COLORADO CONNECTION NEWS
By: Paul Shackelford WBØQMR
Colorado Connection News
08/09/2009
The
tech committee has been very busy the last month. The following site visits have taken place in July.
On
July 5th John (WØIG) and Dave (KAØYDW) went to the Grand Junction
repeater site and replaced the antenna which had been damaged by weather and
repaired the power amplifier. The
repeater is working much better now.
On
July 12th John, Dave and Jon King (WØPDK) went to the Salida
repeater site. They removed the second
old dish and cut them up to fit in Dave’s truck along with tower and other
misc. junk. They inspected the
building, paint and roof sealing. All survived the winter in good shape. They then went to The Breckenridge site and
did some antenna work.
On
July 17th John (NØWBW), Mike
(K7PFJ), Scott (WØKVA) and Wayne (NØPOH) went to the Denver repeater site on
Mt. Thorodin which is shared with other ham groups and many commercial
users. They removed the UHF antenna
systems feeding the 4 UHF repeaters at the site, added a single transmit antenna and combiner system along with a
receive multi-coupler system to alleviate the overload between systems when in
transmit. This solved many issues at the site and gave us much more flexibility
when adding additional transmitters without intermod. Some of the parts were donated by Scott (WØKU).
On
July 19th John, Dave, Sandy (KCØNYI), Kent (KØTKM) and Gail (KCØYGL) returned to the Breckenridge
repeater and replaced some antenna leads and tuned the repeater. It is working MUCH better now.
We
at The Connection would like to thank all of you volunteers and donors for all
of your hard work and donations.
Without you, one of the best linked repeater systems in the country
could not survive.
With
the tough economic times these days The Connection is experiencing fewer
donations as of late. So anything you
can do in the way of cash, sellable
equipment, grant leads or requests or volunteer work will be greatly
appreciated. Please contact us at kb0vjj@colcon.org or John (WØIG) at HRO
1-800-444-9476.
73
From
The Colorado Connection Board Of Directors
N5EHP John
NØUQF Linda
KBØNWM Bill
NØPEO Dave
WBØQMR Paul
kb0vjj@colcon.org
Repeater Coverage Maps
Thanks to Chuck Kimball (NØNHJ) for generating some repeater coverage maps of the various Connection repeaters. These
maps are reasonably accurate, but are somewhat conservative when you consider
using a high powered mobile radio. Statewide
coverage is shown here. As you can see, the Connection has a long way to go
before reaching our goal of 90-100% coverage for Colorado. Keep your donations
coming and we'll get there!
We've begun offering other amateur organizations the use of our voice
controller. If you have a message you'd like to announce statewide, contact one
of our board members. Operating on our low budget, we'd be more than happy to
put a voice announcement on the controller about your upcoming hamfest in
exchange for a couple of tables and admission for our volunteers. There is a
limitation of ten seconds, but it's remarkable how much you can say in ten
seconds.
We Need Your Help!
The Connection needs your help! Please send your contributions to help
defray the cost of keeping the Colorado Connection operational.
For those of you unfamiliar with the Connection, explore our website.
Remember, the Connection is strictly a volunteer organization. We aren't a club
and don't have dues. We survive only through the donations of the system users.
Send your contributions to
Colorado Connection Repeaters, Inc. at P.O. Box 22134, Denver, CO 80222.
Thanks!
Updating This Page
We'll try to update these pages frequently. If you'd like to make an
announcement, send E-Mail to the Colorado Connection Webmaster. Your request will be passed
along to the Board of Directors.
(c) Copyright 1996-1999, Colorado
Connection Repeaters, Inc.
P.O. Box 22134, Denver, Colorado 80222
