12/25/2024
St. Petersburg Amateur Radio Club
The site behind the DMI Research building where the SPARC station is located is being prepared for the tower. Click on photos to enlarge.
Next step is getting the dirt out that is in the way of the concrete (a.k.a. a BIG hole is needed). White paint marks the spot! The hole will be dug near the building foundation. The tower base will be angled to allow folding over with clearance for the fence and A/C units. John, KI4UIP reports the … Click for more
Today (12/29/2015), several SPARC members met at the SPARC Clubhouse to work on several 
projects to help with contesting and other activities at the W4GAC station. Bob N2ESP, John KI4UIP, Dave KR4U, Ron KP2N and Tom NY4I worked on various projects that needed to be done for this weekend’s ARRL RTTY contest. While John, Dave and Bob wrestled the Cushcraft R7 antenna into position outside and ran coax, the rest of us worked on tweaking the Elecraft K3 to work on RTTY FSK mode. For a reason that would … Click for more
In order to promote our club, SPARC “eyeball” QSL cards are available free to members. These cards are business card size versions of our world famous W4GAC QSL cards, and feature our web address and Mr. Sun on the reverse side.
Carry a few in your wallet or in your car. When asked about the world’s greatest hobby, simply hand out a card. Personalizing the card with your name and call is encouraged.
Cards are available at all club meetings.
September is the middle of hurricane season. In an effort to make sure that your handheld and mobile transceivers are in good operational shape. SPARC will be available to test your HT and/or (uninstalled) mobile rig on TBD at the club station. HF, VHF & UHF radios can be accommodated.
Our radio gurus, will setup their service monitors and our spectrum analyzer to checkout your transceivers. Be sure the battery is fully charge and the rig works.
The station crew invites you to stop by the station on Saturday August 29 at 10:00AM to help reorganize (read clean) the station and storage areas. We will break for lunch and then convene the SPARC Executive Board meeting at 2:00PM. All are welcome.
On Friday, June 12, four of us met down at the station for lunch and then to work on the K3. The K3 that the club uses is a radio that was used in the WRTC-2014 contest held in New England last summer. As contest radios don’t really need a second receiver or a digital voice recorder (DVR), this K3 was not fitted with these options. As we also like to DX with the radios at SPARC, NY4I procured the parts for the radio to add the second receiver, upgrade … Click for more