If you’re in the northwest Ohio area, here’s the next scheduled testing information:
Where:
PeopleWorks
3440 County Road 9
Bryan, OH 43506
When:
Saturday, May, 31 2025 @ 9:30 AM
To register, contact:
Ben Murray (KD8JBS): 419-630-3547
Matt Keck (KE8YDW): 419-553-6976
All levels of testing are available (Technician, General, or Extra Class).
A donation of $15.00 is appreciated.
This Tuesday, April 22, join the Williams County association for WCARA Amateur Radio Day from 10am until 4pm at the Northwest State Community college, Archbold, Ohio. The group will be located between the building and parking lot.
For further details, please reach out to Stan DeGroff (W8SRD). His contact information is accurate on QRZ.
Stan (W8SRD) invites everyone to take part in both basic and advanced SKYWARN training sessions being held this month in Williams County. Event details follow. Note that reservation IS required for either session.
https://www.weather.gov/cle/SKYWARN_schedule
https://www.weather.gov/iwx/Spotter_Event_List
Location:
Williams County Government Offices
1425 E. High St
Bryan, Ohio 43506
Google Coordinates: 41.47757139115696, -84.52916324262809
UPDATED 03/11/2025: Everything is configured, and EchoLink is now back online on the 2-meter repeater!
Many thanks to the club for donations to purchase equipment, to Ed (WD8JVV) for guiding the equipment selection process, to Terry (W8UY) for the donation of the mini-computer, and to John (KD8JSP) for his work in configuring the equipment and lending his space and internet electrons!
Hope to hear all the old EchoLink stations on the repeater again soon!
Though advertised on the air for a short while, I felt it was important to get this news out to the general public, and make it available to those who may not have tuned in while discussion was taking place.
In order to combat some rather troublesome interference, we unfortunately had to change our PL tone on the 2-meter repeater to 123.0 Hz. Everything else remains the same.
Frequency: 147.090 MHz
Offset: +0.600 MHz
PL Tone: 123.0 Hz
Please feel free to share, and if you see the old 107.2 PL tone published on a site or catalog, let us know so we can get it updated.
We recently received the club certificate for participation in the 2025 Winter Field Day event!
The following changes were proposed to the DCARC Constitution and By-Laws during the February meeting, which will be voted on during the regular March 10 meeting, pending any additions or modifications:
Constitution Article III, Sec. 4, adding: “Monthly recurring bills (such as electric bill, post office box fee, and club insurance costs) may be paid without prior notification, then reported at the next meeting.”
Constitution Article VI, changing: “[Regular annual dues of] $15.00 per member or $20.00 per family” to “$50.00 per member”
By-Laws Section 4 – Dues, changing: “[Regular annual dues of] $15.00 per member or $20.00 per family” to “$50.00 per member”
By-Laws Section 6 – Finances, adding: “Monthly recurring bills (such as electric bill, post office box fee, and club insurance costs) may be paid without prior notification, then reported at the next meeting.”
Notes:
The current $50.00 dues fee schedule has already been in place for a few years, but the current constitution and by-laws had not been officially updated.
The change for monthly recurring billing is to simplify the tasks for the treasurer, and (when possible) take advantage of discounts for automatic and/or on-time payment.
It has been cold in NW Ohio. But natural disasters don’t wait for perfect weather, and neither does the Defiance County Amateur Radio Club (DCARC). On Saturday, January 25th the DCARC took part in Winter Field Day (WFD). WFD is an event that aims to help amateur radio operators improve their preparedness for disasters and enhance their operational abilities even in adverse conditions.
The purpose is for participants to go out and setup a temporary station in an effort to improve emergency preparedness skills. This station consists of a few radio transmitters, temporary antennas that span several feet, and coax to connect the two together. Using this system, radio operators use different radio frequencies and modes to make contacts. The operators leverage these contacts to send and receive information worldwide. Different modes consist of regular voice contacts (one operator talking to another operator), digital (computer to computer over RF) and morse code.
Participation in this event also allowed for a lot of fun and conversations off the radio waves. The DCARC enjoyed making contacts with 34 different states and 6 different countries. If you would like to know more, or are interested in amateur radio, we would love to talk to you about it. Check out our Facebook page or email us at dcarc.k8von@gmail.com
What an amazing year we had in 2024! So many fun events and get togethers as we continued to learn from one another and improve in our amazing hobby. The pinnacle of which was our 2nd place finish in the OSPOTA contest. But the year consisted of much more than that one event, as we also participated in Winter Field Day, Summer Field Day, Amateur Radio Day and a few others.
So much fun was had, and it culminated in our club Christmas party as we finished out the year. The party was well attending, the conversation joyful and the food delightful. But as I reflected on everything, it seemed as though there should have been more.
So this year, in 2025, we hope to provide more. This year at our club Christmas party we look to recognize and give awards to radio operators who are furthering our hobby. But rather than just “spring” these awards on you, we want to let you know the categories and let you set them as goals for 2025. The awards are as followed;
1 – WAS (SSB) in 2025
2 – WAS (CW) in 2025
3 – WAS (Digital) in 2025
4 – Most contacts (SSB)
5 – Most contacts (CW)
6 – Most contacts (Digital)
7 – Most total contacts (all modes)
8 – Longest distance unassisted VHF/UHF contact
9 – Attend most DCARA meetings/nets
10 – Attend most events (Breakfast, Summer Field Day, etc)
We hope these goals will encourage you to operate more in 2025. We also hope they will fuel excitement and friendly competition. Also, we hope this will foster discussions for new categories/awards in 2026! From all of us, we hope you have a radio-active 2025!
On Saturday, September 7th, the DCARC joined together at Independence Dam State Park for the annual Ohio State Parks on the Air contest. Many members came out to experience this contest and either operate a radio, help with logging, or even just provide support. Every member there was appreciated as it was a long day.
Scoring a total of 25,000 points was our goal this year. In recent years that would rank us somewhere in the top 5. But every year is different with some years higher than others. This is based on propagation as well as the number of parks (multipliers) activated.
Propagation was in our favor as we made contacts with 10 DX entities, 39 individual states, 49 different Ohio State Parks, and 511 total contacts. This all added up to a fun but exhausting day. But we believe the work was worth it as we totaled 25,039 points!
Obviously, we are excited for our success. Especially as we look back over the last 10 years from 2013-2023. In those 10 years, K8VON took part in OSPOTA only 5 times. During those 5 outings our highest score previously was in 2023 when we scored 6,270. This was far above the other four outings. In fact, if we added our scores over the 2013-2023 OSPOTA contest, we accumulated just 8,623 points.
That’s right, this year in 2024, we almost tripled our score over the previous ten! That is amazing and speaks to the devotion and dedication of our club to this event.
All the logs have been submitted, and now we will wait to hear of the results. I will assume that we will hear of the results in early November. After all, that is the regular release date of the results. Until then, rest up, and then get out into the Parks to get ready for next year!
73, Kevin-W8NI