Cherokee Amateur Radio Society Website

Welcome to Cherokee Amateur Radio Society
Club Website for WX4CAR
Serving Cherokee County, GA and the surrounding communities

Announcements

SPECIAL NOTICE TO ALL MEMBERS

Because of concerns about the spread of the COVID-19 virus, City of Woodstock has closed the William G Long Senior Center until further notice. As a result, we need to host a virtual event for the CARS Monthly meetings until we can freely gather again in person.

ARRL TESTING: We will hold social distancing friendly ARRL testing on June 13, 2020 at 1 PM. Reservations are highly recommended! Click the link for details HERE: TESTING2020

The risk for Cherokee County remains to be LOW. Here is a link to the county info: https://www.cherokeega.com/_focus/corona-virus-plan.php

Future announcements will be posted to the groups.io distribution and on our Facebook page. Be safe and stay well. 73 from the leadership team

Next Meeting

June 13, 2020
Virtual Meeting

Because we are still unable to meet live at the W G Long Senior Center until further notice, we will hold a virtual on-air meeting on the KG4VUB repeater at 10AM EDT. [145.270MHz, - ,PL100]

We WILL have testing as noted in the announcement above. Reservations are requested, but walk-ins can be accommodated.

An optional technical session will be held after the Net and available on GO-TO-MEETING. Details to follow via the Groups.io list.
[Thanks to Stephen (KK4YQV) for arranging this service.]
In June we will talk about Field Day activities, in light of the Shelter In Place situation. We hope to have some news about other Hams you can join for Field Day operations, as conditions allow. See the Field Day 2020 tab for more info.

General Announcements

ARRL sponsored FCC Testing time change
We have changed the regular Testing session time to be 1PM Eastern after each month's meeting. NOTE: Due to COVID-19 restrictions, these testings sessions are on hold until we are cleared to hold them again. If you want to test for a new license or upgrade, it is requested that you use the Contact Us button and let us know.

Note to DMR Users
The 3108 Brandmeister Server is being decommissioned on May 30. If you use this server for your HotSpot you will have to change it in your PiStar setup. See the Club Blog page for more details.

Need help?
Join the 2020 Elmering (Mentoring) program started! It was a big success.
Bring a lunch and plan to stay around till 2pm and learn what you want.
Posting on this topic is on groups.io distribution. Watch your email for more details on additional Elmering.

Looking Ahead

Special Event Meeting at a future date (TBD)

April 1, 2020 is the 60th anniversary of TIROS, the world's first meteorological (weather) satellite. At the future CARS meeting, Rick Maxwell, W8KHK, will be presenting a program illustrating these very early days in the US space program. As son of Walter Maxwell (W2DU, SK), antenna systems engineer at the Astro Electronics Division of RCA, he was fortunate to experience much of this history. This program was previously presented at the QCWA National Convention in 2010. Slides will be shown, as well as actual spacecraft hardware! Beacon, telemetry, and TV transmitters identical to those that flew on satellites such as SCORE, TIROS, RELAY, ECHO, and many other artifacts, will be on display for all to examine.
This is an exciting opportunity you will not want to miss!

Move to groups.io for our email list
We hope by now that you have made the move. Thanks for doing that. It will work much better for the club members and leaders.

Last warning! If you have not moved yet, please do before we shut down the Yahoo service. You can create an account on the groups.io page or use your existing Google login.
To Join search for the Cherokee-Hams group and click on the Join.

Once your registration is confirmed, you will be able to receive and post to the group.
This is a closed group, so you must be a group member to post.

What has happened?
If you miss a meeting, you miss a lot!

Here are things we did so far in 2020:

Topic for the January meeting was the Parks on the Air (POTA). This is a growing activity that anyone can participate in! Find out how to get started to become an activator or a chaser. Slides are posted - by Rob Bruderer -W1JKU

For the February meeting we heard "Topics on Operating CW (Morse)" as well as "An Introduction to ARES" presented by Steven Price.

Wonder if you can learn CW? Wonder what the different types of keys are and why people like them? Maybe get inspired to build a code oscillator of your own? There were demonstrations of various keys, guidance on learning CW, and lessons learned by the experts. Many Hams there tried out the various keys and wanted to sign up for the upcoming class. Slides will be posted when available.
Thanks to - Bruce German -KK4GEE and Steve Price KK4YQV

For April meeting we did our very first "on air" meeting, led by Rob W1JKU. It seemed to go very well, but we would like feedback from the members on area we could improve on. We also had an optional technical discussion on Go To Meeting that was an introduction to Digital Communications. Slides are posted in the Technical Programs area of this website.

Other Happenings

Want to present to the group?
We NEED members willing to present on a topic in an upcoming meeting. Per our survey, topics include DIY projects, various aspects of soldering, batteries and solar power, working ham radio satellites, and using microcontrollers in your project. Please contact Marty, Rob, or Johnathon about your topic.

What do you want to see presented? Let the leadership team know.

Look for new sessions and all new topics in 2020. Submit your ideas to any club officer.

Slides are still posted for the 2017, 2018 , and 2019 sessions.

Build It Project
The Ham Radio Workbench website has a number of DIY projects you may want to try. We are here to help.

We have a list of who is seriously interested in doing projects.

The picture at the left is the Benchduino project from the Ham Radio Workbench crew. Boards should be available for sale still.

Information about us

Cherokee Amateur Radio Society is an organization of FCC licensed amateur radio operators (also called Hams) that meet and share the hobby, educate people about amateur radio, as well as support our local community in times of disaster. We are located in Cherokee County Georgia and have club call sign WX4CAR.

The club also participates with ARES, and the Cherokee County EOC when severe weather gets close to the area, and we help with local public service projects.

The members of the club also dedicate some of their time to promote and help new hams to develop their skills and knowledge on Amateur communications modes and to be better operators. We are a very active club and participate in ARRL Field Day every year. If you are in the Woodstock, Georgia area and would like to participate, drop us a note and let us know. This website will provide details about the Field Day site.

The menu tabs on the far left will help you navigate to the area of interest.

If you have a question and would like to contact us, use the button at the top to go to the Contact Us page.

Weekly Nets

CARS Weekly Net
Our weekly Net can be found on 145.270 MHz every Thursday evening starting at 8PM Eastern Time. (- offset, PL=100Hz) KG4VUB Repeater - located in Waleska,GA

Georgia DMR Talk Group Net
Wednesday evenings at 8PM Eastern Time
Talk Group 3113 Brandmeister Network
Website Link

Testing - Need to test for your license or upgrade? An ARRL Testing session will be held at 1 PM the same day. Testing is done at the William G Long Senior Center. Walk-ins are welcome, but we like reservations. Click on the Contact Us button if you want more information or reservation to take an exam.

Elmering Program (ie Mentoring of new or even experienced hams)

We now have a list of Elmers willing to help people in various parts of the hobby. Do you have questions or need some help on a certain topic or topics? We will provide a link to a page where you can see the available people and how to contact them. Ask any officer for the link.

In 2020, Elmers will be available to help people after the regular scheduled meetings each month. Bring a brown bag lunch and we will use the time from noon to 2PM.

Participate
What would you like see in 2020? The club officers will be looking for your suggestions, ideas, and your participation.

If you have a topic you would like to present to the club, please provide a summary or abstract in writing to any officer. It needs to related in some way to amateur radio.