Megan's Message and Musings The old saying goes, “In like a Lion, out like a Lamb”... and for anyone who volunteered for the Satruday Muziekparade, we not only saw that lion, we heard it, felt it & talked about it! Here are some Weather Facts: It was colder for this parade than it was for the Sinterklaas Parade. This was the windiest day since Christmas Eve. The wind speed varied from about 20mph to 47mph that day. The people and flowers held on so we avoided having a stem festival. Speaking of holding on, my dad had an expression: “The road to success is always under construction.” As we enter May, we are not just holding on, but driving forward with some changes while avoiding those orange barrels. One of the most important changes is that I am proud to announce that, unlike we previously thought, the Holland Amateur Radio Club will again be able to host its 9th Annual Great Lakes Superswap this year! Mark your calendars for October 16, 2010. The venue remains the same, West Ottawa High School's South Campus. Our swap chairmen are John Hanse KC8QDE, Ike DeWitt K8EMU and Jeff VerHage KB8QAP. They have many new ideas and have already started the preparations rolling. Another welcome change is that Mike Cole WD8NHA is stepping forward and offering to teach Morse Code classes. Beginner classes will start on June 1st at 6:30pm and run through July. There are a few spaces still available, so contact either him or Ed Heyboer KF8EF to reserve a seat. Oh, and these classes are ..-. .-. . . ! Continuing on with the changes, Mike Hill W8DER and Charles Nowak AJ8N are hosting a Foxhunt each third Tuesday of the month! The HARC clubhouse is the place to be at 6:30 pm for an evening of fun and “finding the fox”. This month Sheila Bosscher K8AJ will be our fox. We wish Tom K8TB Good Luck in finding her!!! Mike and Charles will also be announcing a time for an inexpensive Tape Measure 'Make and Take' session that will be scheduled for later this summer. One of the obstacles we must dodge this summer is a change to our monthly Membership Meetings. We have to move the meeting to the second Monday of the month, June 14 and July 12 to avoid the summer American Legion Concert Season across the street which will probably take up all available parking spaces, and then some! Our August 10 meeting will be at the Park Township Airport to watch how Amateur Radio is used with model rockets. Do you remember that we asked that everyone to step outside their box, try something new and experience a new facet of your amateur license? How are you doing with that? Have you checked into the Monday 2m Net yet? Have you attended a Membership Meeting? Did you enjoy some coffee and conversation at Open Mic night? Are you thinking about upgrading your license this fall, or learning Morse Code? Have you attended an OCEC meeting? Have you taken advantage of any of the free training opportunities? Have you volunteered your time and talents for any radio related activities? Do you plan to help operate a station during Field Day weekend? If not, then ask yourself, why not? You see, the road is always under construction, but sometimes the detours lead to fun and surprising memories! Who knows, after you avoid a few of those orange barrels, there may be coffee and cookies at the end of the journey! 73, WO0MEG Meet, Greet and Eat Times and places to meet fellow amateurs “Open Mike” Night, every Tuesday night at 7:00pm At our Ken Groom ZR5AAD Memorial Technical and Training Center, 280 East 8th Street in Holland, Michigan. Come to operate or just enjoy coffee and conversation, members and guests are welcome. Board Meeting, 1st Tuesday of each month at 7:00pm Various locations announced via our K8DAA Yahoo Group email reflector. All members are welcome. General Membership Meeting, 7:00pm, Holland Fire Station Conference Room, 279 Kollen Park Drive in Holland, Michigan. See our Calendar for summer dates. Guests are welcome. Donuts @ Donutville, every Wednesday at 2:30pm Meet at Donutville, 676 Michigan Avenue in Holland for coffee and conversation. “HAM is for Breakfast” last Saturday of each month Join us at at 9:00am for an informal gathering. We meet and eat at Perkins Restaurant, 2332 North Park Drive in Holland, Michigan, across from the Walmart plaza. We usually occupy the back corner. Members, spouses, friends, family, and anyone else interested in amateur radio are welcome. Girls on the Run Chris Dandrea KC8RQT has received the following letter and is asking for volunteers to help with this event: Hi Chris, We’ve started planning again or the Girls on the Run Celebration 5K Events and I wanted to email you and re-extend the invitation to have the Holland Amateur Radio Club volunteer at our event. This year our South Ottawa/Allegan event will be on Friday, May 21 at the Holland Municipal Stadium. (We’re keeping our fingers crossed for no rain storms this year!) The 5K will begin at 6:00pm so we would like HARC members that are able to attend to coordinate their positions with our staff and the Holland Police Dept and be in place by 5:45pm. Your members have been a huge asset our events in the past and we’d love to have you join us again. Please let me know if any of you are able to attend this event, and how many. Thanks so much for your time and consideration this and every year. Susan Fenton Program Assistant Girls on the Run of Ottawa and Allegan Counties Center for Women in Transition 411 Butternut Drive Holland, MI 49424 616.494.1732 616.355.9760 fax www.gotroac.org Nets of Interest Compiled by Tom Wilson, KD8DEG Sunday 8:30 AM 50.400 AM, Grand Rapids 8:00 PM 145.270 FM, Lowell Club 8:00 PM 50.400 AM, Kalamazoo, Gary K8BKB 8:00 PM 147.240 FM, Allegan, Jim AC8AG 9:00 PM 50.150 USB, Zeeland, Charlie N8QEM 9:30 PM 144.155 USB, Holland, Bill K8NFT Monday 7:30 PM 147.060 FM, HARC, 2m Net. Ed, KF8EV is Net Manager Tuesday 7:00 PM 144.222 USB, Kalamazoo, K8BKB Gary 8:00 PM AM, Kalamazoo WJ8L Phil 9:30 PM 50.300 USB Kalamazoo, K8BKB Gary 9:00 PM 145.270 FM, MDXA, Dave KC8PCL 9:30 PM 50.400 AM Kalamazoo, K8BKB Gary Wednesday 8:00 PM 28.380 USB, Allegan 9:00 PM 50.140 USB, Cedar Springs, AC8AH Jerry Thursday 6:30 PM 147.520 FM 2nd Thursday each month OCEC Simplex Net 7:00 PM 147.060 (+) FM 4nd Thursday each month OCEC Repeater Net 7:00 PM 147.160 Michigan youth, 22 and younger 8:00 PM 146.800 FM, MAARC weekly Net Daily 7:00 PM 50.200 USB, Cadillac, round tables Six-Figure Grid Squares Explained I have received emails from two people who expressed puzzlement when I gave the grid square of my six meter beacon as EN62WU. They both knew that the grid square for the Holland area is EN62, but they didn't know what the two additional elements were for. Around this area of the world, a 4 digit grid square is around 100 miles wide and 70 miles tall. The EN62 grid square that contains Holland, Michigan also contains South Haven, Benton Harbor, and crosses Lake Michigan to includes the NE area of Chicago, Racine, Wisconsin and the SE area of Milwaukee. This is a large area. Go to the ARRL web site on grid squares, where this is explained rather well: http://www.arrl. org/locate/ gridinfo. html When the Maidenhead system was designed, a 4 digit grid square is to be 1 degree of latitude and 2 degrees of longitude. The Maidenhead people then added the two digits to define a smaller area. The area is now 2.5 minutes worth of latitude tall and 5 minutes worth of longitude wide. This neatly divides a four digit grid square into tiny slices 1/24th as wide and tall, meaning the resolution is 576 times greater. By adding the two additional letters, we can now identify an area that is only 3 miles tall by 4 miles wide, such as EN62WU. If you want to find your six digit grid square, QRZ offers a good guess, and most of the time it is very accurate, but be careful as the QRZ program can be faked out by local road addresses. You can also use a neat online resource that ties into Google Maps to find your six digit grid square: http://www.dxzone. com/cgi-bin/ dir/jump2. cgi?ID=13877 Click on the line "Full-screen version with gridsquare limits here." just below the top that takes you to a Google map. Then, click on and drag the map over to your area, and zoom in to your house location. Double-click, and the program will give you the six digit grid square. You can now zoom out to see the limits of this 6 digit grid square. As an example, the Holland HARC clubhouse is EN62WS and the GRARA Red Cross locations is EN72EX. Many of the logging programs can use the six digit grid squares to show the azimuth between the two points, for a much superior antenna pointing accuracy. Tom Bosscher K8TB "EN72BV" ! Public Service Opportunities Please contact each event's coordinator for more information. Burn Survivors Car Show May 15, 2010 John Hanse, KC8QDE 616-836-3737 johnhanse@charter.net Girls On the Run May 21, 2010 Chris Dandrea KC8RQT, kc8rqt@yahoo.com Muskegon Summer Celebration June 24- July 4, 2010 Rich "Doc" Strait, AC8AL Disaster Services Technology Lead dstlead@arcmon.org Coast Guard Festival Parade July 31 through August 8, 2010 North Ottawa Amateur Radio Club Details to follow Air Affair, Park Township Airport Saturday August 21, 2010 Brian Fredricks, KD8IFE Megan Heyl WO0MEG Details to follow Parade of Lights Tuesday, November 30, 2010 Ivan DeWitt, K8EMU idewitt@charter.net Corrections to March Membership Meeting Tulip Time: ...Steve Vanderhill N8UJD and Dave Lamer WA8RSA will be our liaisons for this event. HARC Banquet November 9, 2010: ...Motion supported by Dave N8UJH. Emergency: Steve N8UJD, announced... 2010 Swap Chair needed: Steve Vanderhill N8UJD took the floor... [Secretary's note: Steve is N8UJD, Dave is N8UJH. Whoops, I'll get it soon...] Please make a note of these correct callsigns. Minutes of May Meetings Minutes are now posted and available for review and download from our website.