CALENDAR
July NGARC meeting:

July NGARC meeting:  Monday, July 18 at 6PM to eat, meeting at 7PM. Location and reservation has been confirmed at Fire Mountain Restaurant, Hwy 53 and Ga400 in Dawsonville.  If you haven't eaten at Fire Mountain before (was the old Ryan's Steak House Chain), you'd better come hungry
because they have plenty of choices on the buffet and it's all good. Look forward to seeing everyone there.

Reminder:  Club dues of $10 are for the year Jan to Dec.  ($5 now for the last half of the year) and will be collected at the next meeting for 2005 for those of you not already paid up.  Also, please fill out one of the new NGARC club application forms even if you are a long time member so we
will have your information for our records.  Diana has a roster of all the members info (addresses, telephone, etc.) available.

Other July Ham Radio happenings:

Lanierland ARC HamFest:  Saturday July 9, 8AM to 2PM in the parking lot at Johnson High School in Oakwood.  There will also be a VE Session for exams at the hamfest. Exams will be at noon at the HS, so you'll have time to enjoy the hamfest also.  Checkhttp://www.lanierlandarc.org/ve_exams.htm   for a map and further details.  This is a "tail-gate" party hamfest with no inside vendors. It was a great time last year and we look forward to another good one here this month.  For those of you wanting to take an exam, here is an opportunity soon and close by.

Ellijay ARC did not have a July exam because of the July Fourth holiday, however, our good friend Dave Meadows K4LDI informs us of their exam session at 9AM at the Ellijay hamfest on August 13th  in the Lions Club on South Main St.  The remainder of the year they will give exams as usual on the first Saturday of each month at 10:00 AM in the Harrison Memorial Hall, on Dalton Street in Ellijay.  The Harrison Hall is located near the First Baptist Church.  Dates are 9/3, 10/1, 11/5 and
12/3.

Special Recognition:   The much appreciated assistance of a couple of hams in our community to the recent FourLanders June VHF contest effort can't go unrecognized.  The FourLanders wouldn't have been able to have our regular set-up or complete stations for the contest without the generosity of Bobby Ledbetter KE4BRX of Dahlonega Pharmacy who loaned us his 14 foot cargo trailer for two of the stations to be set up in.  With the hurricane rains and winds that weekend on the mountain-top, it was even more important than usual that we had a second operating trailer. Thanks so much to Bobby for his support.  We also recognize Mac McIntyre K4RBM for helping out our effort and pulling the trailer up to the mountain near Cherokee and staying and helping the entire weekend.  He
was invaluable in helping us set-up and tear down all the gear also.  We all got wet coming and going, but kept the equipment dry and operating in the trailers.  Thanks again to Mac and Bobby for supporting Amateur Radio and the FourLanders Contesters.  See some pictures of the contest
at http://home.earthlink.net/~shermanbanks/June_2005_VHF_Contest.html and when we get some more ready, they'll be on the www.w4nh.org web page.  I may get Buck to post some on his web page also.

Be sure to protect your eyes when you get to page 91 of the July issue of CQ.  Joe Lynch snuck a pic of yours truly at the SVHFS banquet when I wasn't looking and put it in the mag.  Fair warning.

73 Bob K4SZ

Emergency Communications Report

EmComm Station at EMS.  You may recall about a year ago we did some preliminary field pattern
testing to get information about 2 meter coverage from the Lumpkin County EMS center.  The test results were very encouraging from the temporary antenna.  Now that we have a good antenna on the tower, we need to run the test again. It will be good to know where the shadows are so that contingency plans can be made for relay stations if the need should arise.  Operators interested in participating in this test project should contact the Lumpkin County EC, Dave, W9JWT, so that an ad hoc net can be organized for this purpose.

73, Russ, W4YKF

Many, many things to come, ARES-wise.  The EOC station continues to make progress.  We have all the equipment (with the exception of a DC power supply and a backup), the VHF/UHF antenna, lightening protection, rig, and cable.  Craig, KG4TJJ, is working on "teaching" the FT-7800. 

I am now the proud possessor of ten copies of the ARRL "ARES Field Resources Manual."  As soon as Russ, W4YKF, and I get together and outline a training course ("Readers' Digest version") we'll distribute them.  The manual is available on-line at the ARRL web-site for free ... but it is about 130 pages long and will probably eat an ink cartridge! (The booklets cost $10 each, if you purchase them through the ARRL.  The first ten are on me.)

Please try to attend the next club meeting.  Dust off you tux and/or formal gown, and I'll try to see how ugly a "mug shot" I can take of you for your ARES ID card.  ('Just kidding about the tux/formal part ... a Six-Gap or Tour de Georgia tee shirt will be quite fine !)

Ponder a simplex frequency, please.  If Pete's repeaters should poop out in an emergency, we need an alternate simplex frequency.  The folks in Forsyth County have chosen 146.460, and we are far enough away from them so it would be ok for us.  (Ok ... I am lazy and it's already programmed
into my rigs.) We really need to ponder an HF station for the EOC.  It needs to handle 75 meters, so we can pass traffic into/out of the Georgia ARES system. 'Anybody have a spare HF rig to donate?  It doesn't need to be fancy.  An HF antenna is another issue to discuss.  (One that will handle 75,
and that we can put up at the EOC.)

On the home-front, I finally have my VHF/UHF rig installed in what used to be Ms. Joan's car.  (She got the new one.)  And the trailer hitch is set up with a mount for ham-sticks, so I can operate HF mobile.  The basement will be under construction for another three weeks, so I won't have a base station operating until about the end of July.  What fun. Bear with me for nets and things.

And speaking of nets and things, at least for now Lumpkin County ARES will team up with Dawson County ARES/RACES on Monday nights at 8:00 PM for our ARES net.  Scott, KG4WPU, and I have agreed to share the 146.835 repeater each week.  The Dawson folks are revising their net protocol so it will be alphabetical check-in, instead of member roll call.  We'll share basically the same protocol.  'More info to follow on all that, along with a copy of the protocol so you, too, can practice being the NCS !!!

73 de Dave W9JWT

W4QQ 2005 Field Day Report

Thanks to all the FD participants from NGARC, FourLanders and other Friends from around the area.  Operators were Dan W4EA, Paul W6XA, Neal K4EA, Bob K4SZ, Duane K4PTT, Ryan W4RLW, Jeff W0ONR,  Ivan K4VJM, Jim KG4WLA and Matt KI4APH.  There may have been other operators, but I'm doing this from memory since I forgot to put out a sign-up sheet.  We also had others helping with set-up, take-down and just visiting including Larry N4RPH, Jerry N7SZD, Art KC4FRV with sons Chris and Michael, Diana KB4SNU, Bill KF4IE with grandson Ben, Dave W9JWT with son Dalton, Chuck KI4EFB with son Jason, Jim's grandson Jay, Ryan's girlfriend Ginger, Duane's mom Jackie and ham-to-be visitor Steve Ogburn.  If I left anyone out, it is due to burn-out!!  Several folks camped out on Friday night and a few more were added for Saturday
night.  With the trailer and tent, the rain wasn't too much of a problem and it cleared up for take-down time which is always nice.  It only took us an hour to finish take-down after the operating time was over at 2PM.

Special thanks must be made to Brian NX9O for loaning us his cargo trailer again when he couldn't be with us and Ivan K4VJM for pulling the trailer from my house and back.  It takes a major league truck to pull it.  Thanks also to Larry N4RPH and Russ W4YKF for loan of the 10 and 8 foot ladders, Art and Dave and other volunteers for having back-up generators available, but the little Honda did just fine except when I turned on the coffee maker and made it groan.  Maybe I should also check the fuel more often too!!  Thanks to Lynn Pfeiffer and Anita Roush of PolyPortables for arranging for the Porta Potty.  The club paid for part of it and Anita paid for part.  I think it was delivered by Nix Tank
Co.  They did put it exactly where I put the sign for it.  Finally, the greatest thanks to Jeff W0ONR for the excellent food and cooking duties.  We had Hamburgers, slaw and chips for lunch on Saturday after we got set-up, Smoked Pork Loin, Potato Salad and Fresh Cantaloupe for dinner on Saturday night and Jeff's awesome breakfast Sunday morning of Scrambled Eggs with onions and Peppers, Hash Browns with Ham, and Biscuits with Sausage Gravy.  We did eat well and much too cheaply for such excellent food and service.  Jeff made a bunch of trips back and forth to home.  Thanks again to Jeff for the food and for taking the lead in putting up and taking down the long-wire antennas.

Preliminary results:

We will have bonus points in several categories: 300 for generator power, 100 for copying the W1AW FD message, 50 for electronic submission.  We could have made another 100 if we'd had each of the kids out there to make one Q each, but we didn't have the rules with us to check it.  Anyway, with the power multiplier of 2, we should have a total of 3708.  I haven't gone over the dupe sheets yet though.  Last year we had 3500 or so, so this year is a little better.  Not bad I guess since 10 and 15 were dead again. 

Thanks again to all for your participation in any and all forms. 

73
Bob  K4SZ