DAREN of WV News June 12, 2016(.C49)
WA8LLM (304) 679-3470 wa8llm@yahoo.com
WOOD COUNTY EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS, 319 COMMUNICATIONS DR, WAVERLY, WV 26184
www.wc8ec.com or www.wc8ec.org
DAREN News, are articles and information about the Digital Amateur Radio "Emergency" Network of WV, which operates on 145.69 MHz. Anyone having any information about DAREN, or Amateur Radio in general, and would like to share it with others, may send it to WA8LLM @ PKBGWV on 145.69 MHz, or to my E-Mail: wa8llm@yahoo.com. A State Wide DAREN NET is operated every Saturday from 7:00 pm to 10:00 pm, and lately, before and after those hours. The DAREN Net Announcement, showing the MAIN NCS, ALTERNATE NCS, NODEs accessible to both, and the previous week's check-ins, are posted by Thursday on most of the Main county DAREN PBBS'. The DAREN News can also be found on the www.wc8ec.com and www.wc8ec.org websites.
Yesterday four members of Wood County Emergency Communications (WCEC) went to New Martinsville to teach a one day technician radio class, and administer the testing. After the class and testing, and on the way back home, the group stopped by the Wetzel County NODE/PBBS of WETZWV/NMARWV. The station had been off the air for about two years. When we checked the station, the radio was still on, but it was sitting on 145.000 MHz. That was the same problem it had the last time it the station was off the air. The station has a back-up battery, so it shouldn't have lost it's memory. The TNC time was only off by a few minutes, so it's power hasn't been off. Since we planned on stopping at the site, I brought along a spare transceiver to change it out, in case it was off frequency, or dead. I changed out the transceiver, and checked out different paths. The station seems to be working okay now.
Today the WCEC group held a chicken dinner at the Mineral Wells Community Building. Since the community building is only about six miles from the Wirt County NODE/PBBS of WIRTWV/ELIZWV, four members of the group decided to make a trip to the tower site to see why the DAREN station was off the air. When we checked the station, the transceiver was off. The TNC was still powered up and the Remote Receiver for the 147.255 MHz voice repeater was still operational. When I moved the packet transceiver the power came back on so I checked the power connections. I guess it still has a problem, since I just tried to connect to it. The station started to come back to me, but quit transmitting. The power connection must have a high resistance. I still need to make a trip back to that site to change out the two 2 Meter antennas and the UHF Beam. I guess the Wirt County NODE/PBBS will be off the air again for awhile.
There were 31 check-ins to the State Wide DAREN Net this week. Jim Woodford, KC8MLK, who has been participating in the net since February 7, 2004, has completed 600 check-ins. And, Keith Dobbins, N8KLD, who has been participating in the net since May 3, 2008, has completed 150 check-ins. Both of these operators will be receiving their certificates.