[BARC] Boring Report

[Tree N6TR]

The domain of K7RAT is expanding.

As I type this, I am listening to our new club beacon.  

However, I am sorry to say that it is currently running a foul per the
FCC rules for beacons.  Bert didn't do his homework before setting up 
the beacon.  Hopefully, Riley won't hear it before we have a chance to
move it.

The beacon is currently on a frequency of about 432144.657 MHz for the
dits and 432144.648 for the dahs.  This gives it a very distinktive 
sound that initially might give the listener the impression he is 
listening to a UA9 beacon.

The power of this beacon cannot be measured easily.  The transmitter
is a modified Radio Shack HT - that was never intended to operate the
finer mode (aka CW).  However, with some surgery performmed by Dr. Little
W. Gun (the W stands for Weller I believe), it can make dits and dahs
(just not on the same frequency).

You can hear the beacon at http://www.kkn.net/~tree/beacon.wav if
you are interested.  This was recorded at the Boring Oregon monitoring
station.

Oh, back to the power - it is probably running about 200 milliwatts.  
The power management sports battery backup so the keyer won't get 
unprogrammed in the case of a power failure.  

The beacon is located in grid square CN85ss, near Battleground Washington,
about 26 miles north of Boring, Oregon.  It is at a fellow ham's QTH, 
but I am not sure he wants to be associated with the beacon...  or the
club for that matter.  

The antenna for the beacon is a horizontal loop - about the size of a 
large bagel, mounted up on top of his house.  It ends up being about 
30 feet up in the air, and the QTH is on a nice hilltop.  

While our southern monitoring station has not yet recovered from his
visit to Penguins (where I understand there is lots of Iced cream), he
should be reporting in soon.  He is located 67 miles from the beacon.

Here in Boring, both the dits and dahs are moving the S-meter most
of the time.  When a big airplane takes off from PDX, it gets louder.

We will QSY the beacon up to the beacon band (who ever knew there was 
such a thing on 432 mHz).  I will announce its new frequencies once
this happens.  

The purpose of this beacon is to encourage more activity on this band,
which will hopefully have a positive impact on the contest scores in
the upcoming June VHF shootout.  Once again, Bert will take on Dr. Big
Gun in the June VHF contest.  

What a great radio club...

73 Tree N6TR
tree@kkn.net