RAYNET: Eastbourne Half-Marathon

First time back on RAYNET duties since my licence was reinstated, and it was a pretty easy ride. I was on checkpoint with two long-standing friends, who brought their motorhome for extra comfort. We got there for a 9:30 kick-off, and got our runners' numbers posted by lunchtime - which resulted in us being able to stand down half an hour early! We pretty much took it in turns to do the talking, and I called in with the leading female runner's number.

I also drove around to see Dick Jeffries (Group Controller) on a checkpoint near ours, and dropped in on the main control station at which I met some of the other current RAYNET members, some new, some familiar. The control station has been upgraded since I was last about, and rather than a caravan, it's now a purpose-built box-trailer which looks really well fitted out inside with whiteboards and information charts the like.

I'm certainly looking forward to getting involved again, and hopefully (as I'm old enough now!) some training as well :-)

First Contact... (again)

Since my last post, I have made my first contact with my restored licence! I took part in the SARS 2m net on Thursday evening, which happens to start at the same time I finish teaching that evening. I walked home with my Yaesu VX-1 in hand and managed to get a break in to reintroduce myself and have a chat. Although I could hear everyone, not everyone could hear me (not surprising on half a watt in a built-up area on foot!) - but it was very satisfying nonetheless.

My local RAYNET controller has also been back in touch - and the group will be covering the local half-marathon. He invited us new and returning members to join in, and be placed with one of the more experienced teams. I replied, indicating my interest, and have been placed with two people I already know from SARS and who I get on with very well.

It's all 'go' now - and I can't wait to get back working as part of RAYNET :-)

Honey, I'm Hooooooome!!!

Checked the Ofcom website at lunchtime - and they've re-instated my licence! :-) Whoop whoop! Same old callsign, new 3-page licence and 20 pages of T&Cs to print out.

Time to get myself a new hoodie printed methinks!

A bright future?

I'm back on the committee at the radio club for the first time in some years, and while I went to the meeting with some trepidation - I came out of it smiling. While there are a number of new faces, some of which weren't even members when I was last about, the Chairman outlined a very positive way forward for the coming year and everyone seems pretty keen to work together to restore the club to its glory days.

As I'd requested before the meeting, I was given 5 minutes or so (which, with discussion, turned into a bit more than that!) to bring everyone up-to-date with my current skill-set and outline what I felt I could bring to the table as a returning member of SARS, and as a member of the committee. Some of my ideas invoked discussion and we went rather over the 5 minutes - but it was almost all positive (including my proposal that we consider moving the club magazine over to a more blind-compliant digital format from the one it's currently presented in) so I'm now pretty optimistic about the coming year.

I was also able to make a number of offers and suggestions with regards to some of the other matters discussed, such as sourcing QSL cards, club publicity, and filling the vacant October slot on the club meeting/talks list. I've also offered to donate one of my very old laptops to the club once I've decommissioned it as a server. It's got a floppy drive and a serial port, and so should be great for all their old software used for contest logging etc. I have to check however whether it has a DVD drive, as one of the other things they'd need it for is for showing videos at meetings. I'm sure I can sort something out!

All that said and done - I came out of the meeting feeling like I'd returned to a big group of old friends, which was lovely. I think we could be in for a good year as far as SARS is concerned, and I'm really hoping that we can do a lot to expand our membership this year. Our treasurer also happens to be the membership secretary for my local branch of RAYNET - and gladly took my forms and subs before I left. It certainly looks like we could have good times ahead!

Methinks it is webware time

I went on an SQL course back in May-ish 2009, and have been looking for a project to make good use of it on. I've messed about a bit with creating a "caught/seen/failed" Pokédex, but haven't done anything really useful so far.

So - with getting back on the air (and subject to whatever the rules are now - should be made available to me at the same time as my licence is re-instated) I'm thinking that I might write myself some logging webware which also generates RSS feeds, stats, and so on. I'd then test it out for a bit, maybe put out a Beta, then release it for free (or ad-supported) download.

I'm going to start off with basic call-logging, then hopefully build in other tables to take care of callsign-locating etc. and additional queries for "busiest day of the week", "busiest time of day" and the like. Anyone interested or want to suggest any features? :-)

It's on it's way!

I'm sitting here with a big grin on my face at the moment. I've just got off the phone with Ofcom again (who must be getting sick of me already!), they've confirmed that they've received my paper application and that my licence should be re-issued by early next week! I can also keep an eye on their website, where it will appear in the listings on my account and I can print it out as soon as it has been approved.

With my licence re-issue now being processed and the Icom batteries appearing to charge pretty well - I'm a happy bunny today :-)

And now? We wait...

This is the most frustrating part - I've had the form, turned it around, and sent it back to Ofcom. The weather won't be helping with the postal service nor the staffing levels at Ofcom, and so now all I can do is wait. Their estimate over the phone was 'a week from posting', whereas their website says to allow two weeks. I'm not mouthing off about the admin or anything like that - I'm just keen to get back on the air!

I posted the form back first-class on Monday afternoon. I'd hoped that it would have arrived on Tuesday - but I called today (Weds) and the woman said that they've no record of it yet, although it could possibly be with the colleague who's off today. While I was a little disappointed, I'm not worried yet. :-)

In other news, I've recovered a couple of handheld radios out of some drawers at my Dad's QTH - one of which was the Icom he used to lend me to use while I was out with RAYNET. I helped at the move of the Belle Toute Lighthouse with that little set! I say "little set" - by today's standards the thing is a brick - but it's a brick which brings back a lot of memories for me. Good times :-)

I'm trickle charging the 2 battery packs (which barely made my multimeter flicker when I checked them) and I'm investigating the 3rd, which is marked up as a dud needing refurb. Through the course of this evening, the primary unit has gone from 0.2v to about 3½v - so by morning I hope to have it registering a lot closer to 12v. I'd like to bung the secondary pack on charge in the morning - but as I'm teaching (web design), I figured it'd be safer to wait until I got back and to do it overnight, same as the primary.

I'm really hoping that the batteries hold a charge well enough on the Icom! The tiny set (different unit) has a proprietry battery which is very difficult to get hold of nowadays, so I'm having to run it off an old phone charger until we can source a new battery.