Welcome everybody to 2010.  This year is shaping up to be a year of action and progression.  The 2010 OLRC board meet for the first time last week and and had a very productive meeting. The primary focus of the board meeting was to map topics for the entire year and to plan a few activities.  I think we came up with a great schedule and look forward to working through it this year.  Of course, as with all things the schedule is subject to change and for the latest information on activities and topics of discussion at meetings, check out the Club Calendar.

For 2010 the board has put together an outline of topics for the year.  

• January: Welcome to 2010, Member survey review
• February: Build-it-Night (AA Battery Packs)
• Mar: Public Service Events, Operating in different conditions and environments
• April: Police Radio Operation, Intro to ICS, Facility Tour of City Hall/EOC/PD
• May: Country Fest preparation, More ICS
• June: Repeaters and their operation, Tour of a mountain top repeater site
• July: Mobile installations and show-n-tell
• August: Radio Direction Finding, Family BBQ
• September: Build-it-Night (Antenna)
• October: Build-it-Night (Battery Charger)
• November: Digital Radio Modes, 2011 Board Nominations
• December: 2011 Board Elections and club member social 

On December 17 we held our final club meeting for 2009.  At the meeting we held elections for the 2010 board as well as conducting a traffic copying exercise.

The 2010 Board is as follows:

For the traffic copying exercise, we tuned into the Statewide RACES Net and copied checkins from stations located all over the state.  This is a good test of skill as the audio through the different repeaters isn't always clear.  In addition the group quickly noticed that small differences like Kilo Whiskey vs Kilo Watt Whiskey make a big difference when trying to understand what is being said.

Congratulations to our 2010 board and we would like to thank our 2009 board for their time and service. 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year...

 Last night we had our November club meeting.  We held it a week early as to avoid the conflict with Thanksgiving.  For the meeting we walked through performing various tasks on our handhelds.  We started off by going to a VFO and entering a frequency.  From there we would add CTCSS and then an offset.  It got really interesting after that when we rotated the radios to the person on our left and repeated the process.  We did this for about 4 iterations and it proved to be a great learning experience.  It was very interesting to learn that on Icom radios when you press the MONI button it opens the squelch like on other radios, but if you are setup with an offset it flips to the other frequency when it opens up.  Very interesting...

We are also taking nominations for the 2010 Board with election being held at our December meeting.  If you are interested please contact one of the board members to express your interest.

On October 31st, the State of Utah will be conducting an Amateur Radio Simulated Emergency Test (SET).  As part of this the Oquirrh Lake Radio Club will be participating in the SET in support of the City of South Jordan. 

We will need volunteers to help staff the EOC as well as primary communication spots throughout the city.  The SET will be conducted in the morning and be done in plenty of time for Tick-o-Treat.  If you are interested in participating please let Brett (KC7IIB) know (brett[at]brettneilson{dot}com).