VP’s Corner

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Jeff Fuller  WB6UIE 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 some new concepts? Then our latest additions to the OVH lending library (right)are for you. W1CRO recently donated several several copies of each to the club. Thanks Art! I’ll bring them to the meetings where they’ll be available for check out.     … Read more >>

Pinkie’s Corner

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Pinkie Pig here! The February meeting was super! We had a huge turnout and club officers were elected. Theresa handed out yummy Valentine treats! (She is so sweet and thoughtful!) The weather was great—-no snow and no rain. However, I did enjoy all those mud puddles last week! Perfect pig weather! Peaches decided not to attend the meeting. She wanted to stay home, watch “Charlotte’s Web”, and drink pink lemonade. I got home and caught her using my pink umbrellas in her lemonade! The nerve of her! I received a surprise from Andy—-a pink pig clock! It’s so cute! Thank you, thank you! I was honored! (Peaches is so jealous! That will teach her to steal my umbrellas!) I need to find a spot to hang it where Peaches can’t … Read more >>

VP’s Corner

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Jeff Fuller WB6UIE It seems our recruiting efforts have been paying off with several new members joining the club recently.  When you see them at a meeting or club function, please take a minute to introduce yourself and welcome them to OVH. Club recognition has definitely helped our recruiting.  So, as spring approaches with Hamfest and other activities, this would be a good time to order your club polo and nametag if you don’t already have them. Nametags can be ordered from the above link.  It will be some time before our next custom polo order. However, I have several generic polos (club logo but no name or callsign) available for purchase. E-mail me with your size and I’ll check stock. This year’s Virginia QSO Party, sponsored by the Sterling … Read more >>

Sunshine Corner February

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SUNSHINE CORNER Happy birthday wishes to the following club members: Roland WB4NWG, David W5DRR, Richard (no call) Gavin KK4MXT, Dick WN7S, Harvey WB6TTF, Jeff WB6UIE, Stephen KK4UZC, Patty KI4FQF, Norman KK4HDL, Art W1CRO and Katie Apologies to John KI4OWH for missing his birthday in January, hope you had a great day! February is election time for the OVH, a very appreciate thank you to Ray KM4EKR, Jeff WB6UIE, Byron AK4XR and Terry KC4DV for serving as the club officers this past year. Butch W4HJL is home, very happy to hear this! We hope he is done with the hospital visits. Please do call or email him. Joe KI4OHR is continuing to recover from his fall, glad he did not have to have surgery! Get well wishes to Ken KE2N from … Read more >>

Pinkie’s Corner

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Pinkie Pig here!  It was a splendid beginning to the New Year with a great turnout at our January meeting!  I was tickled pink to see everyone!  A few days after the meeting, several members came down with a cold/flu —- myself included.  Trust me, I was more green than pink for a couple of days!  I hope everyone has recovered! Peaches thoroughly enjoyed the meeting.  She got her picture taken with several folks, and was very excited!  (I think she likes the attention!)  John wore his pig shirt, and Peaches loved it!  Now she wants one! Looking forward to seeing everyone in February!  Stay well and stay as warm as a pig in a blanket! Pinkie signing out —- until next time!  

Presidents Letter

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Presidents Letter: Greetings to all and I hope this message finds you all healthy and well after all of the Christmas and New Year activities. Well, it is that time again where I’d like to remind all OVH members who have not done so already, to renew his / her club membership(s) for 2018.  The club needs the support of all of its members.  A mail-in form to accomplish membership renewal appears later in this Newsletter; you can also renew (and pay) online at http://w4ovh.net under the Membership Application tab; or, you can pay at the upcoming meeting. OVH officer nominations are now being received; there will a vote for a new slate of officers for 2018 at the February, 2018 OVH meeting.  So please be thinking of the best … Read more >>

Sunshine Corner January

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SUNSHINE CORNER Welcome to 2018! Starting the year off with a birthday are the following club members:  Justin KJ4LAS, Elizabeth KG4NXV, Chuck W4XP, John WA1STU, Ken KE2N, Ed WD4AVU and Woody N4MQ.  Best wishes to you all for a great year ahead! Many thanks to those that attended our Holiday Party in December and showed up with donations for the Toys for Tots campaign, your support for the kids is amazing. Sad end to the year with two of our club members passing away. Milt N4SN passed on December 20th  and Tom KB1FLK passed away on December 21st.  We will miss them both, please keep their families in your thoughts.  A card from the club and flowers were sent to both services. ARES training is on Saturday, January 20, 2018 at … Read more >>

VP’s Corner

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VP’s Corner Jeff Fuller WB6UIE This month we’ll explore what has become one of amateur radio’s hottest high tech topics – Software Defined Radio, or SDR. SDR works by sampling the radio frequency spectrum and turning those samples into a stream of bits.  Sounds simple, but it takes quite a bit of computing horsepower to do so in real time.  Seems like just a few years ago in grad school when this was a computer exercise (submitted on punched cards) and actual SDR was just a pipe dream. Today, with the addition of a digitizer and software, you can have your own SDR running on a PC.  Here’s a short You Tube video covering SDR basics You can listen to a variety of SDRs from around the world via http://websdr.org/  Cascade your sound card’s output to Fldigi to demodulate digital … Read more >>