- January 2022 Special Speaker!
Bridge Builder in Petticoats: Emily Warren Roebling and the Brooklyn Bridge
A presentation by Carol Simon Levin
David Sarnoff Radio Club Meeting (via WebEx) January 18, 2022
Many books and films have featured the Brooklyn Bridge and millions of people have crossed it. Built between 1869 and 1883, without modern machines or even electric light, it was one of the most amazing technological achievements of its time. Yet few people know that a woman helped manage much of its construction.
After her husband was bedridden, Emily Roebling became his liaison to the project – eventually communicating with the engineers and suppliers so well that it was rumored that she had become the Chief Engineer herself! Later she helped design the family mansion in Trenton, studied law, organized relief for returning troops from the Spanish American War, attended the coronation of the Tsar of Russia and even took tea with Queen Victoria.
At her death, she was called “the most famous woman in New Jersey” and “one of the most noted women in the country,” yet today almost no one knows her name!
Click here for Emily’s own Website!
Carol Simon Levin is a Youth Services Librarian at the Bridgewater Branch of the Somerset County Library. She is an experienced storyteller and a member of the New Jersey Storyteller’s Network
- Pi Day Operations are Coming 2022
Our Pi Day Page is updated! 3/14/22 0000Z-2359Z
See the Pi Day Page for frequencies, etc. In the next month we will be determining operation schedules for our Special Event callsign
N3P – Number Three Pi, Papa, Pizza, or Physicist
- Winter Field Day 2022 Guide
Dates: January 29 – January 30
Time: 1900 UTC (2pm EST) Saturday to 1900 UTC (2pm) Sunday
This post will provide guidance for your Winter Field Day operating! Check back as details will be added during January.
Introduction
So what is Winter Field Day? It isn’t an ARRL operating event like June Field Day… what is it?
Purpose: To foster Ham camaraderie, field operation, emergency operating preparedness, and just plain on the air, outdoor fun in the midst of winter for American, Canadian, and DX Hams. Don’t let those winter doldrums keep you locked up in the house… get out and play some radio!!
– 2021 WFD RulesOnce again, our club invites members to participate in “WFD 2022,” a 24 hour on-air event, and to pool our scores for the greater glory of David Sarnoff (or just to have fun.) The actual goal is to test operating skills in non-ideal weather conditions. The rules state that a participating station could be a portable or mobile station “Outdoor”, a station set up somewhere where there is not normal ham radio activity “Indoor”, or using a home station “Home.” The exercise is not as competitive as the big contests, so no station may emit more that 100W per transmitter.
Because of COVID-19, we will not set up a portable club station. Instead DSRC encourages members to gain experience operating from home stations, or create single-operator temporary stations, and be safe. Even though you don’t get bonus points for Home operation, you can use this weekend to do something different: put up a temporary antenna, operate battery powered, or from a different location in your home.
Your particiapation is important!
Take a picture of yourself operating your W.F.D. station!
AC2YD What you get lots of point for (What to try)
Only contacts where the FULL EXCHANGE is completd qualify for points. (with special case exceptions)
It seems like EXPERIMENTATION is the way to score points. 10 contacts using one mode on one band might get you 10 points. If you try QRP that could be 20. If you try 10 different bands, that would be 100, or 200. Trying out the solar array or generator can get you 500. Even shaky CW can get a new band, as can RTTY. A single satellite contact is 500.
WFD Rules divide stations into three CATEGORIES of operation:
HOME (using home antennas make a station a “H” home station, etc.)
INDOOR (using a heated structure that is NOT home and NOT where ham equipment is normally available.) See the rules for “I” station operation.
OUTDOOR (no heat*, remote from normal at-home station and fixed antennas… ) *Emergency heat is OK. See the rules for “O” operation. This is most similar to a “field day operation.”
Most bonus points are only available to O and I categories. Alternate power bonus is available for any station category.
The WFD rules favor operation on as many WARC band-mode combinations as possible. Use of as many mode types as possible is also encouraged. Modes are CW, PHONE and DIGITAL. Each mode creates its own band– 40 CW is a distinct band from 40 Phone or 40 Digital. The same station can be contacted three times on 40 in this way.
“CW” is CW!
PHONE (“PH”) means any communications method where one hears a vioce (SSB, FM D4FM, Dstar…)
DIGITAL (“DI”)means any mode where text or a picture is communicated (PSK, RTTY, Packet, SSTV) Note: FT8 and FT4 do not allow the WFD exchange, but JS8Call does, so the rules specify that FT8/FT4 may not be used for contacts. (Time to try out JS8Call? https://groups.io/g/js8call )
Here’s why diversity matters:
Mode and Band Multipliers: Count 1 multiplier for each mode operated per band. For example,
operating CW and Phone on 80, 40, 15 and 10 meters, CW and PSK31 on 20m, FM on 2meters &
440 would be a total multiplier of 12x.
2022 WFD RulesThis means GET ON AS MANY BANDS AS POSSIBLE AND MAKE AT LEAST ONE CONTACT. Use CW and Digital if you can… Your score is (Contacts) x (Band-Modes used)
EXAMPLE: making 2 contacts on 2-meters FM and 3 on 440 FM simplex gives you 5 contacts and 2 band-mode combinations. or 10 points– with more adjustments for power. Making one additional contact on 2-meters using CW makes 6 contacts on 3 band-mode combinations… resulting in 18 points!
Read this year’s rules for much more!
Don’t forget to submit your log (so we get points totalled!)
Logs must be submitted using “Cabrillo Format” a format that would work well with punch cards… but it’s what they want. The completed log looks something like this (from their rules document):
START-OF-LOG: 3.0 Created-By: (software used to make this log) CONTEST: WFD CALLSIGN: WA1WZC (the call you or your group used for WFD QSOs) CLUB: David Sarnoff ARC LOCATION: Rocky Hill, NJ ARRL-SECTION: NNJ (or whatever section you operated in) CATEGORY: 2H (Home station, with 2 simultaneous stations on air) CATEGORY-POWER: LOW (QRP or LOW are the only choices this year) SOAPBOX: 500 points for not using commercial power (if applicable) SOAPBOX: BONUS Total 500 (example) ... (see their RULES - link at the end of this document) QSO: 3750 PH 2017-01-07 1911 WA1WZC 2H NNJ WB9X 2H IL QSO: 7030 CW 2017-01-07 2021 WA1WZC 2H NNJ K8UO 14I MI QSO: 14070 DI 2017-01-07 2131 WA1WZC 2H NNJ K6XXX 14I LA END-OF-LOG
The log is a plain text file… the rules tell you to name it with your callsign and .log or .txt as the suffix
In this example: WA1WZC.TXT
To make sure the club aggregates your points:
Make sure your Cabrillo Log entry includes (Exactly!) the line :
CLUB: David Sarnoff ARC
You don’t need to make the log by hand!
The good news is there are lots of types of logging software that can make cabrillo format files. Don’t send the file in directly. You may have take the CALL.TXT file and insert lines like “CLUB:” or “SOAPBOX”, then send in the modified file.
There are LOTS of ways to make a Cabrillo log. Here are two pages of discussion we had in 2021:
Our Winter Field Day Logging page (From 2021)–
General discussion of Logging Software
Then SUBMIT IT By the morning of February 28!
LINKS For more information:
- Holiday Party 2014
Presents await! David Sarnoff Radio Club Holiday Party, December 6, 2014 Photos by John Case III
What’s inside? - Holiday Party 2013
Tree by Cathy Tsao John Case III documented our wonderful 2013 holiday event, and Gerry N2GJ took a nice group shot.
Group shot by N2GJ 
Yankee Swap Gifts and Tree?
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