PAARAchute Mobile - AF6IM Style

Mark has been going to great lengths to get really high! This is NOT to say he has been engaging in some unlawful activity but rather sky diving from 17k feet or more. While aloft he has the time while hanging from his canopy to look around and get a birds eye view of the world. At the same time, he has been able to operate amatuer radio while descending back to earth. Come here Mark’s latest exploits and get a feeling of what it is like to operate ham radio from aloft.

Their conclusions were that the “technology readiness” of our critical electric systems needs to be improved. Jerry will tell us more about what happened at their meetings and what to look forward to.

Automated Antenna Design and Optimzation Methods

Dr, Jason Lohn

Sr. Systems Scientist at Carnegie Melon, Silicon Valley Campus 

Dr. Lohn has recently co-founded a startup to commercialize his automated antenna design technology based on his evolutionary algorithms.  Previously he led Evolvable Systems research at NASA Ames Research Center, worked at Google, Stanford University and IBM.  He received his MS and PhD in Electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland at College Park, and his BS in Electrical Engineering from Lehigh University.  Dr. Lohn comes to us courtesy of the NASA Ames Research Center.

Dave Wolfe - AA6XV

This talk will cover various aspects of operating CW and is primarily intended for people who have not operated CW before, or are perhaps, returning to it after being off for a while.

David Wolfe has been operating CW as an amateur since 1965 and served as a Radio Officer in the Merchant Marine and later as an Operator/Engineer at Coast Stations operating  in the Fixed, Maritime Services.  He holds BSEE, MSEE and PhD degrees
in Engineering and Physics. He is currently employed as a independent consultant in the areas of Communication, Radar Systems and Digital Signal Processing. He is a current holder of FCC T2, GROL , GMDSS DB with Ship Radar Endorsement Commercial
Licenses and is a past holder of the T1 and First Class Radiotelephone Licenses. He has held the Amateur Extra Amateur Radio License since 1972. His principal amateur radio interests are Dxing, Contesting, VHF/UHF operations on CW and Digital modes, Experimentation and Antenna Design.

Cameron Rolfe, KA6ONV

“What makes Helicopters fly and how are they different from airplanes”

Cameron has a background in broadcast engineering, has flown traffic
reporters for several local radio and TV stations in the bay area for
many years. He is the owner of Bay Area Helicoptours at the San Carlos
Airport. When not touring the Bay Area, Cameron gives helicopter
instructions. Cameron was instrumental in setting up the CARLA 440
linked Repeater system in the late 80’s.

ICOM D-Star - Digital Amateur Radio

Tim Barrett K6BIV, will provide a very informative talk to overview what the ICOM D Star system is. All repeaters are analog and mostly FM, but recently some are GMSK! Tim will discuss the various aspects and modes of D-Star operation and some of the advantages and disadvantages of utilizing this mode/system for amateur radio. He will also cover the current status of systems being coordinated in and around the Bay Area.

Tim is currently serving on the board of directors for NARCC, (www.narcc.org) and they are the coordinating body for all amateur radio repeaters in Northern California. Tim has been very active in D-Star since it first came out and was also responsible for launching and now a trustee of the K6MDD D-Star machine on Mt. Diablo 145.02 (C). We are planning to have a live demonstration using D-Star simplex, through a repeater and finally through a repeater-gateway-reflector system using digital voice (DV mode) on 2 meters.

Matt Ettus N2MJI - AMSAT Geostationary Project

On Friday, April 4^th, Matt will provide an overview of the current AMSAT project and describe some of the hurdles that will need to be overcome to get this huge effort off the ground. The payload will be discussed as well his proposal for the link design and how the ham community will benefit from this design.

Map & directions

The Palo Alto Amateur Radio Association meets on the 1^st Friday of the month at 7:00pm (19:00J) at the Menlo Park Recreation Center, located at 700 Alma Street, Menlo Park, CA.

A low-bandwidth video of the August meeting on BPL is now available in Windows Media format. Other versions in QuickTime will be posted soon.