12/20/2025
St. Petersburg Amateur Radio Club
Originally licensed as WN2JTL in 1968. License and interest lapsed until 1984 when relicensed as N2ESP. I currently hold an Extra class license and a BSEE from the Florida Institute of Technology.
I am past President of the St. Petersburg Amateur Radio Club (SPARC) and trustee of W4TA, the club’s contest station. I’m also a member of Florida Contest Group, an ARRL Volunteer Examiner, member of the ARRL A-1 Operator Club, frustrated DXer, 10-10 member (40586) and charter member of the Radio Shack Battery of the Month Club.
Station QTH is a small island (USi: FL285S Coquina Key) on the shores of Tampa Bay (Pinellas County / EL87qr). Station consists of an Elecraft K3/P3 (100W) into a ZeroFive GP-1040 Vertical/Ground Plane or an 80M Horizontal Loop. QSL via LoTW.
This serving of Lagniappe features some poetry of Olde.
Silent Key
By Howard O. McCall
From The Sparks Journal, Vol. 3 #2
A shaft of sunlight,
Pierces the gloom,
Of the shadowy quiet,
In the radio room,
The equipment sits idle,
Because, you see,
The one who used them,
Joined SILENT KEY.
The once shiny microphone,
Now dusty and dull,
A coaxial switch,
Angles off from the wall,
The chrome plated bug,
A beauty to see,
The one who made use of these,
Joined SILENT KEY.
Gone … Click for more
Another interesting email arrived at SPARC this week. A lady had “received” a message in Morse code she couldn’t decode. Strange you ask? True. She asked us for help in decoding the message. Forwarding the request to a few SPARK members, Ed NZ1Q, stepped up to the challenge.
Ed was given a phone number that connected him to the recorded CW message. Thirty seconds later, the message was decoded. It turns out that sender of the email was involved in a “learning challenge that involves solving [a series of] … Click for more
As president, I get a lot of emails from folks who search on Google for the terms “ham radio” and “St. Petersburg.” Recently I received an email from a boat owner who lives in Seminole. He was having VHF radio issues on his sailboat, and was not sure what or where the problem was. Sailors, like hams are resourceful folks, resulting in the email to me. I forwarded the email request for help to the SPARC membership via the SPARC email reflector.
Within hours SPARC member Jack, W4GRJ, was making … Click for more
SPARC received word that we did well in last year’s RTTY Roundup, Multioperator Low Power category.
Operators enjoying this victory are: KA4IOX, KB8ESY, KP2N, KR4U, N2ESP, N4GD, N4KPJ, N4RI, NY4I, VE3XD, W4CU and W4TSP.
Not to be out done, the 2018 Roundup just ended. Some new antennas and software enabled the W4TA team to beat … Click for more
As the year comes to an end, we look forward to what awaits us in 2018. In 2017 we put the final issue of the SPARC GAP Newsletter to bed. In this age of electronic and social media, hard copy has become a thing of the past. How many of you still use paper logs? One exception is the introduction of our new tri-fold SPARC Brochure that introduces the club to people interested in amateur radio. That being said, having been reelected President, I am struggling with ways to include … Click for more
The weather was picture perfect. The station engineering team of Dave, KR4U and John, KI4UIP had the necessary tools and hardware ready. Then the SPARC Elves showed up at W4GAC/W4TA, and suddenly our station had the ability to work the “top band.”
Up went a 160M/80M fan dipole, extending virtually the entire western property line of our station. But not before a semi-permanent tower was erected to support the north end of the antenna. A robust pine tree anchors the southern end.