1992 - Palomar Amateur Radio Club

•
Diego County is alive and committee chairman ••or can as soon as we can find
MAY'92
well. They DO MONITOR show us where in Part 97 cabinets for them ••and they
VHF/UHF amateur communicatIons
and ALSO the AUTO­ Also, remember that PARC's
your views are covered. will be off the air for
PATCHES. Your editor has
had an FCC engineer call him
three times lately ••but
fortunately not about any of
our club members. You need
to be reminded that the FCC
does monitor so please
••please conduct yourself as
if they are monitoring EVERY
transmission that you ma~
One of the things that
the FCC looks for is
BUSINESS communications
••and several of our members
really look bad sometimes
••the other evening two
amateurs were talking about
what appeared to be definite
business communications and
it was only near the end
that it was mentioned that
they were talking about ARES
meetings and ARES members.
Don't talk business over the
air or talk about something
that sounds like business
without making it known to
those that are listening
(FCC? & PARC?) that it is
not business communications.
The Palomar ARC has
prided itself that we have
some of the best operators
in the amateur community and
we would like to keep it
that way. With the large
number of new hams and new
club members we need to keep
reminding you of what you
should and should not be
doing on our repeaters and
in the use of our autopatches.
Much of what we
preach is nothing more than
common sense. Please do not
feel offended when a club
member talks to you about
something that you could be
doing wrong. Rather than
argue about it, follow the
suggestion until you have
talked to a club officer or
suggested "rules of conduct"
sometimes are more restrictive
than required by the
FCC ••but then we have
always been that way •• and
we don't always succeed.
Club members are
reminded that during the
commute hours of 6-8am and
4-6pm that the repeaters are
used mainly by mobiles and
that "base" stations should
probably refrain from
contacts with other base
stations during these time
slots. It is nice to have a
base station available during
these times to help with
emergencies but with our
autopatches this is not as
important as it used to be.
AUTO PATCHES
AUTOPATCR STATUS
146.175 & 146.730: Normal
147.130: Low audio
449.425: Normal
Jerry-WB6FMT has removed
the old tape recorder
from the autopatch monitor
and has replaced it with a
11/16 ips stereo tape deck
loaned to the club by John­
WB6IQS. One channel carries
the patch audio and the
other channel is stamped
with the date and time of
the calls using a Radio
Shack talking time clock.
If the FCC contacts us about
any call, we will have
everything needed for their
investigation.
Jerry has installed the
Vista patch (pwr sup, RF
filters, batteries, xmtr,
rcvr, and T-tone computer)
into a cabinet. The VSTA
patch is the first one to be
boxed up with emergency
power installed. The MMSA
and LMSA patches will follow
several hours while these
modifications are being made
some Saturday or Sunday
afternoon.
The following is a list
of additional things that
are on the agenda
autopatches:
I-turn OFF timer for 911
without use of "A" code
completed, not installed
2-patch units in cabinets
with mods and batteries
VSTA(done)nxt LMSA/MMSA
3-patch emg pwr beeper
4-repeater busy signal
finished, not installed
5-computer log & control
project started
6-one code for ALL the
patches, idea stage
7-computer logging of all
calls, time, duration,
for the
& statistics, started
8-automatic selection of
autopatches, idea stage
The most recent repeater
access codes are on your
address label although NEW
MEMBERS should request an
autopatch information sheet
by sending a Self Addressed
Stamped Envelope (SASE) and
home phone to W9FQN (see
Editor) since you need to
know several additional
things before using the
autopatches. You DO NOT
RAVE A PERSONAL CODE at this
time. Only general codes.
PARC members need to
review PARC suggestions on
the use of the autopatch
system. So far about 1% of
the calls being made have
some problem and we feel
that most of the errors are
with some of our newer
members. Autopatches are
new to the club and it will
probably take some time
until everyone becomes
familiar with how they are
SCOPE-MAY'92
CLUB MTG WED MAY 6th, 1930Rr, CARLSBAD SAFETY CENTER
Pg. 7