The October meeting will be given by Jim Pace, K7CEX, our WWA ARES Section Emergency Coordinator who will come to us from Centralia, WA. Our County ARES is being reorganized and he will give us more information on it, and his plans. Hopefully, we'll get more members that will volunteer or take a leadership position.

So tnx for the past help on our events, and bring a friend or future ham to the next meeting. It will be interesting and informative.

73. Jerry Turner, K9CCZ.

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August 21 – 22, 2004, the North Kitsap Amateur Radio Club set up and operated a special event station, KC7Z, in conjunction with the International Lighthouse Weekend. The purpose of the weekend was to commemorate lighthouses around the world and make contacts with them. The club set up its emergency communication van at the Point No Point Lighthouse Station at (where else?) Point No Point near the northernmost tip of Kitsap County (WA) at the entrance to Puget Sound.

Project coordinator Bob Tomas, N7KTP, was called out of town by a family emergency two days before the event and asked Bill, W7ARC to take over the operation at the last minute. Through email and the club’s Yahoo Internet reflector, Bill put together a small crew and we were off to the races.

The meager group collected 101 contacts with other hams and lighthouses from as far away as Brazil (PT2ND). We did manage to contact 4 lighthouses/lightships during the hours we were on the air. We had one major distraction…the North American QSO party was also on Saturday.

The Point No Point lighthouse was constructed in 1872 and gradually improved as technology evolved. During the weekend, the lighthouse was manned by volunteer docents (tour guides) who explained the history and operation to visitors. This undoubtedly helped increase the number of visitors to our station.

The event brought out several ham visitors, as well as curious passersby. Some were attracted by the sound of KI7IPG’s melodic CW emanating from the club trailer, including one 5 year old, who had read about Morse code, but had not heard it before.

Among other visitors, were KA6MWR, Bob and XYL; W07B, Bob; W7YLG, Gerry; KJ7EL, Dennis; WB7BPB? Al.

Participating in the setup, operation and/or teardown of the station, were W7ARC, Bill; NF7M, Malcolm; KI7IPG, Russ; K7ORY, Horace; WA7EKK, Forrest; AC7QI, Margo; WL7E, Joe; and N7EM, Ron.

By Bill, W7ARC & Ron, N7EM

Sept 8th -- Presentation meeting -- 7:30 PM– Viking Park Clubhouse -- Astronomy and Radio Astronomy – Jerry Turner, K9CCZ, and Ed Saftich, AK7H

Sept 18th -- VE testing Community Room, Poulsbo Library, 700 NE Lincoln St., Poulsbo. Doors open at 9am. Picture ID, original and photocopy of current amateur radio license and pending CSCE's needed. Cost of session is $12.00. Questions please call Susan, AB7MD at 360-697-9379.

Sept 22nd – Business Meeting – 7:30 PM – Viking Park Clubhouse

Oct. 8th – Hamfest Setup – President’s Pavillion – Kitsap County Fairgrounds – 1:00 PM

Oct. 9th – Hamfest – President’s Pavillion – Kitsap County Fairgrounds – 9:00 AM

Oct. 13th – Presentation Meeting – Viking Park Clubhouse – 7:30 PM – Kitsap County ARES and Emergency Communications -- Jim Pace, K7CEX, WWA ARES Section Emergency Coordinator

Oct. 16th – VE testing Community Room, Poulsbo Library, 700 NE Lincoln St., Poulsbo. Doors open at 9am. Picture ID, original and photocopy of current amateur radio license and pending CSCE's needed. Cost of session is $12.00. Questions please call Susan, AB7MD at 360-697-9379.

Oct. 27th – Business Meeting – 7:30 PM – Viking Park Clubhouse

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If you missed the opportunity to buy one of those spiffy yellow club jackets worn by the club members at the club meetings, you will be able to get one soon. The NKARC board voted to purchase some jackets especially in the large, XL, and 2XL sizes. A notice will be posted as to cost and availability when they arrive.

Some members indicated that the jackets could be very warm if worn during a sunny summer day here in the Pacific Northwest. Yes it can get hot here once in a while. Vests readily visible in emergency situations are available from Horace, K7ORY, for $17.50 each.

If you have any items advertised on the site and they have been sold, please let me know so I can remove them. The site is live and there will be lots of new and useful changes in the very near future.

73, Bill, W7ARC

It costs approximately 60 cents per copy to print a newsletter and postage to mail it. Receiving your newsletter electronically helps keep publishing costs down allowing the funds to be used for other club projects

During September, the ARRL will be among dozens of organizations and agencies participating in National Preparedness Month. "The Ready Campaign," produced by the Ad Council in partnership with the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), is aimed at making citizen preparedness "a priority for every city, every neighborhood and every home" in the US. The League is an official affiliate of Citizen Corps, a DHS initiative to enhance public preparedness and safety. ARRL will combine its role in National Preparedness Month--which starts September 9--with its own "Amateur Radio Awareness Day" on September 18.

"The two events offer great opportunities for Amateur Radio to showcase its valued service to the nation," said ARRL Field and Educational Services Manager Rosalie White, K1STO. She encouraged ARRL-affiliated clubs and Field Organization volunteers to use the occasion to set up public demonstrations of Amateur Radio and to present or even demonstrate--under the banner of National Preparedness Month--the free services Amateur Radio provides to communities.

ARRL Club/Mentor Program Manager Norm Fusaro, W3IZ, suggests that while displays should be informative, they also need to be neat and simple. "This is also an excellent opportunity to recruit prospective hams for licensing classes that clubs may be forming for the fall," he added. In addition, ARRL encourages all Amateur Radio operators to have a family emergency communication plan in place in case of an emergency, such as a severe weather event. "Get Ready Now" brochures are available. Visit the Ready.gov Web site <http://www.ready.gov> for more information.

On Amateur Radio Awareness Day, September 18, W1AW/90 will be on the air from 10 AM until 10 PM Eastern Time with ARRL staff members, new Section Managers in town for the annual Section Managers' Workshop and volunteers from the Newington Amateur Radio League as operators. White encourages amateur groups to invite public officials, representatives of served agencies and first responders to visit their public displays to discuss plans for their Simulated Emergency Test (SET), typically in early October, or other drills.

Some clubs already have jumped on the National Preparedness Month/Amateur Radio Awareness Day bandwagon, Fusaro notes--in some cases by taking advantage of already scheduled events during September.

The Middletown Amateur Radio Club--W2MAR--in New Jersey will take part in Middletown Day activities September 18 with a public ham radio display, information table, traffic handling and ARES/RACES displays. The club expects some 3000 visitors in town, including state and local officials.

In Illinois, Amateur Radio Awareness Day falls on the same weekend as the three-day Peoria Superfest 2004 Amateur Radio and computer show. The Peoria Area Amateur Radio Club will have an all-day demonstration at the Exposition Garden Fairgrounds on September.

The Space Park Employees Association Amateur Radio Club (W6TRW) in Redondo Beach, California, will have its emergency communications team (ECT) van at the Northrop Grumman Space Technology open house September 18.

Reprinted from ARRL Letter Vol. 23 No. 34

With the number of natural catastrophes occurring and the threat of terrorist attacks it is imperative that Amateur Radio do its part in maintaining communications in time of an emergency. This was proven during the 9-11 attacks and during the devastation to the Florida peninsula caused by Hurricane Charlie last month. Amateur radio was the only form of reliable communications immediately after.

This is short notice about the national effort being undertaken to encourage and test preparedness. As noted in last month’s newsletter, Kitsap ARES is undergoing reorganization. The new ARES leadership is:

Mr. Alf Anderson, W7ALF

Mr. Doug Hudson, K7CUU

Mr. Martin Prehm, N7INE has been asked to serve as the OES lead station

Mr. Jerry Turner, K9CCZ

Monte Simpson, K2MLS

If Kitsap ARES is planning to participate in the national event, the information will be provided on the weekly Kitsap ACS/ARES net that meets on Sunday evening . The net starts at 7:30 PM on the 145.43 MHz repeater.. The repeater has a negative offset with a tone of 179.9.

The ARRL wants members' comments on a planned petition to the FCC seeking to regulate amateur subbands by bandwidth rather than by mode. The ARRL Board of Directors adopted the petition's guiding principle--to create a regulatory environment more accommodating to newer technologies--two years ago, and it wrapped up its review of a draft petition in late July.

"The main objective is to make appropriate provision for digital modes in the HF amateur bands, while preserving amateurs' prerogatives to use the traditional modes," said ARRL CEO David Sumner, K1ZZ. "Regulation by Bandwidth" is the title of Sumner's "It Seems to Us . . ." editorial in September QST.

The draft petition represents expert input from the ARRL Ad Hoc HF Digital Committee. ARRL staff also provided an interim report, and the Board reviewed a draft petition when it met last January. An ARRL Executive Committee review followed. The EC decided to make a synopsis and explanation of the petition available to ARRL members before it goes to the FCC.

"The regulation of emission modes in Amateur Radio Service allocations is a limiting factor with respect to Amateur Radio experimentation," the petition synopsis concludes. "It leads to attempts to put new technology into a regulatory framework that was designed only to deal with older analog emissions." To implement digital technologies, an underlying assumption of the League's draft petition is to provide for an intermediate bandwidth--between what's needed for the legacy CW and phone modes--in the middle of certain bands.

As drafted, the ARRL's bandwidth petition would preserve double-sideband AM unchanged, but it would stop short of opening the phone bands to digital and other modes of the same bandwidth.

FCC rules now permit RTTY and data emissions throughout the HF CW subbands, although informal agreements typically keep RTTY and data signals out of those parts of the CW band generally used for CW. The ARRL's petition proposes to limit bandwidth in the CW subbands to 200 Hz, which also will accommodate data modes such as PSK31.

In addition, the League's proposal would limit bandwidth in the existing "RTTY/data subbands" to either 500 Hz or 3 kHz, with phone emissions specifically prohibited in certain subbands where 3 kHz would be permitted. Under the proposal, these would include 3650-3725, 7100-7125, 14,100-14,150 and 21,150-21,200 kHz.

"The reason for this is to encourage the development of higher-speed data communications in these subbands by preventing them from becoming de facto 'expanded phone bands.'" Sumner explained.

The new proposals take into account the ARRL's prior "Novice refarming" petition to expand some HF phone bands, included in the FCC Notice of Proposed Rule Making in WT Docket 04-140.

Amateurs typically won't have to be able to measure the bandwidth of their signals, Sumner says, since the bandwidths proposed are more than sufficient for "clean" signals using traditional HF modes.

The ARRL proposal would eliminate bandwidth restrictions in the 222-225 MHz band--beyond a requirement to keep signals confined within the band.

Help the environment by properly disposing of discharged household batteries. This includes alkaline, regular zinc carbide batteries, and batteries with heavy metals such as ni-cads and lithium ion. The Solid Waste Facility on Hansville Road accepts the batteries as part of the county-wide recycling program. Otherwise, bring them to the meeting for transfer to the disposal site. Do not bring lead-acid batteries to the meeting for disposal. It is your responsibility to take them to the Solid Waste Facility.