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Radio Amateurs of Canada (RAC) is the national association for Amateur Radio in Canada. It is a not-for-profit membership association with headquarters in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, representing the interests of Amateur Radio all across Canada.

Speaking on behalf of Canadian Radio Amateurs, RAC provides liaison with government agencies and carries the Amateur voice about regulatory and spectrum issues to the discussion table with government and industry leaders, nationally and internationally. RAC is the Canadian voting member society of the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU).

Check out this very original method of mass disconnecting an antenna system during a lightning storm.

Has anyone been using an Icom 7100 in a mobile (in motion) environment?

http://www.arrl.org/news/well-known-yukon-ham-j-allen-vy1ja-is-stepping-away-from-amateur-radio

For all those who have had the opportunity of a QSO with Allen, he'll be missed. He is stepping down from amateur radio in Whitehorse, apparently due to health reasons. Meanwhile, the search is on for an active Yukon-based amateur radio station who can fill his shoes. It'll be tough, Allen has logged over 110,000 contacts.

I have not heard of anyone going down to the Bahamas after Dorian. Has anyone else heard anything?

Over the Labor Day weekend I checked into the Cherry Tree Net and made several QSOs with this Heathkit HW-101.  It's back on the air after being idle for some time.  It needed some work on the VFO and alignment of the transmitter.  Currently, I'm using a D-104 mic with this transceiver.

So, here we go, ICOM is about to challenge the Yaesu 991A? I wonder if this might have something to do with 9700 sales. I'm not sure if they're selling well or not, but I have not yet met anyone who has bought one. So here we go...

Here is the first article I've read on the prototype: https://www.dxzone.com/icom-ic-705-new-product/

Thoughts?

I have a wonder question. If you have a radio room (if you don't, assume that you do) and you have an operating position facing the wall. In your youth, you lusted after some really great equipment but couldn't afford it (or your parents couldn't). Or, perhaps life got in the way and you let your old gear go. You don't have room for it now, but would love to have the memories. The solution at which you arrive is a mural on the wall of an operating position containing this gear. Which would you prefer, the old gear we so dearly would have loved or a military station, say a battleship or submarine radio room? (No, this is not some photographic project I am planning; I'm just curious)

Personally, I'd go for the shipboard radio room. My first experience with hf was listening to maritime radio on a Zenith TransOceanic at a friend's house.

Ham Community will be exhibiting at Hamcation in Orlando on 7 to 9 February in East & West Hall Booth 099. We look forward to meeting and recruiting many new members!

JVCKENWOOD Corporation is a leading developer and manufacturer of consumer electronics and communications equipment. Founded in the United States in 1961, JVCKENWOOD USA is the largest sales subsidiary of JVCKENWOOD Corporation of Japan and is recognized by consumers and industry professionals for providing products known for quality, performance, and value. 

JVCKENWOOD USA has a reputation for bringing important new products to the consumer electronics market. The company built the first audio/video amplifier for home theater back in 1981. JVCKENWOOD also created the first anti-theft car cassette deck that could be slid out of the dash; the first with an automatic broadcast sensor system and automatic noise reduction; the first with 24 presets; and the first polypropylene speaker cones. Over the years, JVCKENWOOD engineers have invented dozens of new technologies later copied by others. 

JVCKENWOOD USA Communications Sector, based in Irving, TX, maintains a leadership position in North and South America for mobile and portable two-way radios and custom systems. Upon entering the U.S. radio equipment market in 1975, JVCKENWOOD quickly became known for its devotion to quality, which created immediate demand and credibility for the professional land mobile radio products introduced to American business and government buyers in 1983. KENWOOD land mobile portables, mobiles and custom systems are acknowledged to be a top choice in the world market, particularly by first responders, and are a trusted supplier to business and industry. In addition, JVCKENWOOD's dominance of the amateur radio market has been recognized in the U.S. for more than 30 years. KENWOOD amateur radio products are the number one choice for ham operators who are on the forefront of civilian emergency response. 

Today JVCKENWOOD USA has taken a leading role in developing market-driven products and continues to operate as one of the largest manufacturers of personal entertainment and communications equipment in the world. It is a central JVCKENWOOD belief to listen to the market and develop exacting products that address customers' needs at the highest possible value.

Corporate name: JVCKenwood USA Corporation

To reach their amateur radio team by phone: (310) 639-4200 (Option 4, Option 1)

I'm curious which branches of the military our members have served. If you've served in more than one, feel free to include them.

World Radio TV Handbook or WRTH is the most accurate and complete guide to the world of radio on LW, MW, SW and FM, available in any form. The CD takes part of this information, international broadcasts on LW, MW and SW and domestic SW, and displays it as a graphic colour bargraph.

The WRTH Bargraph Frequency Guide has been carefully designed to give the maximum information in a clear and easy to read format. It is supplied as a pdf. 

http://www.wrth.com/image/Sample-page-WRTH-BARGRAPH.pdf

Text columns show the frequency of the broadcasts in kHz; the names of the stations making the broadcasts or the broadcasters responsible for the broadcasts (you can tell international from domestic broadcasts at a glance, as stations making domestic broadcasts are shown in italic type); the transmitter site code for international broadcasts and the country code for domestic transmissions; and the power of the transmitter in kW.

Each entry also has a colour bar. These colour bars show the duration of each broadcast in UTC on the 24-hour clock. The colour of the
bar shows the language of the broadcast. Eighteen languages are identified by different coloured bars, with the colour and language shown at the bottom of the page. Other languages, or combinations
of languages, are shown above a buff-coloured bar. Information above the bar also gives the target area or country at which the broadcast is aimed; an indication of the days on which the broadcast is made; and symbols showing if the broadcast is inactive, irregular, of variable frequency, or used for DRM broadcasts.

You can use these pages to identify a broadcast you have heard on a specific frequency, or you can scan the colour bars to find broadcasts in your chosen language at a particular UTC time. You can also use the Find function in Adobe Acrobat to search the pdf for frequencies, stations, or sites.

The disk also includes a list of abbreviations used in the bargraph along with decode tables for international transmitter sites and countries or geographical areas. These are also supplied as pdfs. There is also a sortable list of transmitter sites in Excel format. 

We are very pleased to be able to offer this very useful tool to industry professionals, DXers, SWLs and BCLs. 

Please note - International broadcast SW frequencies change twice a year. The 'B' season comes into effect at the end of October each year and the 'A' season at the end of March. It typically takes 4-6 weeks after the start of the season for the broadcasters to settle on the final frequencies they will use, although changes do continue to be made. We monitor all the frequencies and changes before releasing our information.

I might as well be the first one to make a shameless plug. Last year (2018) I wrote my first novel. I'm thrilled to present a link here, It's available on Amazon in paperback or Kindle.

https://bit.ly/tuk50

The Teaser...

After 34 years of service, retired Lt. General El Masri is living comfortably in Washington D.C. His new life is a balanced mix of adventure motorcycling and amateur radio, until one day he receives a message on an HF frequency; it will change the course of his life and of the very world order he once defended. What causes this ex-Deputy Commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, NORAD, to steal a Top Secret archive from the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency? Why is he trying to start a nuclear war with Russia? As worrisome, why are an elite group of Russian Navy Spetsnaz preparing an infil into North America? In this military, espionage, adventure novel, we discover the fragile nature of inter-agency intelligence and how a single event could trigger a nuclear Armageddon, still today. Fortunately, a pair of mismatched allies, Graham Lombard, a CSIS, has-been, intelligence analyst, and Masako Fujimori, an overdriven DIA field agent, will make it their duty to chase down the General over land, across oceans, in the air, and even on the airwaves. In the end, it will come down to a choice, will one of the General’s own family members be prepared to stop him, even if it means killing him?

 

So as a new HAM I have been trying to figure out what is out there and what works for me. Currently I haven’t ventured out past using local repeaters, but I have found this seemingly simple avenue very cumbersome and not strait forward.

I am curious to hear what the seasoned HAMs do when they travel. Does anyone commonly use technologies like D-Star, System Fusion, and WIRES?

Here is my experience:

To start, I have an 8 Watt Baofeng HT and a 50 Watt Yeasu Mobile. I read the manuals and know how to hand jam the freqs in, but this process reminds me of trying to set a VCR to record something a few days in the future.. a process that is doable but very few people take the time to figure out how to do it, and if you haven’t done it in a few months you are probably going to do it wrong a few times before you get it right. So I bought a programming cable and downloaded CHIRP. I pulled the freqs of bunch of repeaters in my area and dumped them into CHIRP and onto the radio. So now I have a HT with a bunch of local repeaters saved, but I have no idea where 99% of them are physically located. When I am out and about and feel courageous enough to broadcast, I have to pull up my RepeaterBook app, find the repeater call sign close to me, and then scroll through my HT’s memory bank to find the corresponding slot.

Does everyone do this? Because it feels very convoluted.

This process has left me really only tuning to the repeater closest to my house. 

Now I am traveling on vacation and trying to make contact on the local repeaters, so I brought my HT. When I am able to broadcast I have to look up repeaters on RepeaterBook, hand jam them into the radio and kachunk the radio (with proper identification) to see if I put the info in correctly or if the repeater is even operational. I am of course not even saving these channels into the HT because it is a pain and I can’t even give them a proper name, so if I want to go back to try the freq again I might have to re-look it up and of course rejam it in the radio. 

I do not have my mobile radio with me, but hand jamming info into it is just as annoying as the HT. 

 

I want to know what the “Elmers” do because there must be a better way..

Tomorrow, Sunday August 4, 2019, W4DOI and I (K3MRI) will be presenting Ham Community for the first time in public. We have rented a small table in the main hall of the Berryville Hamfest, at the Clarke County Ruritan Fairgrounds, to show the site on a monitor, to hand out invitation cards for people to sign on to the community, and to, most importantly, hear directly from amateur radio operators. Our goal is to offer exactly what the greater amateur radio community wants and needs and the only way to do that is to listen. It's nice to have our own ideas, and we're excited to show what we've built, but that's just the beginning. To be a successful community we are fully aware that we must reflect people's expectations. That does not mean we cannot have innovative ideas of our own, it does mean that those ideas have to fill a genuine need.

Berryville will not be our last Hamfest. We will most certainly be presenting the Community at future hamfests both in our region and throughout the U.S. and Canada.

We hope to see many of our members, many of our friends, and to make new ones.

For those of us who approve of Winlink and the convergence of technologies, here is an interesting development... Winklink on Raspberry Pi !!

https://hamradiohawaii.wordpress.com/2018/11/13/winlink-on-raspberry-pi-project/

In my case, activating a beach is the perfect couple activity. My wife loves the beach and I get to operate.

If you'd like to know more about BOTA... https://www.beachesontheair.com

My channel is "Ham Radio Answers," and this video invites those visiting my channel page to subscribe. My channel includes videos for Technician, General, and Amateur Extra training. They're unique on YouTube in that they closely follow the ARRL License Manuals. My new video series is "Ask Dave!" which answer questions of particular interest to new hams. Be sure to subscribe to get notice of upcoming videos!

I keep hearing about how many HAMs are licensed but inactive. Some, we are told become licensed, get an HT, get on air for a few days, get bored and go quiet. Others, even old-timers, seem to be frustrated by over-bearing HOAs who will not let them put up antennas. And then there are those who are frustrated by the low point in the solar cycle and have decided that it's not worth the effort.

What is the proposed solution? I may be wrong, but it seems to me as though the large membership organizations in most countries are focussing on contesting. It seems as though contests are the best way, or so they think, to get on air. There is a second effort: digital. While some castigate FT-8 and the like, others say it brings younger operators into the fold.

The point is, I meet people regularly, usually because they see my call sign on some piece of apparel, who tell me that they are HAMs. They rattle off their callsign and then tell me that they've been inactive for x years. When I ask why, they actually don't have an answer. "I don't know, I've just not had time," is a common answer. I ask if it was money; not really they answer. Was it antenna restrictions? Some yes, most no. Was it just a lack of time? For some yes, for most no. So what is it? What is keeping people off the air and, more importantly, how do we get them back on?

Our new K4 doesn’t just harness the latest technology: it blends new tech with a classic user interface to create a transceiver that’s more than the sum of its parts. One that’s sophisticated, yet civilized.

Like you, we’ve witnessed the recent revolution in direct sampling and SDRs. But rather than rush toward change, we’ve been observing — saving the best ideas, testing them, and quietly merging them into a new kind of radio. The resulting modular, hybrid design is innovative and versatile, yet still a pleasure to use.

In particular, operators who’ve used our K3S transceiver and P3 panadapter will find the K4’s controls familiar, and its complement of I/O compatible with their existing station. But they’ll also discover a new level of convenience in the bright, 7” touch display, which combines a large panadapter with three intuitive multi-function controls. Everything you need is at your fingertips, including a unique built-in help system.

Three K4 Flavors 

There are three K4 models to choose from: the basic K4; the K4D, which adds diversity receive capability; and the K4HD, which goes a step beyond other direct-sampling SDRs, adding a dual superhet module for the ultimate in blocking and close-in dynamic range.

A basic K4 can be easily upgraded to a K4D at any time by adding the KDIV4 option.

Similarly, a K4D can be upgraded to a K4HD by adding the KHDR4.

The K4 and K4D, like other “pure” direct-sampling radios, do not require crystal roofing filters. Digital signal processing is used to provide advanced demodulation, filtering, and signal display. The K4HD can operate either in direct-sampling or superhet mode. Typically the latter is only needed in the presence of extreme signals.

Modularity that Adapts to Your Needs 

Flexibility — now and in the future — was a major design goal for the K4. All of Elecraft’s transceivers embody this philosophy. You can tailor the radio to your current needs, with one of the three models described above as well as other options. But you’ll also be ready to take advantage of new technology that in some cases hasn’t even been invented. Modules are segmented strategically to allow updates at a moderate cost so you won’t have to invest in a new radio every couple of years. Elecraft also listens to its community: the best ideas often translate into new options and software features.

Advanced Remote Control, Host Interfacing, and Display 

With the K4, you can operate at the radio itself or from anywhere — whether it’s your living room, back porch, or halfway around the world. One K4 can control another, including streaming panadapter display. you can also use a tablet, netbook, or desktop PC. When operating the radio directly, you can use both the built-in LCD and an external monitor (HDMI), with different content.

Application programmers will benefit from the K4’s rich, yet easy to use command set, including many new commands for setting up panadapter and audio streams.

Let's see how well you know your amateur radio history. Warning, this is not the easiest test...

Welcome to Ham Community, an experiment by an amateur radio operator who, like all amateur radio operators, loves to experiment. That's what we do. We try new things, then we improve them, then we simply build another one, better still.

There are other amateur radio websites out there, we know this, And yet, none seemed to have the most important defining characteristic: a sense of community. Some are about reviews, others about propagation, still others about technology. All those are important, and we support them, we even have links to them in our Links Directory! Instead, Ham Community was born out of a need to create off-air bonds. Let's be clear, first and foremost, HAMs build bonds on air. But why not use the web to strengthen those bonds, to facilitate them, even to nurture them?

As I type this, the project is in its infancy; it's not even live yet. As you, however, read this first post, who knows how far we've gotten. One thing is certain, we will get nowhere if we do not make this space useful to you, and that's what we've spent the past six months doing. We've been talking, thinking, and planning. We've been building and rebuilding, all in the hope of giving you a worthy tool and space.

As for the future, we have dreams. We think we know where this online community could end up, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Before I close, a quick shout out to several HAMs, and non-HAMs, who have been instrumental in making this site a reality. Their encouragements and input have been invaluable. I count them as friends and accomplices in this mad venture.

A most special thank you to W4DOI, W3JRD, K3HLT, and KW4TO; the Five Hamigos.

Hi all. Is it me or does everyone have a problem with hearing any repeaters, or simplex, while driving past the Tenleytown towers? The S-meters on my Icon 5100 go to S7/S9. They don't break the squelch, kudos to Icom for recognizing the interference and keeping it out, but as soon as a repeater comes back to me and does break the squelch, all I hear is the QRM from the towers. Nuts. For me it starts right around the McDonald's on Wisconsin and lasts until just past Friendship Heights.

Let me just come out and say it, I know less about the K4 than anyone else, and there have been no independent tests to date, yet here I am, smitten. Anyone else get the K4 bug? I am seriously considering saving up for one.

This is the text of the FCC's Part 97, the regulations that govern amateur radio in the United States.