The Emergency Amateur Radio Club net has become one of my favorite on-air hangouts, ever since a couple of days since I got my call sign. For a while, I’ve wondered what it would be like to actually do the net as net control.

When the student is ready, the teacher appears. And that teacher was none other than KH6DAD. Rich was wonderful about easing me and the other NCS trainees into the job. From just shadowing the NCSs, writing down callsigns as they would, to finally having a chance to read the preamble and closing under an NCS’s supervision.

But then came the big step…doing the net solo. Rich was kind enough to give me a call on the landline about 45 minutes prior for a pre-flight briefing. Still, there I was on Tuesday, at 7:20, sitting next to my radio, and wondering, what in the world am I getting myself into? I had a few concerns in my mind…like, what if I have a visitor with lots of QRM in the background, who checks in non-phonetically, and I can’t copy the callsign? I’m pretty sure I knew what to do, but listening to someone doing the net is a lot different from actually taking the driver’s seat. It felt like being at the starting line of my first marathon all over again. 

Fortunately, a pre-net QSO with Edward, NH6WI, eased my nerves somewhat. And at 7:30 straight down, I keyed the mike and spoke:

Aloha! This is Whiskey Hotel Seven Golf Golf, calling the Emergency Amateur Radio Club Net. My name is Keith, and I will be your net control station for this evening… 

I need not have worried. After that, it was a blur. Everything just flowed. It was like an out-of-body experience…almost as if my body, hands, and mouth were doing the net on autopilot, drawing on seven months’ worth of audio memory, and my brain was just watching, as if it were just another nightly net.

In general the reviews for my debut were good. The most common comment I heard as I was going down the list was that it was like I had done this for years. Well, obviously not for years, as I’ve only had my ticket for less than a year. But I do admit, it did feel familiar.

And it was a pretty good crowd for a Tuesday night. 16 check-ins for a 25 minute net.

Pretty soon I’ll find a place in the NCS rotation, and then my real learning will begin…a ham radio Padawan taking a big step on the journey to being a Jedi master… 

Wow, lots of things have happened in my ham radio life in the past few weeks. Here are just a few:

1.  Finally got to do my first public service event as a ham, doing the communications at the Nuuanu aid station for the Hawaiian Ultra Running Team’s HURT 100 Mile Race. (It’s gotta be a race that I wouldn’t dream of doing as a participant.) Old technology met new this year as, in addition to the radio, we had laptops with wireless broadband and the ability to e-mail results to the finish line in Makiki. I had a more experienced ham, NH7WL, helping me get comfortable in the role. It was pretty quiet (and pretty wet), but I had a lot of fun. Would definitely do it again.

2. Attended the EARC meeting on the 24th; was intrigued with Chuck (NH7XL)’s demonstration of PSK31 and what can be transmitted using a computer and the HF bands. Definitely something to look forward to once I get my General. I’m still studying when I can…maybe by my one-year anniversary.  Unfortunately for Chuck, he had trouble competing with NH7QH and his ham gear. Hams can’t resist bargains.

3. In other news: I finally got the chance to finish the independent study for the ICS 100 course and passed the exam, so now I have a nice looking certificate from FEMA to show for my efforts. I also signed up for the ARRL Emergency Comm Level 1 course.

The “mentor” they assigned me (N1LL) lives in Indiana, in what looks like a pretty farm community in the Midwest according to Google Earth. Definitely different from Hawaii. In his welcome e-mail, he told me:

You’re the first student I’ve had from Hawaii. Would love to be there now – about 12 degrees right now and just starting to snow (6-8 inches expected tonight). You know what I’ll be doing come morning – or sooner if the wife gets called in.

Like I said, way different from Hawaii. But emergencies happen anywhere.

I can’t believe that it’s been six months already since I’ve been a ham.  (And over two months since I’ve updated here). Part of that was preparing for my pursuit of Honolulu Marathon #8 on December 9. (I finished it, in 5 hrs. 5 minutes and 18 seconds.)

Hams help out with the communication needs of the Honolulu Marathon as well as the Great Aloha Run in February. As a runner, I certainly appreciate all the efforts that they put out. This is something where an old passion and a new hobby collide. As much I’d love to help out with the Marathon and for the Great Aloha Run, I can’t exactly volunteer and run the race at the same time. If I had the opportunity to help out as a ham at a race I’m not running, I’d love to do it. Anyway…

I’ve been noticing a lot more activity on our local 146.88 repeater lately as Echolink has been introduced to it on a trial basis. Had a nice QSO today with a ham from Missouri, WA0CFQ, who’s here escaping the winter weather for the holidays and who brought his rig with him.

At the same time, I’ve been trying to look at ways to provide emergency power to my rig. I found, but didn’t buy yet, an emergency battery-operated power supply at Costco. $85 for an 18 amp-hour 400W inverter that also provides 12V DC power. I might consider picking it up later. Any other suggestions for emergency power?

Funny how this hobby works. One day I was struggling to get signal out while commuting. The next day I find myself with not just one, but two mobile antennas.

Last week I ordered an MFJ 1724B dual band quarter wave mobile antenna with mag mount, and a UHF to SMA jumper cable to adapt it to my HT.  Yes, I know, to some, MFJ = Mississippi’s Finest Junk.  But I figure it can’t be that junky if it were recommended by one of our emcomm gurus on the local EARC net.  It came in the mail on Saturday.

That Saturday was also the day of the ham swap meet over at Aiea Elementary. One of the finds I found (besides a free roll of antenna wire) was a Workman KS1SMA quarter-wave rare earth magnet mount dual band mobile antenna.  Only $15. 

What a difference getting the metal outside the vehicle makes!  I was able to hit the 146.88 repeater from just outside the Honolulu-bound Pali Tunnels!  Yes, that far into Nuuanu Valley.  On the HT from in the vehicle, it would have been a 50-50 shot from the Queen Emma Summer Palace.

Right now I’ve been operating my base off a half-wave dual-band, a Diamond NR73BNMO on loan from Ron (AH6RH).  I’ve been able to get good results on 146.88 on 10-20 watts from Kailua (pretty good, considering I’m operating it indoors right now and having to hurl the signal over the Koolaus to get to Diamond Head).

Alas, all good things come to an end; Ron wants his antenna back (along with the speaker and the SWR meter) so that he can give a full rig to another new ham.

Fortunately, after several tries I was able to jury rig the 1724B with a ground plane to give an acceptable SWR (about 1.7). Let’s just say that it involved a pizza pan and a whole lot of aluminum foil.  So now I have a substitute base in my 1724B and the KS1 is atop my vehicle.  Eventually I’m going to need to find a place to mount a permanent antenna.  I’m thinking about mounting it off one of the eaves.  But we’ll see.

Hams have a reputation to uphold. We are, after all, the communication service that works when all else fails. The ARRL fawns all over stories giving the amateur radio service rave reviews.

Then you get a story like this.

Via Long Delayed Echoes comes this story from Everett, Washington. A neighborhood in this Seattle suburb has been suffering from the antics of a certain operator:

Laura Holland says a vulgar rant came through her TV while she was watching a movie.

She says the source is her neighbor, a ham radio operator whose strong signal feeds every word of his transmissions directly to his neighbors every day.

Holland posted a video (with full audio) of the ham’s voice, in flagrante delicto, superimposed over a television movie. (WARNING! CONTAINS EXPLICIT LANGUAGE!) Two Seattle television stations, KOMO and KING, covered the story.

Looking on Switchboard.com and cross-checking it against QRZ.com found that the ham in question may be one Anthony Peluso, AB7OP.  He lives right across the street from Holland.

Hunh?!?  An Extra pulling stuff like this? What struck me as funny was the statement on his QRZ page that says “my family is the most important aspect in my life.” Never mind his family. What about the poor families in the immediate neighborhood?

I mean, one of the first things I read in my “red book” in the section on licensing rules and regs is that obscene and indecent language is prohibited. And further research shows this is true not just on the ham bands (FCC rules 97.113(a)(4)) but also on CB (95.413(a)(2)).

Holland and others in the area have filed formal complaints with the FCC, and maybe we might see this guy’s name show up on the Enforcement Bureau page (otherwise known as the Amateur Radio Hall of Shame) in the near future, named in a strongly worded letter from Riley Hollingsworth.

I don’t think I was much older than about ten or eleven.  There I sat, messing with an old Sony AM radio, one with a knob with “MW,” “SW1″, and “SW2″.  Not that I really knew what those abbreviations meant back then.  Just out of curiosity, I turned the knob to SW1.  At first, as I turned the tuning knob, I heard a whole bunch of nothing.  Static.  White noise.  

But when I passed by the 5 on the dial, I heard what sounded like a telephone dial tone that clicked every second, just like a clock and telephone together.  Suddenly, the dial tone disappeared, and all I heard were clicks, then a female voice that said, “At the tone, 5 hours, 47 minutes Coordinated Universal Time.”  Then a beep.  Then the dial tone again.

I didn’t realize it then, but I had heard WWVH for the first time. That was the first time I realized that radio encompassed more than just the AM and FM dial.

As I came back to that radio again and again, I made further discoveries.  Weird beeping and twittering on certain frequencies.  Then voices.  Voices coming from faraway lands like China, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Britain.  I had stumbled on a new world – the world of world band, or shortwave, radio.

I still listen to shortwave now and again.  I don’t have that Sony radio anymore, but I’ve since traded it in for a Grundig S350, which I still listen to every once in a while.

As I learned more about the shortwave bands, and found out that amateur radio operators occupied several parts of the shortwave bands, I think I probably thought a few times about becoming a ham.  What deterred me was the fact that in order to get a license, I needed to learn Morse Code. 

Morse Code?!?  It seems easier to learn ancient Greek.  Or so I thought.

Since then the Morse code requirements were modified, then eliminated entirely in February.  What finally gave me the motivation I needed was the story of Ron Hashiro, AH6RH, who made contact with the International Space Station and the first space tourist, Charles Simonyi.

Ron’s exploits made our company newsletter (we both work in the Information Systems department at HMSA). Then, as I browsed our local Barnes & Noble I ran across the “red book,” the ARRL Ham Radio License Manual.  At that point some thing just clicked.

I bought the book and devoured it in less than a month’s time, passing my Technician exam on June 20.

Since then, Ron has been a valuable resource in helping me get started. He invited me to my first Field Day, and I was intrigued by all the different radios there and made my first IRLP contact with a ham in Alaska.  He even lent me an antenna, radio, and power supply to get started.  I’ve since gotten a dual-band walkie and a dual band radio of my own.

So…that’s the story so far.  I’ve gotten the General level manual and have been studying it in my free time, with a goal of upgrading within the year.  I imagine, though, that even after I’ve had my Extra for twenty years, I’ll still be learning new things.