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Posts published in “Operating”

SPARC Breaks Own Record in CQ WPX RTTY Contest

This past weekend (February 10th – 11th, 2018), the SPARC Contesters activated the SPARC club station again to participate in the CQ WPX RTTY Contest. You may recall that in last year’s effort, SPARC achieved the highest score in our history and had the top score in the 4th call area. We also had the 7th highest score in the US in the Multi-operator, Single transmitter category.

2017 Certificate (Note the score is the final score versus the 3.1 million we submitted)
2017 Certificate (Note the score is the final score versus the 3.1 million points we submitted)

The WPX RTTY contest, sponsored … Click for more

Winter Field Day 2018 Report – Field Day Fun at 70 Degrees instead of 93.

One of the first Field Days I ever attended (back in 1982) was at the Fairgrounds in Largo (home of the Renaissance festivals). At that event, the Clearwater Amateur Radio Society (CARS), the Metro Repeater Association (Metro) and the St. Petersburg Amateur Radio Club (SPARC) came together in the spirit of inter-club cooperation to put on a huge ARRL Field Day effort. This was complete with a great location, good equipment, operators to man the stations, great food and loads of fun.

View of site from fire tower (dipole support)
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A Tale of Two Roundups

 

W4TA 2017 RTTY RU Award

SPARC received word that we did well in last year’s RTTY Roundup, Multioperator Low Power category.

  • First in the West Central Florida Section
  • Second in the US & Canada
  • Winning the Southeast Division

Operators enjoying this victory are: KA4IOX, KB8ESY, KP2N, KR4U, N2ESP, N4GD, N4KPJ, N4RI, NY4I, VE3XD, W4CU and W4TSP.

Final tweaks on the 40M Vertical Dipole
Dave, KR4U Connects Surge Arrestors

Not to be out done, the 2018 Roundup just ended. Some new antennas and software enabled the W4TA team to beat … Click for more

You’re invited to an Antenna Party Saturday

SPARC members are all welcome and encouraged to assist at the assembly, repair and erection of antennas at W4GAC. Starting at 9:00AM on Saturday 12/16, the tower will be lowered to replace the rotator. At the same time, adjustments will be made to accommodate the center support for the new 80/160 dipole. The south end of the dipole will be attached to a tree near 90th Avenue. The north end will terminate at a new “tower” to be installed at the north end of the property. Finally, a new Click for more

Festival Goers Exposed to CW

KR4U, NZ1Q, KI4UIP and N4GD Setting up the booth
Getting Ready for the Crowd [N2ESPhoto]
SPARC completed another successful day at the St. Petersburg Science festival. Situated under a big oak tree on the breezy shore of Tampa Bay, SPARC station W4GAC was again on the air.

This year we focused on CW. We noticed in prior events that the sound of Morse code emanating from our tent caused people to ask “what is this?” We set up a simple 20M CW station and put CW guru Dave KR4U behind the key. In spite of so-so propagation, Dave was … Click for more

The MAK is Back

SPARC contesters enjoyed entering W4TA in the newly reestablished Makrothen RTTY contest. Makrothen is a Greek word meaning distance. In spite of poor propagation, the SPARC team made 541 QSOs with a claimed score of 2,203,706 points.

Tom W4CU running while Ron KP2N watches [N2ESPhoto]
What makes the Makrothen different from the other contests we compete in is the method of scoring. Most contests are scored based on the number of QSOs times the number of “multipliers” worked in the contest. The points value awarded for each QSO varies with … Click for more

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