VP’s Corner

VP’s Corner Jeff Fuller WB6UJE One of the more interesting things I’ve seen during my return journey to ham radio has been the marriage of the microprocessor and the radio.  It started with frequency synthesizers.  Easy to net everybody up on one frequency and no more drifting VFOs. And them came digital modes. All those nifty error correcting codes I studied years ago in school were once limited to pencil and paper exercises, or maybe a mainframe lab or two. Now they run on a laptop computer sound card, like the one I used last month in a transatlantic QSO running five watts of PSK31. And, ham radio has joined the Internet of Things (IoT) – a variety of unmanned systems and sensors for monitoring and reporting. Want to learn … Read more >>

Presidents Letter Apr 2017

PRESIDENT’S LETTER: Well it appears that spring has finally sprung. The season started off with the first Mini-Tri of the year, and the turnout was good. Thank you to all of the volunteers and to Andy (KJ4MTP) for the planning. Our next event is the 2017 Manassas Air Show on Saturday, May 6th (rain-out day: May 7th). This will be our second appearance as an exhibitor at the Manassas Regional Airport. If the air show this year is anything like in past years, it will have about 20,000 visitors and should offer a fun time for the whole family to take in the aerobatic performances, aircraft displays, and the numerous informational booths of various Manassas organizations. Even though it is still in the planning stage, we expect the OVH booth to have HAM radio equipment on display, working ham radio(s), and possibly … Read more >>

Sunshine Corner April

SUNSHINE CORNER Happy birthday wishes in April to: Brian / KK4CBS, Robert / KJ4SZJ, Jeff / KB4IWD, Gil / KM4OZH, Paul / N4PD, Joe / KI4OHR, Lilly / KK4MXY, Paul / W4ZB, David / KD4DEE and Harry / KC9TXL. Wayne, N7QLK was unable to make it to the March meeting so we went to Wayne! John / KG4NXT, Al / KB4BHB and I took an appreciation plaque over to Wayne for his great work while he was President of the club. (Picture in the newsletter) You still have a day or two left to get your Virginia QSO logs submitted, please make sure you put the OVH as your club on the log! Please send me a picture when you get your certificate would really like to see where everyone … Read more >>

W4OVH Support to Tri-It-Now Triathlon Events

The first of the TRI-IT NOW Triathlons were held at the The Freedom Aquatic & Fitness Center in Manassas, Virginia on 26 March 2017 and of course W4OVH members were there to ensure participants were always kept under the eyes of W4OVH to help ensure safety and road course security. This was the perfect short-distance multisport event to start off everyone’s season!  The Tune Up Tri is an excellent race for beginners, and also a great opportunity for more experienced athletes to use as a gauge of your fitness early in the season.  It’s a tune-up…for everyone to hone their skills and remember what it feels like to race 3 sports in one event! The event had a slight ‘twist’ on the traditional order of events, designed to allow everyone to get an early-season … Read more >>

Web Site Improvements Coming

The Web Improvement Committee members gave a presentations on their efforts to give the OVH web site [W4OVH.NET] a “new look”; the attendees at the meeting were enthusiastic about the possibilities. Look for a new web site soon with lots of new features.  One of the primary purposes in addition to updating the look and feel of the web site is to make publishing articles and images much easier so that we may increase our web site content.  All members will be encouraged to provide and post articles, news, general information useful to the club and Amateur Radio and images of the adventures of the Ole Virginia Hams.

W4OVH Election Results

The Ole Virginia Hams W4OVH March 2017 Election Results are as follows:

  • Ray / KM4EKR was elected as the new President
  • Jeff / WB6UIE was elected as the new Vice-President
  • Terry / KC4DV was reelected as Treasurer
  • Byron / AK4XR as reelected as Secretary.

Thank you to our Ole Virginia Hams members and officers for giving so freely of their time and energy to make this Amateur Radio Club a successful and effective endeavor in our pursuit of Amateur Radio.

VP’s Corner – Jeff Fuller WB6UIE

I’m honored to have been elected OVH’s Vice President and I look forward to working with you and the other officers and directors in club activities and in the recruiting of new members. Like many of us, my interest in ham radio began when I was a youngster. In my case, that was over fifty years ago in junior high school. After passing our Novice exams which included a 5 wpm Morse code test, a couple of us pooled our very limited funds and managed to buy a World War II surplus ARC-5 receiver and enough parts to assemble a power supply and a 6L6 (vacuum tube) crystal oscillator. The total cost for these items was probably under $20 but that was a lot of money back then. I can still remember the smell of the solder melting as we carefully added each component. … Read more >>

Presidents Letter Mar 2017

PRESIDENT’S LETTER: Let me first say as your new President, that I am honored and privileged to be a member of the Ole Virginia Hams and I look forward to serving OVH this upcoming year. I do want to thank Wayne / N7QLK for handling the reigns for the past two years; I trust Wayne will remain available to assist as needed as I transition into his former position. I have big shoes to fill and it will take some time to grow into them. I have some ideas that I would like develop, and continue with events that we have participated in the past year. This year, the OVH will continue to provide communications support for the Manassas Mini-Tri race program. Andy / KJ4MTP has graciously accepted to lead that in 2017, I expect that with support from everyone, we … Read more >>