The meetings are every third Wednesday of each month, 7:00 pm at the Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology, 750 East King Street, Lancaster Pa 17602. Below is a map of the campus, the building (Learning Resource Center) that we meet in is circled. Come enjoy some camaraderie with fellow hams and there will be refreshments too!
Springtime Work Party at Welsh Mountain
Every spring is a time of cleanup outdoors. The downtime we had in winter is replaced with busy time in the spring. Every year Red Rose Repeater Association joins up with the crew at Welsh Mountain Community Park to clean up their park. There’s a building for public meetings, a picnic pavilion, basketball court, horseshoe pits, children’s playground and hiking trails. This year on 27-Apr club members provided much needed volunteer assistance in their cleanup; many hands make light work. Thanks goes out to:
- KC3EWJ (Allen Hewitt)
- KC3HQZ (Jean Hess)
- KC3VTP (Jim Krauss)
- KB3ZMB (Dan Boone)
- Mary Boone (associate member)
HamClubOnline Now Active!
The club is now utilizing a powerful state-of-the-art system called HamClubOnline or HCOL for short. This new system will allow us to better manage the club membership, events and assets. You may have already gotten an email welcoming you to the system. Simply visit https://www.hamclubonline.com, click “forgot password” and enter your callsign to get started. Or if you are a member of an existing HCOL-enabled club, you can use your existing password to access ALL clubs you are a member of. We plan on announcing events such as weekly nets, breakfasts, field day, and more through this new system via email. If you have any issues with HCOL, please reach out to N3CH.
Pre Field Day Shakedown in the Park
On 21-Apr (Sunday), there was time set aside for club members to participate in a test of club radio equipment at a Shakedown Event. This was in preparation for Field Day.
LOCATION: French Creek State Park (near the boat launch)
TIME: 1:00-5:00pm
There were lots of activity on the air (four consecutive QSO parties, Rookie Roundup, etc.) plus activating this POTA park! Summer Field Day is on its way and we learned how to use the new hardware (plus the existing hardware), practiced making contacts, all in preparation for Field Day. Meanwhile, others were discussing techniques, preparing hardware and enjoying the time together.
Two Days In the Life of a Ham
24..25-Sep-22
One September weekend I volunteered in support of the Multiple Sclerosis City-to-Shore Ride (AKA MS150), a fundraising event involving bicyclists riding from Cherry Hill, NJ to Ocean City, NJ. I didn’t do the riding, but I supported the event as a radio communications volunteer. I was assigned to a checkpoint about midway through the ride in the pine barrens of southern New Jersey.
About the event – It is a bicycle ride that started on a Saturday morning in Cherry Hill, NJ. It ended late that afternoon in Ocean City, NJ. If one ‘does the math’, one finds that the course is ~77 miles in length. Each bicyclist is a volunteer, giving of their time and bicycling endurance to ‘go the distance’, to raise money to support research to find that cure for Multiple Sclerosis. The scope of the event is far and wide enough that mishaps can occur and no one would even witness them.
Why do this? – What would drive a person to voluntarily place themself out there like that? For those just learning about Amateur Radio, one discovers that helping in public events like this is a reward unto itself. For those who’ve ‘been there and done that’, one can also testify as to the quiet yet essential roles played in providing a public service. The role of the Amateur Radio Operator placed on the course brings a level of safety to the event, especially since the area covered is far greater than that of a football field.
My experience – The weather was perfect for the riders both days! September can be like that, sunny, but not crazy hot, and dry. While they were moving along, the bicyclists created their own cooling breeze.
One could say that southern New Jersey is ideal for bicycle training, because it is quite flat. I’ve seen teams of riders in formation flying by, moving along near the pace of an automobile, shouting instructions to each other and covering some miles. Over the 77 mile length of the course, the elevation is quite mild, peaking out at 125′ above sea level, but for the most part settling around 45′ above sea level. Perfect for bicycling!
My job was to keep an eye on the bicyclists, looking for any with mechanical problems, injuries, anything that could hamper one’s path to the end. In the spot I was placed I could see ‘up and down the line’ far enough to watch for trouble.
One would expect these riders to be fit, to be fast and to be ready to race! However, it’s not really a race, but rather a ride. The ultimate goal here is to raise money for MS research.
Both days were awesome!
If this interests you – There are resources you can look into to see if this would be something to consider a future event:
Mostly Current Club News
UHF Repeater
Our UHF Repeater (449.575MHz) is updated and now has Yaesu C4FM digital mode and WiresX functionality. We are DTMF Mode ID 11283 and DTMF Room ID 21283. Try us out!
Saturday August 3rd 2024 Club Picnic
The 2024 Red Rose club picnic is planned for Saturday August 3rd. The picnic will be held at the Susquehannock State Park (1880 Park Drive, Drumore Pa 17518). Since the park is part of the POTA program, we will be setting up an HF station to make it an activation. We plan on eating around 12:00.
The club will provide hamburgers, hotdogs and drinks. Bring a side dish and the family. Bring along a friend who might have an interest in ham radio! Talk in will be on the club repeater (147.015 (+) 118.8).
Winter Field Day 2023
Winter Field Day is an annual event occurring every January (last full weekend) and provides the amateur radio community with more radio fun. This year was no exception. Word got out and people came to see. Attendance was brisk and all who came benefited from the time spent. The entire range of license classes were there, which allowed for those contesting full rights of the Extra Class portions of the bands. The venue was at the Welsh Mountain Community Park Center and it served as a useful site for all the activities in play.
Workshops
There were hands-on workshops with various people involved:
- ARES Meeting (photo below) – Again, attendance was tremendous. Topics of discussion included a recap of the 2022 activities, discussion about the importance of the task books, plans for 2023 events and a discussion of training ideas for the future.
- Antenna Building Hands-On Topics – Part of the excitement of the hobby is in being able to create ones own equipment, including effective antennas from scratch:
- Tape Measure Yagi – This type of antenna serves as the ideal handheld antenna for satellite communications (outdoor demonstration by Alex Van Patten), radio direction finding and even for simple 2m communications.
- Roll-up J-Pole Antenna (photo below) – This is a single-band antenna that allows for quick and flexible deployment in the field.
- End-fed HF Antenna – This is a simple wire antenna designed and tuned for specific bands and is available for flexible deployment in the field. This is dedicated to the HF bands.
Radio Contesting
Another highlight of this event is the obvious goal of any field day, to reach out and make contacts (photos below). Our club was established as a ‘4I’ (four simultaneous stations, Indoor) entity for the duration of the contest. We contacted, we logged, we socialized and enjoyed every minute of it. Modes were single-sideband and CW.
Feedback – Here’s a sampling of the feedback received:
I can’t thank you and the RRR group enough for the fun I had this past weekend. Rob allowing me to continue on his rig after he left was HUGE! Thank you so much and I truly do look forward to next year and helping out in anyway I can. I do hope to be able to have a CW station up and running like Alex…
N3YLI – Travis
Being my first field day EVER, the fact that y’all opened up to outsiders was huge and I greatly appreciate that. The food was fantabulous! Especially Doug’s Scrapple sandwich. I also really enjoyed the building aspect of things. I was one who participated in the End Fed Antenna that Jason was running…
Food and Fellowship
As much as there’s the contest underway, this also serves as an opportunity for the area amateur radio community to simply get together, talk, relax, share ideas and enjoy food. Meals were served and people stayed for longer than they originally planned.
All images courtesy of:
Robert R. Devonshire, Jr.
PHOTO-5 Imagery
(717) 475-8172 (cell)
2022 Winter Field Day
WOW! So it came, we played and its gone! What a blast. Winter Field day 2022 was held at the Welsh Mountain Community center in Beautiful New Holland. W3COB (Doug) and KB3PBV (Ed) held an ARES meeting and a table top exercise with 12 participants in person and 7 on zoom. A station was set up for anyone who wanted to build their own 2 meter Yagi antenna. 5 were built during the weekend. Good food was enjoyed all weekend and the super cold and snow didn’t win the day!