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RMVHF+ Home Page
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State of the Net 2009 Dave W6OAL Wishing everyone a Very Happy and Prosperous New year. Our Rocky Mountain VHF+ Net is alive and well. We can boast a roster of some 250 members and we are averaging approximately 30 check-ins every Monday evening. We found, in the early Winter months of last year that the cacophony of calls received by a Net Control Station on his first call for check-ins was something we had to address. When ten stations call in at once only about three can be acknowledged leading to repeats and lost net time. Many nets have a call up roster but in our case this just would not work, so the next best approach would be an alphabetized group call up for check-ins (A-F, G-L, M-R, and S-Z). The Net Control Stations preamble has been modified to reflect this change in procedure and seems to be working quite well, relieving the congestion and waste of net time asking for repeats. Something else we have implemented since we are a ‘service’ net is to have the Net Control Stations, in addition to asking, at the top of the net, for announcements to also ask for any Emergency Traffic and Mobiles that wish to check in. Our Winters are at least 6 months long and some of the weather we receive can be fairly sever at times. Since we are known far and wide, we might be the only hope for a stranded motorist or party in distress as we can cover areas where cell phones may not. Our ‘newbie’ (first time check-in‘s) letter has been received quite well by our new members. And, it is revised on the order of about 4 times a year to reflect any changes in net operations and activities. Our web site rmvhf@rmvhf.org is being kept up the date, thanks to the efforts of Tim - KAØMWA and Wayne - NØPOH. A net roster has been generated and is available from both Wayne - NØPOH and Doug - W7IJN. Our propagation beacons continue operation; 144.282, 222.055, 432 360 and 1296.225 in South Park (DM79CH) which is the approximate geographical center of Colorado. The cabin at 9500’ near Como/Jefferson, CO in which the beacons reside has been provided by Ken - WØETT and engineering by Dave - W6OAL. Our 33 cm beacon (903.075) has been relocated to Fort Collins, space and engineering auspices of Art - WØBA. Our ‘activity nights’ have continued to flourish at 8 PM local time; Tuesday - 222.1, Wednesday - 432.1, Thursday - 1296.1 and Fridays, a conglomeration of 903.1, and 3456.1, Saturdays has been dedicated to 2304.1. It’s been gratifying to see so much interest in 70 cm as we have had up to 16 people stopping by some Wednesday nights. Our own awards/certificate program continues with a requirement of as little as 10 contacts made in any ARRL or CQ sponsored contest to qualify for a very nice certificate. Certificates are produced by Wayne - NØPOH and Joan - KBØYRX, logs are checked by Ken - WØETT and mailings by Dave - W6OAL. We have a welcoming table at all the local hamfests with Dave - WØEDM manning the table and creating a ‘rogues gallery’ of photos of members as they stop by to meet and greet the net control operators and others of the net. We welcome suggestions from the membership on how we might improve or change our net procedures and operation to better service our members.
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