the North American continent, and 9th spot in the United States. Not bad!

The kind folks at Yaesu appear to have our T-shirts ready to be mailed. They will have our club’s name and callsign printed on it. All of this is Yaesu’s “thank you” note for us testing their DR-1 repeater. Let’s hope they’re not dark black! 🙂

The treasurer’s report lists $696 available; but will go up now that the President finally paid his dues. Shameful!

The original constitution and bylaws were revised and signed by the board, and forwarded to the ARRL to have them considered for ARRL affiliation. As discussed in previous meetings this – among other things – will allow us to get affordable equipment insurance for the shack, let us participate in the ARRL DXCC program, and so on, and so forth.

The meeting was adjourned at 8:09 PM, after which idiot K5WW – with the help of a few friends – managed to get back into his car after locking his doors with the keys in the ignition. Always carry a spare fob!

You’re being put on notice! 🙂

Look what arrived in the mail a short while ago:

And yes: our fabulastic president made sure it’s being displayed, proudly, on our wall!

Good job, Jason and that other guy. Next up: the NAQP RTTY this weekend, woohoo 🙂

And here’s the latest:

Where do I know that guy from…….?

😉

The result of Field Day 2015: due to various varying variables we had to relocate to the club shack at the very last minute. That turned out to be a blessing; because this part of Texas got way too much rain on Saturday. If we’d had Field Day at Kickapoo Cavern State Park we would all have been soaking wet 2 minutes into FD, and “enjoying” a wonderful bronchitis by now…

So thanks to our esteemed President, who has just added a new skill to his already impressive toolbox, we relocated to 1038C. But: in the spirit of Field Day we did run all equipment from the small generator. And that generator had a really good workout, so much so that it quit on us a few times – for no apparent reason. But thanks to our uninterruptible power supply, generously donated by K5QOW a while ago, our radio operations were never interrupted! Oh, and that new skill Jason learned? Predicting the future! 😉

Only a few folks got to operate; but they both had a blast. Mary KU5Z made numerous RTTY contacts; something she hadn’t done in a long time. And we did observe many other stations on RTTY this year, as opposed to years past. Always good for some extra fun!

KU5Z running RTTY on 20 meters (bad focus, sorry!)

We even made more than a dozen QSOs on 6 meters. It turns out that, after properly grounding all equipment in the shack, our Spiderbeam also works beautifully on 6 meters. German engineering, don’t underestimate it! And best of all: we had a QSO with member Roger K0YY in Denver, on 6 meters. Thanks Roger!

Because of the rain and lightning storm we were off-air for several hours; but all in all we made almost 400 QSOs (SSB and RTTY) in the few hours that remained. Probably our best effort ever! We could have used an extra CW operator; but the usual suspects never showed up. Meanies! 😉

Thanks to the many visitors, and those who always do the logistics but are afraid of microphones, paddles and keyboards. Big fun in little Uvalde!