John Heartney

OVH Holds VE Session

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VE Session grading table with Tony

Following Mark’s video technician training class class,  we had a VE session at Buckhall Volunteer Fired department.  We had 23 candidates and everyone got at least one new license.   We have 16 new Techs, 3 new Generals and 4 new extras.   Three of the new Techs took the General unsuccessfully.   I think 23 is probably a record for an OVH  VE session.  We  had so many candidates that we could not fit them into the training room at Buckhall that we use for our OVH meeting.   We had to put two overflow tables in an adjacent room where we did the grading.   We had lots of help from our OVH VEs.   We had Al, KB4BHB, Byron, AK4XR,  Luther, WA3FMO,   Steve (OGRE), N4OGR, Tony,  KM4KLR, Kevin, KX4KU,  Wayne , … Read more >>

First CW Contact Since 1958

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KJ6BKJ QSL CARD

I recently had a CW contact with Len, KJ6BKJ.    He sent me a touching letter that I want to share with the club.  It shows you never forget the code.   Here it is Dear John (KG4NXT), It was a sincere pleasure contacting you on the radio. I recently got my first set of QSL cards and so you will be among the first recipients. More important, you are my first CW contact since 1958. Sorry for the horrible job of sending. The picture depicts my inspiration for getting a ham license. I have been attempting to canoe the entire Mississippi River for the last several years. I do it with two others. Two of us get in the boat and paddle downstream to meet with the third who drives … Read more >>

OVH Does Maker Faire

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boy sending morse

On a weekend already busy with Virginia QSO party and Winterfest,   the OVH also presented “Amateur Radio in the Maker Spirit”.   The Faire included such exhibits as telescope making, The Thomas Jefferson Group making a cubesat and high power rocket stabilization.  see more at https://nova.makerfaire.com/makers-exhibitors-2018/ Headed by Don Meyerhoff, WA2SWX, the OVH exhibit included 1) an eco friendly crystal radio; 2) a SDR cw rig; 3) a 2 meter Fox transmitter built from a rasberry pi and emitting voice; 4) a uBitx 10 watt SSB transceiver with a case 3D printed by son-in-law Nick , KG7SOM; 5)  Tuna tin cw transmitter;  6) ICOM 7610 with LED display running FT8. Our exhibit was well received and we had lots of visitors.   We allowed hands on operation of the SDR  radio, the Fox … Read more >>

DStar Roundtable

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Following the 8pm Thursday night net on Dec 14,  we had a DStar roundtable on the W4OVH 2M  DStar repeater.   This was a good opportunity to use DStar radios , find out what was happening with the repeater and make suggestions.   The following stations participated:  Jeff KM4FTK, Ken K1KDA, Ken KE2N,  Jeff KJ4MTP,  Joe KI4OHR, Bill N4SV and Mark WA4KFZ.   We saw Baofang KK4JFK on the DStar radio screen but were unable to get any audio.  We understand she is new to DStar and still configuring her radio. The DStar repeater news was that the linking capability to reflectors has been tested and works on all DStar reflectors (REF prefix).   There are some reflectors (  DCS and XRF prefix) that it does not work on.  The technical committee is working … Read more >>

OVH Members Participate in Emergency Exercise

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On November 18,  the city of Manassas and the city of Manassas Park held a joint emergency exercise for their combined Community Emergency Response Teams (CERT).   The exercise was held at Osborne High School and involved finding victims in blacked-out rooms and the triaging and transporting the victims. The purpose of the exercise was to use the skills learned in the class room and apply them in a simulated exercise.   The teams checked for bleeding , airway obstruction and shock.   One of the victims was under a table and had a knife protruding from her legs.  Victims were sorted by severity and transported to the medical treatment area. The OVH members who had just received the training and were part of the teams were Ray , KM4EKR,  Sandy, KM4JUS and … Read more >>

A Visit by the PIG

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The OVH Pig graced us with her presence at the November OVH Meeting.   She will be part of the OVH float at the Dec 2, 2017 Manassas Christmas Parade.  To volunteer for the parade,  email N4OGR@arrl.net or K4GVT@comcast.net   The OVH Pig in real life is Rosalie Fuller who purchased the outfit at her personal expense.  Thanks Rosalie.

The Making of a full size 160 Horizontal Loop

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Jeff Fischer, WB4TT, recently decided to add a 520 foot horizontal loop to his antenna farm. Jeff wanted this to be a homebrew antenna and not an off the shelf antenna. He made his own 1:1 balun rated at a kilowatt out of 12 gauge magnet wire over which he applied a 3M coating for extra insulation. With the help of neighbor, Gil Thompson , KM4OZH, he created  antenna mount points for the trees from hardware store hardware. These mount points are designed to flex with the trees to avoid snapping the antenna wire through metal fatigue. The mounts consists of an 8 inch eye bolt in the tree connected to two pulleys. The pulley connected to the eye bolt is connected to Dacron rope that is a loop to … Read more >>