KG4NXT

On October 16, 2021, OVH went to Camp Snyder to support JOTA. The club members supporting were Theresa, KG4TVM; Wayne, N7QLK; Ken, KN4DD; Bruce, KN4GDX; Andrea, KI4SXM; Rob, W4FSK; Mike, KO4BCN; Don, WA2SWX and Ron, K3FR. Diana, KO4QJR was also there to help us. On the day before, John , Bruce and Al, KB4BHB set up antennas for the event. Although not physically present, we heard club member Bill, AF4LL talking to scouts on 2 meter FM. We had a wide variety of stations. Don had DStar. Ken ran 2 meter FM. Bruce had a digital voice station. John ran FT8. We did not have as many scouts as we would have liked. We started with good weather but a storm front was approaching around noon and we secured at … Read more >>

The OVH Volunteer Examiners held an exam session in Nokesville Community Park on October 2nd, where we have Field Day. We had 10 applicants and subsequently, 11 new licenses. We have 7 new Techs and 3 new Generals. One fellow passed both Tech and General. One fellow did not pass his upgrade test. The OVH Volunteer Examiners were Al, KB4BHB; “The Other Ken”, KN4DD; George, K4GVT; Ray, KM4EKR and John, KG4NXT. Theresa, KG4TVM was a great help with checking people in and organizing the returns. John planned to upload the results electronically, but it turns out that the link is “non public” and the ARRL VEC office was not answering the phone on Saturday. Therefore, John had the results in the mail by 1 PM on the day of the … Read more >>

Back in 2019, the Prince William Fairgrounds announced that it had been sold. This was significant to the Ole Virginia Hams because this was the traditional home for our Hamfest. And so, it was time to move our Hamfest location. We looked at many venues, schools, shopping centers and could not find anything that met our needs. And then we met Amelia Powell. Amelia works for the Parks and Recreation division of Manassas Park. It was Amelia who booked us at the Manassas Park Community Center This was a much bigger task than many people realize. The Hamfest Planning Committee, led by Don, WA2SWX, had to completely change venues. Planning and implementation changes included parking, security, food sales, setup access and tear down. Amelia was very helpful every step of … Read more >>

On October 20, 2020,  the OVH had an antenna party for Butch, W4HJL.   Butch has a crank down tower at his house.   On the agenda:  1) replace the rotor because control box no longer displayed direction; 2) some of the beam elements were not in same plane as the rest – straighten them; 3) add a 6 meter beam to the antenna.    The crew consisted of Gil, KM4OZH;  George, K4GVT;   George’s brother in law, Tom Schweinfurth, Dick, WN7S; Al, KB4BHB;  Bob, W4HJF and John, KG4NXT.    Butch, W4HJL, cooked us all a fine lunch.    The replacement rotor did not have mounting holes in the right place so the decision was to field repair the old rotor and grease it up.   The field repair was handled most ably by … Read more >>