07/19/2025
St. Petersburg Amateur Radio Club
Please join me in welcoming Dan “Nic” Nichols KZ0J to the SPARC board. Nic was nominated and elected at the February meeting for the spot vacated by Tom W4CU. You can email Nic directly at boardmember3@sparc-club.org.
As you may know, SPARC is a board-run organization per our bylaws. We rely upon the board to steer the business of the club. Please join me in wishing Nic much success.
On behalf of all the SPARC board and members, I want to extend a heartfelt thanks to Billy KN4LUZ for his service to the club as the repeater trustee of SPARC. Billy–while maintaining his role as SPARC net manager–has asked to step-down as trustee and in an act that makes being president easy, found his own replacement.
Alex KO4CEE was authorized by the SPARC board at its most recent meeting to become the trustee for the WA4AKH club repeater callsign. There are some housekeeping tasks to get the change made with the FCC but this should be done within a week or so [These are now complete – 9 Dec 2024]. We appreciate Alex taking on this responsibility and we trust everyone that uses the repeaters will exercise all due care in operating on those club repeaters.
Once again, thank you Billy! We wish you all the best and look forward to your net manager reports again.
Field Day produced good results for SPARC. The group of operators listed below worked a total of 1643 QSOs. Of those 759 were made by CW, 702 by FT8/4 , and 182 by SSB. Our score based on QSOs alone was 6,208. Dave KR4U added 100 points to that total by copying the ARRL Field Day Message. Another 50 points was added by submitting our results on ARRL’s submission page.
FD rules allow any club member to operate any class under their own call and have their total QSOs added to the SPARC station score to be used in the Club Competition. Dave KR4U, John KI4UIP, Carol AB4YI, and Josef KQ4GAH added points from their home stations.
Operators of the SPARC station were: AAØO AA2MF AB4YI KB1EBC KB9LX KD2UDU KF4TYA KI4UIP KN4YQC KO4WPO KQ4DVG KQ4DXM KR4U N4GRC W1EES W4BOO W4CU
The SPARC club radio station is in the process of moving within the DMI Research building. The work is being done in stages with the removal of everything from the old shack a couple of weeks ago. The video clip link (below) is of the latest phase from Jan 21 beginning the process of cleaning both rooms and starting the wiring. The AC facilities were added several weeks ago with the assembly of the antenna switchboard and the removal of old antenna cabling this past weekend.
Enjoy the video clip
The ARRL Side Band Sweepstakes (ARRl-SS-SSB) runs from 4:00 pm EST on Saturday 19 November until 10:00 pm EST Sunday 20 November.
The objective of the contest is to support amateur self-training in radio communications, including improving amateur operating skills, conducting technical investigations, and intercommunicating with other amateurs. Stations in the United States and Canada (including territories and possessions) exchange information with as many other US and Canadian stations as possible on the 160, 80, 40, 20, 15 and 10 meter bands. Working all 83 sections is considered a “clean sweep”.
Detailed Information can be found at: arrl.com/sweepstakes
All SPARC Members are invited to participate including all new members. Members regardless of license class (and even their guests with no license) are authorized to fully participate at the club station under the supervision of Extra Class Operators.
Contact tom_w4cu@yahoo.com if interested in operating or attending, or wish to be added to the Operating Event email list for future events.