JUNEAU AMATEUR RADIO CLUB NEWSLETTER
Kl7JRC
August 1, 2014
Ivan Hazelton, KL2UG, PresidentJack Gregson, KL1AS, Vice-President
Scott Novak, KL3JM, Treasurer
Ernie Mueller, KL2UH, Secretary
Ron Hagerup, WL7ZN, Board Member at
Large
Richard Anderson, KL2QZ, Past President
David Bruce, WL7BKA, Membership Chair
Jeff Deaner, KL7JVD,
Howard Shepherd, AL7I, VHF Co-Chairs / The Juneau Amateur Radio Club meets at 7:00 P.M. the first Wednesday of each month at the National Weather Service Juneau Forecast Office, 8500 Mendenhall Loop Road in Juneau. There is also an informal lunch meeting every Wednesday at noon in the dining area of the Juneau Safeway 3033 Vintage Boulevard.
The Juneau Amateur Radio Club has a fully equipped HF and VHF amateur radio station located in the Juneau Forecast Office. Club members wishing to operate this station must complete a briefing and comply with NWS visitor rules and JARC operating requirements. For further information email the Club or contact any Club officer.
The next regular meeting of the Juneau Amateur Radio Club will be 7:00 P.M. Wednesday August 5, 2015 at the National Weather Service Juneau Forecast Office, 8500 Mendenhall Loop Road.
Thanks to Glenn SicksKLøQZ for the following summary report of
Field Day 2015.
The 2015 JARC Field Day event was held on June 27th and 28th from 10am to 10am with set up on June 26th. It was successful this year in that no one was seriously injured, we all learned something, and we all had fun doing it. It was held again at the Hagevig Regional (fire) Training Center on Sherwood Lane and across from the DMV office.
Many thanks to Larry Walter & Dave Bruce for coordinating use of this ideal space again. The
Guest Log was signed by 35 participants, including 3 invited Assembly Members. Dave Bruce advertised the event on KTOO and also sent a notice to the Juneau Empire. Jenn Ruel posted a notice in the Capital City Homeschoolers’ blog too. After a wet set-up afternoon on Friday, the weather cooperated during most of the event. The club’s portable 100 ft. + tower supported a 3-element triband antenna, a dual band VHF/UHF vertical
Tower Trailer and canopies all set to go
antenna, and the apex of a “V” antenna with 500 lengths of wire on each leg which were tied off at towers east of the site. The portable tower’s generator supplied power for all event radio operations.
We used Pat Moore’s K-3 Elecraft radio for all of the HF contacts, and 83 CW, 57 digital, and 78 phone contacts were made. Points earned for the contacts equaled 716 and 950 bonus points were claimed for 1666 total points—slightly less than last year’s 1770 count.
James Zuelow KL2ZZ making contacts
Pat Moore sent out an operator sign-up list via Survey
Monkey and printed out the log of all contacts. A miniHamfest and a silent auction were conducted during the event and lots of gear exchanged hands at good prices. A VE session was conducted by Jerry Prindle, and Ben Ruel passed his General Exam—congratulations to Ben! Jerry Prindle grilled hamburgers & hot dogs on Scott Novak’s grill this year, and no one went home hungry.
Deputy Mayor Mary Becker visits with Jerry Prindle
KL7HFI and James Zuelow KL2ZZ at the information booth
Jerry & Chris Prindle loaned a portable shelter for the Information booth, and Glenn Sicks loaned his shelter & blue tarps for the picnic area in addition to the club’s canopy.
When the official 24-hr. operating time ended at 10 am on Sunday, all the radio gear, antennas, shelters, and picnic supplies were dismantled and stored for use again next year. Thanks to everyone who helped make this year’s event safe & successful! If we start planning now, next year’s field day can be even more enjoyable
A great picnic was enjoyed by all
(More pictures of the Club’s 2015 Field Day participation will be found on its web site.)
Kluane-Chilkat International Bike Race: Pat Moore AL7L traveled to Haines to assist The
Yukon Amateur Radio Association (YARA) in providing radio communication support to the 2015 Kluane-Chilkat International Bike Relay held June 20. He worked with Terry, VY1MAP, who traveled down from Whitehorse to man the finish line checkpoint. After Scott, VY1SW completed his sweep ahead of the bicycles, he joined Pat and Terry at the finish line.
The fastest time over the 148.1 mile course was by Joel Macht, who finished the race in 7 hours, 5 minutes and 8 seconds for an overall speed of 20.9 mph. The fastest Juneau entry was Jesse Jones, who finished in 7:47:00.
YARA has been providing emergency communications to the race for over 20 years. This communication is exceptionally important for this event as there is virtually no cell phone or other means of communication for most of the course. The race runs from Haines Junction (2,000 feet) over the 3,500 foot Haines summit, and then down to Haines at sea level. The racers achieve speeds over 50 mph in the downhill legs of the course.
YARA has an extensive network of ham radio repeaters through the length of the Haines Highway and most of the other major highways in the Yukon. They monitored the progress of the 1280 race participants through the checkpoints and maintained communications with the Race Marshall. Only one incident occurred, a collision between two bicyclists which destroyed one expensive race bike. After the race concluded, Pat, Terry and Scott joined the annual race celebration, and then Pat met up with YARA President Terry Mayer VY1AK( Whitehorse) who drove his motor home on into Haines after manning one of the checkpoints along the course.
New Repeater at Eaglecrest now connected to YARA linked repeater network. On
Tuesday July 28 Pat Moore AL7L, Howard Shepherd AL7I and Larry Walter KL7IWC accompanied Jeff Stanhope VA7JPS, Technical Director of the Yukon Amateur Radio Association, to determine the feasibility of installing a repeater at Eaglecrest that could link to YARA’s linked repeater system that covers the road system from Skagway and Haines to and along the Alaska Highway. They determined that a new linked repeater would work and installed the equipment Jeff brought in the Ski Patrol offices at the top of the second chairlift.
This repeater is now up and running and can be contacted at 147.36+, a 100 Hz tone is required.
Thanks to Pat, Howard, Larry and especially Jeff for making this happen. Although some hams in Juneau have been able to contact the Chilly Ridge repeater, this will provide a more reliable way to access YARA’s extensive network.
Now that the new repeater is linked in, YARA has begun calling the Wednesday night session of its nightly net on the wide area network. Juneau hams can check in on the .96/.36 repeater after the
Canadian roll call, which begins at 1800 local time each Wednesday evening (0200 Thursday Zulu).
For more information about YARA and its networked repeaters see the web site at
JARC helps the Juneau Fourth of July Parade get going! The Juneau Fourth of July
Celebration is the festival of the year in the Capital City. For many years JARC has helped make this event run smoothly and efficiently. Starting at 6:00 AM on the day of the parade Club members found parking spaces at the mustering site for parade entrants, fed the entrants into the parade in an orderly manner, provided emergency communications and generally keep things going. This project was led by Club member Howard Shepherd AL7I (a member of the Juneau Festival Committee), and included Delores O’Mara KL7JJB, Pat Moore AL7L, Ivan Hazelton KL2UG, Larry Walter KL7IWC and James Zuelow KL2ZZ. In addition nine soldiers from the 297th Military Police Company, Alaska
National Guard, joined in and were greatly appreciated for their skills and help. Howard remarked that “I saw every participant in the Parade, but was so busy I did not see the Parade itself.” Things were pretty much done by noon.
2015US Islands QSO Party
The following was received from Ralph Clark NM5RC, a member of the US Islands Award Program Committee. There are a number of islands in Southeast Alaska that have been activated, including Douglas Island, so JARC members may be interested in
participating in this QSO Party…
Hi to the JARC (KL7JRC) and its Members:
Being DX, and many IOTA as well, Alaska Hams usually generate pile-ups when they get on the air.
Still, this is a special invite to the JARC and its members to participate in the 2015 US Islands QSO
Party on August 29-30 (1200-0300 UTC). Nearly 3000 islands have been listed by the 21 year old US Islands Award Program and a little more than 2000 of these have been activated. There are many more islands (notably in Alaska) that qualify for listing since an Island only need to be surrounded by water, at least 100 feet long and at least 50 feet from the main shoreline. There are three ways to participate in the US Islands QSO Party:
1.If Juneau ARC or your members are on an island, getting on the air to visit with other island stations and an expanding group of US Island hunters can be rewarding activity.
2.If not located on an island, a mini-expedition to activate an island can be a great club or individual
Ham experience. This is especially true during USI’s Spring One-Day Getaway and the August QSO Party. Some QSO Party island ‘expeditions’ will be to previously activated Islands while others will be activating listed but not yet activated islands or new islands they have had added to the list.
3.If Juneau ARC will not be operating from an island please consider contacting the island stations during the USI QSO Party.
Information about the US Islands, the QSO Party and a calendar to post your planned operations can be found at: The site has a list of the 206 Alaska US Islands and their USI numbers.
If you and/or your members are permanently located on an island, it would be appreciated if you would include your USI number in QSO exchanges and also show your island number on your QRZ.com listing.
Hoping NM5RC finds its way into your US Islands QSO Party logbook as I’ll be sitting on a bucket on a desolate New Mexico island in the desert.
National Parks on the Air planned for 2016: The following from the August 2015 ARRL Northwest Division Newsletter report on the July ARRL Board Meeting:
“One exciting event that was approved by the board was the National Parks On The Air (NPOTA) for 2016, as we help celebrate the 100th Birthday of the National Park System. More information will be forthcoming; the operating format will resemble SOTA, with activators and chasers. If your club organizes an NPOTA event, please let us know. We would like to visit some of these sites, schedules permitting. Web based spotting of activations is being worked on as we write.”
Jim Pace K7CEX, Northwest Division Director.
(Editor’s note) Juneau Amateur Radio Club members may be interested in activating sites in nearby National Parks, including Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park in Skagway, Sitka National Historical Park and Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve.
Useful ham radio web sites: Howard Shepherd suggests this web site for lots of information and links to other amateur radio related web sites:
Northern Southeast FM Network Repeater status:
Mount Roberts (146.820-) / Operating Normally / 100 Hz sub audible toneLena Point ( 147.000-) / Operating Normally / 100 Hz sub audible tone
Pederson Hill (147.300+) / Operating Normally / 100 Hz sub audible tone
Hoonah Mountain (146.700-) / Not Operating / Equipment removed
Petersburg (147.360+) / Not Operating / Equipment not installed
Haines Repeater (147.060+) / Not Operating / Needs minor repairs
Skagway Crossband 444.060+/147.060+) / Operating Normally / Linked to Haines input on 2 M
Yukon Amateur Radio Association Repeaters
Chilly Ridge / 146.940 (-0.6) / 100 Hz sub audible toneEaglecrest / 147.360 (+0.6) / 100 Hz sub audible tone
Juneau Private IRLP Repeaters:
KL2ZZ / 147.720 (-0.6) / 100 Hz sub audible toneWA6AXO / 444.700 (+5.0) / 141.3 Hz sub audible tone
WA6AXO / 146.880 (-0.6) / 100 Hz sub audible tone