Announcing the RME on-air ham radio net
- Thread starter TurboMinivan
- Start date
- Location
- West Bountiful, UT
I'm going to give it a try from my driveway tonight. I know I'll hear okay but not so sure if I'll be heard.
- DAA
- DAA
- Location
- The Village of Kay
I might be a little late, but I'll try with an HT from downtown slc.
- Location
- The Village of Kay
Great Net tonight. Thanks @TurboMinivan for leading it again!
- Location
- West Bountiful, UT
Went fine from in the driveway. Chatted with Nate for a minute afterward, from inside the garage. Got a little bit snowy on the receiving end when actually parked inside, but still able to communicate. Pleasantly surprised.
- DAA
- DAA
TurboMinivan
Still plays with cars
- Location
- Lehi, UT
RME net #3 is in the history books! The following folks checked in:
NM0AB---Dempsey (TurboMinivan) as net control
W6NDR---Nate (nnnnnate)
W7DMW---Dave (moab_cj5)
KD7DAA---Dave (DAA)
KC7MDT---Cade (not an RME member)
We are 3-for-3 for having a non-RME guest participate. Last night, it was a young man from Bountiful named Cade. His call sign threw me for a loop at first, as it was issued by the FCC many years ago. Turns out it belonged to Cade's grandfather, who has passed away. Cade got licensed just a few months ago, and petitioned the FCC to receive his grandfather's old call sign. (This is a common thing in ham radio.) When I asked if he was a member of RME4x4, his response was, "not yet!"
During our net, the repeater went offline for about 30 seconds. Each of us probably thought our radios stopped working, because everything went silent and there was no response from the repeater. But then it came back to life as quickly as it had died. If we were all very close to each other, I could prepare for this possibility by having a backup simplex frequency for us to switch to... but due to the distance between us, that won't work. If this happens again, all we can do is wait it out and hope the repeater comes back online soon.
For last night's subject of discussion, I invited each participant to bring up questions they might have about ham radio operation in general. One topic dealt with nets. Since a few questions came up about them--are they all public, how should you behave, what happens on them, etc--we decided as a group to bring them up in RME's general ham radio thread. When I get a minute, I intent to post there with some more information.
Thanks again to you guys for a good discussion.
NM0AB---Dempsey (TurboMinivan) as net control
W6NDR---Nate (nnnnnate)
W7DMW---Dave (moab_cj5)
KD7DAA---Dave (DAA)
KC7MDT---Cade (not an RME member)
We are 3-for-3 for having a non-RME guest participate. Last night, it was a young man from Bountiful named Cade. His call sign threw me for a loop at first, as it was issued by the FCC many years ago. Turns out it belonged to Cade's grandfather, who has passed away. Cade got licensed just a few months ago, and petitioned the FCC to receive his grandfather's old call sign. (This is a common thing in ham radio.) When I asked if he was a member of RME4x4, his response was, "not yet!"
During our net, the repeater went offline for about 30 seconds. Each of us probably thought our radios stopped working, because everything went silent and there was no response from the repeater. But then it came back to life as quickly as it had died. If we were all very close to each other, I could prepare for this possibility by having a backup simplex frequency for us to switch to... but due to the distance between us, that won't work. If this happens again, all we can do is wait it out and hope the repeater comes back online soon.
For last night's subject of discussion, I invited each participant to bring up questions they might have about ham radio operation in general. One topic dealt with nets. Since a few questions came up about them--are they all public, how should you behave, what happens on them, etc--we decided as a group to bring them up in RME's general ham radio thread. When I get a minute, I intent to post there with some more information.
Thanks again to you guys for a good discussion.
- Location
- Bountiful, land of rocks
I blew it. Got distracted by a basketball game
TurboMinivan
Still plays with cars
- Location
- Lehi, UT
No, this one is completely standalone. That's one primary reason why I selected it. However, there are many repeaters on that peak, some of which are linked to other locations.
lhracing
Well-Known Member
- Location
- Layton, UT
I got my new radio installed in my 4Runner and going to try join in Wednesday from my home. Hopefully this will do the trick.
Unimog
Eric
- Location
- Stansbury Park, UT
There are several repeaters on Farnsworth Peak - three that I've used personally. There is a Farnsworth repeater on 147.120 that is connected to the Intermountain Intertie, which covers mainly the I-15 corridor from St George to Idaho Falls with some branches out to Evanston, Rock Springs, and other areas. I think because it connects so far, people don't often get on just to chat like they do on the local repeaters. Last time I hopped on from my home in Tooele County, I talked with a guy up in Idaho Falls.
- Location
- Bountiful, land of rocks
Just successfully pulled radio data through Chirp from my ICOM 2200H
Now to steal data from here http://utahvhfs.org/rptr.html and input into the file for tomorrow night
Uploading the *.txt file as a .csv. If this works, you can use this in your ICOM (possibly Baofang?) by simply downloading and changing the file extension to CSV and uploading back to your radio through CHIRP
Now to steal data from here http://utahvhfs.org/rptr.html and input into the file for tomorrow night
Uploading the *.txt file as a .csv. If this works, you can use this in your ICOM (possibly Baofang?) by simply downloading and changing the file extension to CSV and uploading back to your radio through CHIRP
Last edited:
Ok. I was just curious if I’d be able to join in from Roosevelt. But I guess not.
TurboMinivan
Still plays with cars
- Location
- Lehi, UT
WARNING to anyone who wants to use CHIRP to program their Baofeng by copying another radio's programming:
When using CHIRP to program your Baofeng, never download the programming from another radio and then upload that file into your Baofeng. Doing so can cause your Baofeng to stop working if your radio does not have the exact same firmware version as the source radio. (Baofeng has made numerous firmware changes over the years, resulting in versions which are not always 100% interchangeable with each other.) In years past, this would 'brick' your Baofeng; nowadays there is a recovery procedure which usually restores and resets the radio.
If you want to safely copy another radio's programming into your Baofeng via CHIRP, do this:
- connect your Baofeng to CHIRP and download its image, even if it is completely blank.
- save this image to your hard drive as a backup.
- if you have not yet done so, download the image from the 'source' radio.
- open this 'source' image in CHIRP, highlight all the fields, and then Edit -> Copy.
- re-open/switch back to the blank image from your Baofeng.
- Edit -> Paste the 'source' data into your Baofeng's file, and Save it under a new (unique) file name.
- upload this image file to your Baofeng.
lhracing
Well-Known Member
- Location
- Layton, UT
I tried to join again tonight but I just can't get to the repeater from the Layton/Kaysville area.
- Location
- Bountiful, land of rocks
Here’s the antenna. Bad pic but enough to get the idea
TurboMinivan
Still plays with cars
- Location
- Lehi, UT
Tonight was RME net #4! The following folks participated:
NM0AB---Dempsey (TurboMinivan) as net control
W7DMW---Dave (moab_cj5)
KE7KVP--Marc (mbryson)
KE8L--Eric (unimog)
KU5R--Tom (not an RME member)
KC7MDT---Cade (mister_cade)
We are 4-for-4 for having a non-RME guest participate. Tonight's guest was Tom, and he helped further our communication by asking what radio hardware we were using. After we had each answered in turn, the topic turned to our locations and how clean our signals were. All in all, I thought it was a great topic considering it was brought up by a guest.
Speaking of guests, we have great news. Last week's guest (a guy from Bountiful named Cade) is no longer a guest at all. True to his word, he went out and found our forum and has joined the RME ranks! I forgot to ask him if he had found RME before last week's net, or if it was our on-air radio meeting that introduced him to us. Either way, I'm glad to have him on board.
As another subject of discussion, I brought up the idea of someone else being net control. This is going to be crucial in a few weeks, as my work schedule will change on April 1st when I'll start working until 9pm. If the net doesn't move to a later time--and I'm not saying it needs to do so--then somebody else is gonna need to take the reins from me. Tonight I mainly wanted to float the idea out there and see what sort of responses I would get. To any of you who missed tonight's net but have participated in the past: if you think you might like taking a crack at being net control, feel free to speak up in this thread.
Thanks again to everyone for a good discussion.
NM0AB---Dempsey (TurboMinivan) as net control
W7DMW---Dave (moab_cj5)
KE7KVP--Marc (mbryson)
KE8L--Eric (unimog)
KU5R--Tom (not an RME member)
KC7MDT---Cade (mister_cade)
We are 4-for-4 for having a non-RME guest participate. Tonight's guest was Tom, and he helped further our communication by asking what radio hardware we were using. After we had each answered in turn, the topic turned to our locations and how clean our signals were. All in all, I thought it was a great topic considering it was brought up by a guest.
Speaking of guests, we have great news. Last week's guest (a guy from Bountiful named Cade) is no longer a guest at all. True to his word, he went out and found our forum and has joined the RME ranks! I forgot to ask him if he had found RME before last week's net, or if it was our on-air radio meeting that introduced him to us. Either way, I'm glad to have him on board.
As another subject of discussion, I brought up the idea of someone else being net control. This is going to be crucial in a few weeks, as my work schedule will change on April 1st when I'll start working until 9pm. If the net doesn't move to a later time--and I'm not saying it needs to do so--then somebody else is gonna need to take the reins from me. Tonight I mainly wanted to float the idea out there and see what sort of responses I would get. To any of you who missed tonight's net but have participated in the past: if you think you might like taking a crack at being net control, feel free to speak up in this thread.
Thanks again to everyone for a good discussion.