By Hannes , 17 May 2025

Central Wyoming Amateur Radio Club

Meeting Minutes

Date : May 17, 2025

Time : 11:00 a.m.

Location : Riverton Library

Attendees : Paul McTee KB7FGN

Mark Harris M7MOH

Hannes Stueckler KJ7VWV

Antoine Day

Brent Struna N7HYF

Carl West

Zane Smith K8ZAS

 

Hannes:

Called meeting to order.

Introduced club officers

Hannes Stueckler, President

Dominick Welgier, Treasurer

Charles Burd, Secretary

  1. All club documents, including the Constitution and By-Laws are available to members for viewing by contacting the club Secretary Charles Burd.
  2. The ARRL application has been filed, and we are now waiting for confirmation.  Once confirmed, club members will be encouraged to join through our affiliate link.
  3. New Equipment is on display at the back of the room.  Feel free to have a look at the end of the meeting.
  4. On behalf of the treasurer, we have spent between 3 and 4 thousand dollars on club equipment.  More purchases will come soon.
  5. Membership costs will be finalized soon.  If we go cheap, it will lower the quality of our activities, but we don’t want to charge too much either.  We will try to find a decent compromise.
  6. We have solidified our relationship with the Lander Cycling club, and need radio operators for the upcoming races.  Steven Ng has the details, and they will be shared shortly.
  7. Volunteers needed for several club positions, including photographers.

Carl:

  1. Carl has a drone that he uses for photography.

Paul:  

  1. Does extensive wildlife photography.

Tony:

  1. Has a photography business

HS:

  1. All members are encouraged to take photos at any club event to promote the club.
  2. Opened the floor for motions.  No motions.

Paul:

  1. Made DX contacts to Thailand and Saudi Arabia.

A Motion was made to adjourn the business portion of the meeting.  Motion was seconded.  No Discussion.  Yea votes had majority.

HS:

Adjourned meeting. 

Notes from educational session:

Hannes:

If we want to build a radio community, we will need to keep our radios on and be monitoring as much as possible.

Good communication practices:

  • For initial contact, transmit for at least 2 seconds prior to speaking so RX stations can lock on the frequency if scanning.
  • Speak clearly and slowly to make contact
  • When in doubt, ask for a signal report
  • What does 5 by 9 mean?  First number is audio quality, second is signal strength.
  • Active listening
  • Once you ask a question, STOP and wait for an answer.

Mark:

NVIS basics

Definition (Near Vertical Incidence Skywave)

NVIS field activity summary.

Improvising equipment.

How good is good enough?

NanoVNA Network analyzer

A field exercise idea:  Give each participant / team a box of parts and components.  Competition to improvise a working radio setup.

Other Resources:

https://www.region6armymars.org/downloads/NVIS-Antenna-Theory-and-Design.pdf

https://practicalantennas.com/applications/nvis/

https://static.dxengineering.com/pdf/wp-nvis-rev2.pdf

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