a field organization of the National Association for Amateur Radio®
Radio clubs
The Bristol County Repeater Association and Fall River Amateur Radio Club will hold its monthly meeting on Monday, March 2, 2020 from 7 to 9 PM at the Stop and Shop, 816 Grand Army Highway, Somerset, MA in the Community Room (2nd floor).
(Enter on the Fall River side near the Dunkin Donuts in the store. The stairs and elevator will be on the right. Go left on second floor.)
At their February meeting, members of the Norfolk County Radio Association plan to discuss ideas for celebrating the club’s 100th anniversary in 2021. According to NCRA president Dick Bean, K1HC, two ideas suggested are: a special event station, and a commemorative QSL card. 
Andy Wallace, KA1GTT, writes on the Billerica ARS mailing list:
Please join me in welcoming back Bruce Blain, K1BG, who is the newly appointed Eastern Massachusetts Affiliated Club Coordinator for the ARRL.
Bruce has been a popular speaker at BARS and other events and is well known for his ability to deep-dive into cause and effect – witness his recent work on the history of Incentive Licensing. As Club Coordinator, it will be very interesting to hear what Bruce plans to do to strengthen the clubs that exist in EMA. We are blessed to have 35 clubs to choose from here! As you can expect, they all bring unique politics, technical focus, membership interests, meeting facilities, etc. Bruce has his work cut out for him in herding these cats.
This will be an interesting presentation and I am sure you will have questions for Bruce about the club world surrounding BARS. See you there!
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Meetings begin promptly at 7:00 PM, first Wednesday of the month. Our meeting location in Chelmsford is at:
Chelmsford Bible Church
128 Gorham St. (Route 3A)
Chelmsford, MA 01824
Please park in back and enter by the rear door. A map can be accessed by the “Club Meetings” notice on the right side of the website.
The Pilgrim Amateur Wireless Association will hold its next business meeting on February 21, 2020 at 7:00 PM in the Margaret Stone Conference Room, Morton Hospital, 88 Washington Street, Taunton. Raffle tickets go on sale at 6:30 PM.
We will have discussions on new events, activities, and new ideas you may have along with items for sale by club members and new radio gear you may have.
Stop by to see what we have planned for the new year. New members are always welcome. Check in for talk-ins along the way. You can find us on our club repeaters:
Have a safe week everyone, talk to you soon. Be safe in your travels.
73 de
P.A.W.A
Stan Pozerski, KD1LE, writes in the February, 2020 issue of The Signal:
“Tech Morning continues to meet every week at 10:15 AM, Mondays at the Pepperell Community Center.
“From week to week we engage in widely (and wildly) varying, ad hoc, discussions on topics of current interest. At times we have a major common project focus, as we had for many months with the Arduino Antenna Analyzer. Mostly though, we just ragchew on our radio interests and issues of the week.
“In a recent session we discussed a kit Peter, N1ZRG, found for building a nixie tube digital clock for those with a big time hankering to solder. It is made up of only discreet resistor-transistor and diode logic! Over 1,200 through-hole parts, with no IC’s.
“Another discussion we recently had was on propagation issues that are impacting our morning 40m CW nets. Since we are in relatively close proximity to each other (max ~17 miles), NVIS propagation is expected to be a determining factor in signal quality. As it is, George, KB1HFT, in North Chelmsford is barely heard by Peter, N1ZRG, in Pepperell, even though George is pumping 50 watts into a resonant Inverted V. George reports that on the same antenna his 1 watt 40 M WSPR signal has been heard in Antarctica by DP0GVN. Hmmm. No NVIS? We set out to investigate.”
The Waltham Amateur Radio Association will hold its monthly meeting at 7 PM on February 26, 2020 at the New York Life building, 201 Jones Road, Waltham, MA.
Directions: From beautiful downtown Waltham, stay on Main St. where it forks right onto Route 117. Jones Rd. is the 2nd left after the bridge over Route 128/95. New York Life is a six story office building at the end of Jones Rd. Turn right immediately before the building into the main parking lot. If nobody is at the door to let you in, knock on the conference room window to the right of the door, or call us on 449.075 MHz. (Google Map)
Talk-in is available on the Waltham 449.075 or 146.640 MHz repeaters.
The Nashoba Valley Amateur Radio Club’s February meeting is Thursday, February 20th at 7:30 PM at the Pepperell Community Center (in Pepperell). That’s this coming Thursday.
This month’s meeting program is our annual “Members Short Subjects” night. If you have a short presentation, please let one of the Officers or Board Members know so we can plan the meeting accordingly (you can reply to this email or call me at the number below). Especially, please let us know if you need any particular equipment such as speakers. The regular presentation equipment should be there with a screen, VGA LCD projector, and computer. An HDMI to VGA adapter will be available if you want to use your own computer.
Remember, Members Short Subjects night relies on member participation. It’s your hobby; brag about it!
Need directions? Click here and put your own address in box “A”.
Thanks and 73. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions.
Bruce, K1BG
978-772-2773 or bruce.blain@charter.net
The next meeting of the Massasoit Amateur Radio Association is Tuesday, February 18, 2020, at 6:30 PM at the Bridgewater Emergency Operations Center, in Bridgewater.
MARA holds monthly meetings each third Tuesday of the month. In addition, members conduct “meetings on the air” each Tuesday at 8 PM on the 147.180 MHz repeater (PL 67.0 Hz).
The Genesis Amateur Radio Society will hold its next meeting on Monday, February 24, 2020, at 7 PM in the Plymouth Airport Community Room, 246 South Meadow Road, in Plymouth.
The club thanks the Plymouth Municipal Airport for their many years of support for allowing the use of their facilities for monthly meetings and annual Field Day events.
The Framingham Amateur Radio Association will hold its monthly meeting on Thursday, March 5, 2020. Guest Brian Gudzevich, WO1VES, will be presenting on “Introduction to digital radio with Hotspots.”
Gudzevich is a repeater operator and self-employed technology specialist. He’s an avid fan of the digital radio modes and operates three repeaters in Stoneham, MA, one Fusion, one D-Star, and one Analog. WO1VES also operates the hub of an Internet linked repeater system called “The Wolf Pack Network” with repeaters stretching from Northeastern Massachusetts to as far north as Ossipee, New Hampshire.
FARA meets the first Thursday of the month (except in July and August), 7:30 pm at the Framingham Police Station, 1 William Welch Way (corner of William Welch Way and Union Ave) in the first floor training room. Enter through the front door on Union Ave. and the room is to the left. All area hams and those not yet licensed but interested in amateur radio are welcome to attend.
The Wellesley Amateur Radio Society will meet on February 18, 2020 at 7:30 PM. Charlie Bures, WA3ITR, will present on his new program called “Your Project in Space” for teens. We meet on the third Tuesday of each month (except July and August) at 7:30 PM in the Kingsbury Room of the Wellesley Police Station, 485 Washington St. (Rte 16), in Wellesley. Please park on the street. Guests are welcome!
See you there!
The North Shore Radio Association will hold its next monthly meeting on Tuesday, February 18, 2020, in the Peabody Municipal Light Plant auditorium, 201 Warren St Extension, in Peabody (talk-in 145.470 repeater). Bruce Blain, K1BG, will present on “Entry Level Licensing – What’s Worked and What Hasn’t:”
All of us entered the amateur radio hobby in a number of different ways. Whether it was the Class B license of the 30s and 40s, the Novice license of the 50s through the 90s, or the current Technician class license, Bruce looks at the history of entry level license requirements and conditions, what’s worked and what hasn’t, and what it means for attracting youth to the hobby.
The next meeting of the Mystic Valley Amateur Radio Group will be held on Sunday, February 16, 2020 @ 9 AM.
The meeting location will be the Milton Auxiliary Fire Dept. Station, 2nd floor, 509 Canton Avenue, Milton. The building is a little beyond the gazebo to the right of the Milton Fire Headquarters where we’ve held our Field Day Operations in past years. Local map is attached below as a post script.
We will be monitoring the 145.43 Belmont repeater for talk-in. Please feel free to email me with any questions. kc1ma at arrl dot net
https://www.townofmilton.org/sites/miltonma/files/uploads/towncommontrafficdirectionfinal.pdf
PART of Westford President George Allison, K1IG, has created a completely revised club website at http://www.wb1gof.org and its “look-and-feel” is stellar.
According to George, “the design is flexible can be adapted to the club’s needs.” He invites feedback about the appearance, formatting, and content from the membership, and adds, “We’ll discuss it at the next club meeting.”
According to the MIT Radio Society’s website, the club is attempting to raise funds to renew its rooftop space atop the Green Building:
“We need your help! The center of many of our activities, located on the roof of the iconic Green Building (MIT’s tallest academic building), is at risk due to a major renovation. Beginning this spring, the Green Building is being renovated and our rooftop shack is to be removed. This space is currently home to our VHF/UHF and microwave contest and research station, W1XM, as well our 70 cm repeater, and a host of student projects. If we wish to keep our home there, we need to raise $300,000 before April 2020 for the renewal of our space.
“Sadly, the club does not have the financial reserves on hand to replace the W1XM shack. So we are asking for your help. We’re already part of the way towards our goal and have some great volunteers – with YOUR help we know we can reach our goal.”
Bill Morris, W1WMM, writes on the CAARA List:
Greetings everyone.
Saturday, February 8, 2020, is the [Cape Ann Amateur Radio Association] member’s meeting at noon, with a club-funded lunch. We hope to see everyone at the club for CAARA club fellowship. Thank you.
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The Cape Ann Amateur Radio Association is an ARRL-affiliated club whose mission includes: providing health and safety communication services for emergencies and disasters on Cape Ann and in other areas when requested, educate and train new amateur radio operators and to maintain a well-tuned disaster team, conduct FCC testing for new licenses and those wishing to upgrade, provide educational services and demonstrations to local area schools and community organizations such as the Boy Scouts, conduct public demonstrations and educational events, assist public utilities in finding radio frequency interferences that could potentially harm or hinder emergency communication activities, and create a positive, supportive environment for our members that promotes camaraderie and fellowship.
Dan Pedtke, KW2T, writes:
I’ve done a bunch of work on the TechNightRadio, having a new board, and building up most of it. Hopefully by meeting time I’ll have the two signal sources working.
I will also do a summary of the Consumer Electronic Show that I went to last month.
TechNight is held every 2nd Thursday of the month, from 7-10 PM, at the Grady Research Building in Ayer, MA. It is open to anyone with an interest in radio or electronics, from age 6 to 100. Though it is directed mainly at the Ham Radio enthusiast, it also covers general electronics and computers. Amongst the marvels of radio technology like antennas, impedance matching, and software radio, we will discuss things like the Raspberry Pi, Arduino, ARM Cortex and the like, and even a little about LINUX and PC applications that work with radios. Meetings also include a period where anyone can ask questions about anything, or repair and test stuff people bring in. On occasion, the meeting will involve building a kit of some sort, that the participants have agreed to buy as a group. See the Topics page for more details.
The next club meeting of the Pilgrim Amateur Radio Club will be Monday, February 10, 2020, 7:00 PM at The Cape Cod Lighthouse Charter School, 195 MA-137, Harwich, MA.
Pilgrim ARC members have been active in amateur radio emergency communications, class/test instruction, and maintaining two repeaters in Truro and Harwich. PARC is an ARRL affiliated club.
The Yankee Clipper Contest Club will hold its next meeting on Sunday, February 2, 2020, from 1:00 – 4:00 PM at the Sturbridge Host Hotel & Conference Center in Sturbridge, MA.
Program for the day:
1. CAC Report- W1UE
2. SO2R Mini- NN1C
3. “In Band Box”- K1XM
4. “Fun with (Telnet) Filters- W1UE
5. An update on a super station build – N1RR
YCCC general meetings are usually held in the even-numbered months at select locations within the club’s territory.
The Whitman Amateur Radio Club‘s next meeting on February 5, 2020 will feature a special presentation by Fred Hopengarten, K1VR, ARRL New England Division Director. The meeting will start at 7:00 PM.
Mr. Hopengarten was first licensed in 1956 and has been an ARRL member continuously since. He is a Life Member, and makes annual financial donations to the League. Instead of enjoying his early life, he spent nine years to graduate from Colby, Boston College Law School, and Harvard Business School. He is a practicing lawyer. He wrote the ARRL book, “Antenna Zoning for the Radio Amateur.” He likes 160 CW, multi-op contesting, and travel.
WARC has invited members from two nearby radio clubs–the Genesis Amateur Radio Society and the Massasoit Amateur Radio Association–as their guests to attend this special presentation.
WARC holds a winter flea market, conducts licensing classes, and participates in a number of high-profile public service events. Meetings are held at the Whitman Knights of Columbus Hall on route 18 just south of the Abington line.