OVH at NOVA STEM day

Ole’ Virginia Hams supported the NOVA STEM Day event at the Manassas Northern Virginia Community College, running one of 35 information booths.  Many ‘thanks’ go out to John (KG4NXT), Theresa (KG4TVM), Cat (KM4PBD), and Don (WA2SWX) who answered the multitude of questions from parents and kids regarding amateur radio.  There were displays and demonstrations of digital radio, home-brew products (e.g., Raspberry Pi fox transmitter, crystal radio, WSPR, etc.), and other radio set-ups.  NOVA loaned us a 50 inch  Screen which we used to display FT8 activity in real time and also to display a world map of  stations hearing us from NOVA using the PSK reporter application. NOVA also provided us WI-FI which was need for the psk reporter application.   Three people were interested enough in our presentation that they … Read more >>

Sunshine Corner

Happy birthday to the following club members: Harry KC9TXL, Harry KN4IJY, Brian KK4CBS, Gil KM4OZH, Paul N4PD, Joe KI4OHR, Steve KJ4YHA, Lillian KK4MXY, David KI4AZX, Paul W4ZB, and David KD4DEE Condolences to Al KB4BHB, two of his sisters passed away on April 9th. Please send Steve N4OGR an email or give him a call and say Hi as he recovers from his surgery. We had a great time with the Virginia QSO Party in March, just a reminder please turn in your logs and put the OVH down as your club. The deadline to submit your log is April 15th. We saw many club members at the Vienna Hamfest while we were at our club table. Hamfest meetings are well under way!  Only 2 months to go, this is our … Read more >>

VP’s Corner

(Adapted from xkcd.com)

Soon spring will be here, birds will be singing, and a young ham’s fancy turns to … antennas. Yes, as part of spring cleaning, now is a good time to check your RF plumbing or maybe think about expanding your antenna farm (cover your ears Pinkie …) A popular ham radio saying: “If your antenna stayed up last winter, it wasn’t big enough. After that last storm, I’ve determined that mine was big enough … Want to brush up on your antenna theory? Learn something new about gain, polarization, or baluns? Then our latest additions to the OVH lending library (right)are for you. W1CRO donated several copies of each to the club. Thanks Art! I’ll bring them to the meetings where they’ll be available for check out. How about something a … Read more >>