Southern Patuxent Amateur Radio Club

SMART Group keeps tabs on the ISS

During the recent visit to the ISS by Richard Garriott (W5KWQ), the SMART Group station was setup to receive SSTV images being sent down to earth by Richard. During his stay, there were many times when the ISS would be transmitting SSTV images, taken only moments before down to earth stations waiting for the signal. Richard was also very active on HAM radio via 2M voice communications and many operators around the world were fortunate enough to make their very first ISS voice contact. The SMART group would like to send out a huge thanks to ARISS, AMSAT, and most importantly Richard (W5KWQ) for their efforts in this venture. Check out the N3PX photo gallery for more of Richards SSTV images.

SMART Group - PSK-31 By Paul (KB3NDS)

On October 21st at 1900 hours, Paul (KB3NDS) taught the SMART Group about PSK-31. The session was recorded via Ustream and is available for review by others. Please see the below link to watch the presentation. Thanks!

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/804089

SMART Group Meeting - Grounding, Lightning, and RF!

The SMART group will hold it's monthly meeting on July 14th at 1900 hours. The topic this month is Lightning, how it strikes, how to protect your equipment, and the difference between RF and Lightning grounding. Our very own Larry Harrison (K3JRR) will be sharing his vast knowledge base with us. Larry has worked with radio's for most of his life and will share some very valuable tips with us. Hope to see you all there!

N3PX Field Day Site to be broadcast LIVE!

The Southern Maryland Amateur Radio Technical (SMART) Group will broadcast their field day activites live via the internet this year. Thanks to Calvert Advanced Life Support and Ustream, N3PX activities will be streaming via the world wide web. Plans are to have video of different stations throughout the event, as well as live audio from the radio being watched. "If it all works out the way we want it to, it should be a great oppurtunity for someone to see what we do without even leaving the comfort of their own home" quoted Paul Lenharr (KB3NDS). "We will see what happens". Viewers can use the link below to see our operations LIVE!

N3PX Field Day LIVE!

APRS Update

The second �mega-digi� was finally installed this month. This one (K3NAL-1) is just north of Lexington Park and is a joint effort between the SMART Group and the St. Mary�s County ARA. The project involved an upgrade of an older APRS digi from the same area with newer equipment and a new, higher location.

The new term �mega-digi� was invented for our region to define APRS digipeaters that cover a large area. The new digi in Lexington Park is right at 300 feet above sea level and covers an approximate radius of 25 miles. This includes all of St. Mary�s county, lower Calvert and most of Westmoreland county in Virginia.

The new digi is part of a region wide effort to provide 100% APRS coverage. The first mega-digi was installed in Sunderland last year and is one of the largest APRS digipeaters in Maryland.

Future plans include another mega-digi in Charles county later this year. Additional plans are in the works for more coverage of the Northern Neck area of VA. This will be a joint project with the RATS group from Richmond (www.rats.net).

Check out the www.n3px.com web site for future photo updates of the APRS system.

Ham radio operators "Show Off" for Southern Maryland

Public Demo of Emergency Communications June 28th and 29th 2008

Prince Frederick, MD � Thousands of Ham Radio operators will be showing off their emergency capabilities this weekend. Over the past year, the news has been full of reports of ham radio operators providing critical communications in emergencies including the California wildfires, Oregon and Michigan storms, tornadoes and other events world-wide. During Hurricane Katrina, Amateur Radio � often called �Ham radio� - was often the ONLY way people could communicate, and hundreds of volunteer �hams� traveled south to save lives and property. When trouble is brewing, ham radio people are often the first to provide critical information and communications. On the weekend of June 28 - 29, the public will have a chance to meet and talk with these ham radio operators and see for themselves what the Amateur Radio Service is about. Showing the newest digital and satellite capabilities, voice communications and even historical Morse code, hams from across the USA will be holding public demonstrations of emergency communications abilities.

This annual event, called "Field Day" is the climax of the week long "Amateur Radio Week" sponsored by the ARRL, the national association for Amateur Radio. Using only emergency power supplies, ham operators will construct emergency stations in parks, shopping malls, schools and back yards around the country. Their slogan, "Ham radio works when other systems don't! " is more than just words to the hams as they prove they can send messages in many forms without the use of phone systems, internet or any other infrastructure that can be compromised in a crisis. More than 30,000 amateur radio operators across the country participated in last year's event.

"We hope that people will come and see for themselves, this is not your grandfather's radio anymore," said Allen Pitts of the ARRL. "The communications networks that ham radio people can quickly create have saved many lives in the past months when other systems failed or were overloaded.�

In the Calvert County area, the Southern Patuxent Amateur Radio Club (SPARC) will be demonstrating Amateur Radio at Calvert Advanced Life Support from 2pm Saturday June 28th straight through the night until 5pm on Sunday June 29th. They invite the public to come and see ham radio�s new capabilities and learn how to get their own FCC radio license before the next disaster strikes. Calvert Advanced Life Support is located at 60 Industry Lane, Prince Frederick MD 20678. The club will be setup in the parking lot area just behind Ken-Mar Liquors.

There are 650,000 Amateur Radio licensees in the US, and more than 2.5 million around the world. Through the ARRL�s ARES program, ham volunteers provide emergency communications for thousands of state and local emergency response agencies, all for free.

To learn more about SPARC, go to www.n3px.com. The public is most cordially invited to come, meet and talk with the hams. See what modern Amateur Radio can do. They can even help you get on the air!

Live Streaming video from our meeting!!

Our monthly meeting will be held tonight. Dwayne Kincaid will be teaching us about PIC chips. Thanks to AJ Farmer (AJ3U), we will have live streaming video from this meeting. Please click on the link below to watch the meeting. It will become active when the meeting starts and the upstream is initiated. Thanks AJ!!

Live Streaming Video of the SMART Group Meeting

Adding an APRS Digipeater to an existing 2M Repeater

Most of you may already know and for those that don't, we have installed a digipeater at the Sunderland tower recently. The SSID is N3PX-2, and it has great coverage. We are sharing the same antenna for both the APRS Digipeater as well as the Sunderland repeater. You might ask, but how? How do you get 2 different signals on one antenna? What happens if they both transmit at the same time?

Dwayne Kincaid has written a complete explanation with illustration. The link is below, and the PDF file is listed in the "Downloads" section of this website. Thanks Dwayne!

How to add a digipeater to an existing 2M repeater! (80kb PDF File)

AMSAT Orbital Classroom concept study announced

Stefan, VE4NSA has been asked to organize and coordinate an amateur radio space communications training concept called the 'Orbital Classroom'.

Stefan said, "Here is an opporturnity for AMSAT members to voice their needs for education. We are listening and working on this."

Stefan asks interested AMSAT members to send him your answers to these questions via e-mail (ve4nsa@amsat.org).

1. Would you be interested in attending pre-conference courses and workshops as part of the annual meeting or at other venues?

2. Would you be willing to pay a registration fee that would cover course material, instructor cost etc.?

3. Would you be interested in receiving a certificate for ongoing education as it relates to amateur radio and satellites?

4. What topics would you like to see taught at such courses?

5. Would you be willing in helping to organize and facilitate courses (you don't have to teach for this one, just help the instructor and take care of registration, etc)?

6. Would you be willing to teach a course and if yes, on which topics?

Stefan concludes, "That's a start and hopefully it sparks your interest as a participant, facilitator or instructor. As always, your opinion counts and even more your help is greatly appreciated."

Stefan, VE4NSA

Visible ISS Pass

On Thursday December 20th at 2018 hours, the International Space Station will be visible by the naked eye from our location here in Maryland. The ISS will be flying over us while it is dark, however because the ISS flys around 220 miles above the earth, it is in the sun longer. This makes the ISS visible to us here on earth as a bright object flying through the sky.

I have seen the ISS several times and it's a neat experience. To find out other times that the ISS is visible, create an account at www.heavens-above.com and enter your location. From there it's super easy to see when the ISS and any other man made space objects will be visible to the naked eye. The image below is for Thursdays pass. The black line is the path that it will take. When the line is solid, it means it will be visible, when it's broken (dotted) it means it has entered the earths shadow and will no longer be visible. Good Luck!