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The Massillon Amateur Radio Club W8NP
PO Box 73
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Our club repeater is always available for all operators. Use PL 110.9 Hz. Try out your Yeasu Digital Voice radio's on our Fusion equipped UHF Repeater on 442.85 Mhz.
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Search Our Site What is the MARC ? Since 1927, the Massillon Amateur Radio Club has been a diverse radio hobbyist club that is currently over 80 members strong. Active within our community as well as an ARRL Special Service Club, we are actively involved in many facets of Amateur Radio, including Public Service, Membership, Field Day, Repeaters, Amateur Television (ATV), Skywarn plus many other interests. Learn More.... Welcome To Amateur Radio !
ARRL Field Day Time !
With no RF interference to the church electronics, it looks like we may have a found an ideal spot to hold Field Day again next year !. Of course we will need a majority yes vote to make that happen. The evening meal was - can I say delicious and plenty of it. If you went away hungry, then there was something wrong. Big thanks goes to the kitchen committee (YL's and the XYL's) for a job well done ! We will have the early results ready for the meeting and final score finished in time for next month's Feedback and printed in the newsletter and our website.
The Set-Up Crew hard at work !
Does anybody remember where the wires connect ?
Jim, WA8GXM on the six meter radio.
Dan, N8DZM opens the contest at 2:00 PM.
The CW Station gets ready.
Our CW Station with Igor, K8INN at the key !
Our Public Information Table. ARRL International Grid Chase Kicks Off With The New Year !
Each new grid square contact confirmed through LoTW will count toward your monthly total. Many hams are familiar with grid squares from the VHF/UHF and satellite realms, and everyone lives in one. An online calculator by David Levine, K2DSL, can determine your grid square. Enter a postal address, ZIP code, or a call sign, and the calculator will return the grid square for that location. Any contact you make in 2018 can count for your Chase score; as long as the other operators participate in LoTW, you’ll get credit automatically when they upload their logs. This means that your contest contacts will count, as will contacts with special event stations, or other on-air activity that uses LoTW to confirm contacts. Except for 60 meters, there are no restrictions on modes or bands, as long as they are legal. Satellite contacts are valid for the Chase too. The event is open to all radio amateurs. Complete details of the ARRL International Grid Chase 2018 appeared in the December 2017 issue of QST. For more information, contact the ARRL Contest Branch. Massillon Holiday Parade
(REVISED Dec 3) - - Due to heavy rains, the Holiday Parade has been rescheduled and will now be on Wednesday, November 29th. Staging is expected to take place at 5:30 PM with parade kickoff at 6:00 PM. We still need our volunteers ! Thanks to the following volunteers for helping out this year ! Jim-WA8GXM, Terry-N8ATZ, Steve-KD8ACF, Dan-N8DZM, Robin-N8EBS, Bob-N8KXO, Vern-KE8VS, Igor-K8INN, Perry-W8AU, Wade-WD8MIU, Russ-N8PII, Mike-KB8OTK, Don-W8DEA, and Mike-KE8EHG. Our last scheduled public service event of the year is of course the annual Massillon Holiday Parade. This year’s parade is on Saturday, November 18th and we normally need about 20 volunteers to assist with parade staging, Cable TV, logistical support and general communications for the 80 plus units that generally make up this annual Massillon holiday tradition. The club has been a part of this parade for over 43 years making it one of the longest public service events handled by the club. As in previous years we expect to have the club’s EComm Trailer as one of the parade units to remind area residents of our continued support of our community. Club member Perry Ballinger, W8AU is communications coordinator for the parade again this year and is looking for volunteers to joins us on parade day. A sign up sheet will be passed out at the November meeting. Please consider volunteering to help with this event. It’s a great way to get in the holiday spirit by welcoming Santa Claus to town. Don’t forget we normally get together after the parade at one of our local restaurant’s for a late breakfast or early lunch. If you don’t make the club meeting contact Perry directly at (330) 832–8612 or by email to w8au@sssnet.com. We will gather downtown around 8:30 AM to decorate the trailer and begin assembling parade units. Communications will take place on 2 meters either simplex or the club’s 147.18 or our 442.85 UHF Repeater. Don’t forget your handheld set to the proper PL Tone and come on downtown to enjoy a great holiday parade ! MARC Visits Touch-A-Truck
The club had our EComm Trailer on site with our mast extended and equipment on display and operating to demonstrate our hobby to the public. Perry, W8AU also brought his military jeep to show. Lots of children toured our trailer and the Jeep many having their picture taken operating our main station. Eleven club members assisted with this event. It was a great time and we received many comments about our equipment and how we serve as a backup communications service to public safety forces and our community. Many thanks to the several club members who helped out or stopped by to have a look including Terry - N8ATZ, Perry - W8AU, Wade - WD8MIU, Jim - WA8GXM, Wade - W8DEA, Chris - KD8TNF, Ted - K8TWA, Mike - KB8OTK, Mike - KE8EHG, Don - W8DEF, Tony - KD8UXK and Ralph - K8HSQ. Also thanks to Jim for some great aerial drone shots.
Jim acts a tour guide for our many visitors !
Our Drone shot, that's our mast on the right !
We even had a shady spot to handle the very hot day ! MARC Participates in Memorial Day Parade
(May 28, 2017) - - The MARC will participate in this years Memorial Day Parade in Massillon on Monday, May 29th. The club EComm Trailer will be decorated in full colors with flags denoting all branches of our armed services and will be part of the parade starting at 9:30 AM Monday morning. Club members are encouraged to attend the ceremonies to recognize our members who have served in the military and to reflect on the true meaning of this important holiday.
W8AU ready to join the parade units !
EComm One Shows Off the Colors ! Ohio Section Manager Visits Club
Thanks for the fine program Scott at our annual ARRL night !
A full house for our annual ARRL program night ! Perry Twp PD Honors WB8HHP
Officer France obtained his bachelors degree from Kent State University in 1979 and continued his education by completing the Lawrence Township Police Academy in 1980. He began his career as an Auxiliary Officer for Lawrence Township and Jackson Township. Officer France started as a full-time police officer with the Perry Township Police Department on June 2, 1981 and was one of the original nine full-time police officers when the department first began operations. During Officer France's career he was a Road Patrol Officer, Detective, Union Representative and Evidence Officer. Officer France has had many highlights in his career and has helped tremendously with multiple large projects within the police department. Officer France was one of several employees to assist in the creation and implementation of the “Special Response Unit,” as well as the radio/communication system and the organization of the evidence room by applying advanced professional standards. Officer France not only has great attendance for his regular shifts but in times of significant and critical investigations he responds to calls for service at all times of the day or night with no questions asked. The Board of Trustees will be honoring Officer France at the Board meeting on Tuesday, February 7, 2017 at 7:00pm at the Perry Township Administration Office- 3111 Hilton St. NW, Massillon, Ohio 44646. As always the public is welcome to attend. It has been a privilege to work with Officer France. His kindness and sense of humor will be greatly missed! We wish you the best of luck, Timmy!
Retiring Officer and Lifetime MARC Club Member Tim France, WB8HHP (R). Congratulations Tim on a fine career of public service to our community ! New Repeater Antenna Installed !
(Oct 12, 2016) - - On Saturday, October 8th members of the MARC Technical Committee completed the final phase of the 147.18 Mhz upgrade project. With the help of Marty Baker, N8XPK and Committee lead Jim - WA8GXM along with helpers Terry - N8ATZ, Mike - KB8OTK, and Vern - KE8VS, the new commercial 4 bay antenna was replaced along with a new section of feedline to the Tower Site. We noted that when the old antenna was lowered to ground level it was clear that the antenna had been damaged by lightning multiple times certainly affecting it's performance. This completes a nearly year long upgrade process that included the installation of the new Yaesu Fusion Repeater, a GE Power Amp, and a newly refurbished duplexer and many other minor upgrades in our effort to eliminate intermittent repeater noise and poor performance to our main two meter repeater. During this time we also upgraded our UHF System on 442.85 Mhz with a new Yaesu Fusion repeater, new feedline and in September a new commercial grade 2 bay antenna. Over the next few months, we will be closely monitoring the main club repeater performance to make sure we have cured several problems and will once again have a great sounding solid repeater system for our membership. Our thanks to Marty and the repeater committee for completing this project before winter weather arrived. A few pictures are posted below from the antenna project...
The Ground Crew prepares the hard line
The feedline is ready to be hoisted up the tower
Marty, N8XPK makes his way to the top of the tower
Marty's assistant working his way to the top
The new antenna ready to hoist up the tower
The new antenna set at approx 200 feet atop the tower
The existing repeater antenna removal
This is tough and dangerous
work nearly 200 feet in
The new antenna as seen
from a drone at the top of the A job well done by everyone and Thanks ! March Program Details UPDATED !
Fear not however, we have a very nice backup program that we will have for you at the March meeting. Several months back an interesting article appeared in either QST or CQ Magazine that covered how well the new series of handhelds performed up against the current big three manufacturer's (Icom, Yaesu and Kenwood). The results were a bit of a surprise as many of the current crop of very low priced HT's did not fair well during compliance testing. How about yours ? Club President Ralph Bugg, K8HSQ will bring along his portable spectrum analyzer to the meeting and will be happy to run a simple test on your HT to see how clean your output signal is. It is simple and quick to test. Just make sure you bring your HT and it's antenna. I know we all have at least one handheld, I have one for every day of the week ! So make sure you bring it along to the meeting and let us put it to the test ! ......THE RESULTS OF THE TESTING...... Our fill-in program on HT Purity testing yielded some very interesting results as we expected it to. The two pictures below show the results of testing on two common manufacturers of current HT's. One was the new infusion of a China made model BAOFENG - UV-5RA and the current Yeasu FT2D Digital HT. Several HT types were tested along with a few commercial models. Have a look and make up your own mind !
This shot is from the Yeasu FT2D. The tall vertical trace on the left shows a nice signal with only a few spurious emissions shown by shorter vertical lines to the right.
This shot is from the China made Baofeng UV-5RA. While the signals are similar you can easily see multiple spurious emissions on the right. A slightly "dirty" radio signal. In all, about 15 handhelds were tested with various results. Not scientific but it would appear that you do indeed get what you pay for ! February Program on NPOTA
(Feb 6, 2016) - - The February club program was given by our Affiliated Club Coordinator John Meyer, KD8MQ who gave us a great introduction to this years major ARRL operating event, National Parks On The Air. John's powerpoint presentation gave us the full details of this nationwide operating event that promises to be very exciting and give plenty of fun operating for everyone. This event will help the NPS celebrate their 100th Anniversary. Hams from across the country will activate NPS units, and promote the National Parks Service and showcase Amateur Radio to the public. The club may even explore the possibility of operating from one of the nearby NPS units.
John had a great presentation at the meeting Steve Hall, KD8ACF Merit Award
(Feb 6, 2016) - - In recognition of his continuing service to the club in many areas throughout 2015 and before, member Steve Hall, KD8ACF was presented a Special Recognition Award at the February meeting. A special thanks to Steve for his dedication to the club year after year !
Steve Hall, KD8ACF (R) receives his Special Recognition Award In Memoriam to our dear friend and member Ed Clinger, WA8DRT
Proceeded in death by his son, Jay Clinger. Survived by his wife, Doris Clinger; two daughters and sons-in—law Jamie Sue and Steve Voican, of Massillon, and Robyn and Roy Adkins of Lake Butler, Fla.: two sons and daughters –in-law Stanton and Lois Clinger of Broomfield, Colo, and Stephen and /Karen Clinger of Boalsburg, Pa; one sister, Lois Armington, of Willoughby, Ohio; and ten grandchildren and 14 great grandchildren.As per Ed’s wishes he was cremated. A memorial will be held at a later date at the Otterbein United Methodist Church– Navarre. Service information will appear in the Repository and on the Funeral Home website closer to the Service date. Instead of sending flowers, contributions in Ed’s memory may be made to the Otterbein Methodist Church –Navarre, 6025 Shepler Church Ave SW, Navarre, Ohio 44662 or the American Cancer Society, P.O. Box 22718 , Oklahoma City, OK 73123-1718. The Finefrock—Gordon Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements. Condolences may be left at: www.gordonfuneralhomes.comOur Most Sincere Condolences to the Family of Ed Clinger. 73’s good friend we wily surely miss you!
Our dear friend and member Ed, WA8DRT (R) April Meeting - ARRL Night
(Apr 4, 2015) - - Our April meeting was our annual ARRL Night as our Special Guest was Ohio Section Manager Scott Yonally, N8SY. Also attending was our Affiliated Club Coordinator John Myers, KD8MQ. Scott's annual visit included current happenings within the Ohio Section and the renewed importance of public service and active club participation in our community. His visit also included a presentation of our active renewal for our ARRL Special Club Status. This elite ARRL status recognizes a affiliated club that goes above and beyond for their community and for Amateur Radio is what defines a Special Service Club. They are leaders in their Amateur Radio community who provide active training classes, publicity programs, and actively pursue technical projects and operating activities. Thanks to the clubs strong belief in our hobby and our community, we have been a Special Service Club for the last ten years.
Affiliated Club Coordinator John Myers, KD8MQ (L) presents President Ralph, K8HSQ with our renewed Special Service Club Certificate. March Mentoring Class
(UPDATED) (Mar 7, 2015) - - - Continuing on the current theme of kit building and fox hunting, the March Mentoring Class covered the construction of a Tape Measure Beam for Fox Hunting. The class was held at the Massillon Senior Center on Saturday, March 7th. This months Mentor was Dan Anastas, N8DZM our resident Fox Hunter. A kit of parts needed to construct the Tape Measure Beam was provided for $13.00. Dan coached the builders on the construction of the beam antenna providing some theory on its design and operation. This will continue in our April Mentoring Class which will be on learning how to Fox Hunt and will give you a chance to use both your Attenuator and Tape Measure Beam. This class will be held on Saturday, April 11th also at the Massillon Senior Center. Additional details will follow. Our thanks to club member John, N8CD for the great pictures !.
Mentor Dan, N8DZM oversees our beam builders
Wade, WD8MIU put the final touches on his new DF beam
Dan (R) checks the final DF Beam for Thomas, KC8ZEH
Another successful Mentoring Session ! February Mentoring Class Info
John began with the basics of soldering, a skill all radio operators should have. This included proper safety techniques, the theory of how an attenuator works and testing out the kit when completed. Approximately 10 club members took part in this session including builders and mentors. John's program included an excellent powerpoint presentation following step by step help and guidance in building the K0OV kit from Marvin West, KE6HTS. The kit included a great looking case from the famous Altoids Mint Tin. Everyone had a fun time during this mentoring session and learned a lot. We especially want to thank John, N8CD for the time he spent preparing this training session including the individual help he and his mentors provided the members. Everyone's kit went together fine and all worked ! Our March and April Mentoring Sessions will continue this theme as we build the famous Tape-Measure Beam used for DX'ing and some actual field training during April. John has made available the powerpoint presentation for those who missed the training. You can view it by clicking the following link. http://bit.ly/marc-kit Some pictures of the event are posted below...
The members enjoyed a great presentation
The build station with lots of help provided ! Proper Station Grounding Class
(Jan 18, 2015) - - The clubs first Mentoring Program was held on Saturday, Jan 17th with about 20 members and guests in attendance. The class was held at the Massillon Senior Center. This months Mentor was James Andrews, KD8VT and the class covered proper station grounding for your shack. The training included a very informative powerpoint presentation and lecture from James. The attendees learned the basics of station grounding including lightning protection for your equipment and tower installations. James also included some show & tell on various types of coax and hard line usage. The club provided coffee and donuts for the morning. Thanks also to James XYL who brought an assortment of cookie's and cupcakes. The presentation was excellent and well received by everyone. James also will provide a copy of the powerpoint that will be posted to the club's website for those who couldn't attend.
Our first Mentoring Class was well received by the attendee's A Bit of Repeater History !
Click here to read the full story. Since 1927, the Massillon Amateur Radio Club has been a diverse radio hobbyist club that is currently over 80 members strong. Active within our community as well as an ARRL Special Service Club, we are actively involved in many facets of Amateur Radio, including Public Service, Membership, Field Day, Repeaters, Amateur Television (ATV), Skywarn plus many other interests. You are welcome to join us at our monthly club meetings held on the first Friday of each month at 8:00 PM at the Massillon Senior Citizens Center, located at 39 Lincoln Way West, Massillon, Ohio 44647. We usually monitor the club's 147.18 repeater, give us a call and we'll guide you in ! MARC owns and operates repeaters
in the 2 meter and 70 centimeter bands. Our annual Hamfest
is held at the Massillon Boy's & Girls Club in Massillon. We have a large indoor
hamfest area, as well as ample outdoor parking. The prizes are
some of the best you'll find at any area hamfest and the bargains
are many.
Reach us at truss@sssnet.com Number of Contacts with this site
Counter Courtesy of digits.net This page was last updated on 08/11/18 Site best viewed in 800 x 600 Resolution 2018 MARC
ARES®, Amateur Radio Emergency Service and the ARES logo are registered trademarks of the American Radio Relay League, Incorporated and are used by permission. |
Still Interested in looking at our Holiday webpage ? Click Here to have a look !
The MARC is an ARRL Special Service Club
Click Here to download a club membership application
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(July 6, 2018) - - Field Day 2018 is now a fond
memory. The weather cooperated well for the most part. We got a
little "damp" during set-up but it passed and then it got a
little windy and cooler. Although the clouds threatened, the
rain stayed away through the rest of Field Day weekend.
Sunday was a great day !
(June 18, 2018) - - On
Saturday, June 17th the club
participated in the Annual Touch-A-Truck
Day at Buhler's Market parking lot in
Jackson Township. This event allows
children of all ages the opportunity to
experience first hand cars and trucks of
all kinds. Everything from Police and
Fire vehicles to a helicopter and many
more were on display.
(Mar 4, 2017) - - A special thanks to Ohio Section
Manager Scott Yonally, N8SY for the great program at our March
meeting. Lots of interesting news going on here in the Ohio
Section and a nice review of what to expect from the League at
this years Dayton Hamvention.
(Feb 21, 2016) - - Our scheduled March program was to
have been presented by club member Don Wade, W8DEA on his recent
FEMA assignment. Due to scheduling difficulties, this program
will have to be postponed until later this year.
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As
a club member, not only will you have access to the autopatches
on our 2m and 70 cm repeaters, but you will also receive a monthly
subscription to our newsletter, 
The
club owns an emergency response 
