Last edit: 12/2/2025 by N5RWK
November 2025 Announcements
Reminder - there are no club meetings in November and December due to the holidays.
Our next gathering will be on Saturday, January 10 for our annual luncheon. The venue will be the Sealand Seafood and Steak Restaurant, 2201 Hwy 290 East in Brenham. We'll be in the private room, and the event will start at 1 pm and conclude by 4 pm. Please RSVP via the club reflector so we will have an accurate head count. All are welcome!
Thanks to some great detective work by Ray Chislett, internet service at the Bellville Tower has been restored. Consequently, the club's XLX server is operational again. If you are using a hotspot and YSF, make sure to do an update of your Pi-Star so the server will appear in the list (87708).
Club meetings are always held on the lAST Wednesday of the month (except for Nov & Dec)
JOIN THE CLUB!
New members are always welcome! You don't need to be a radio expert, all you need is to have an interest in radio communications. For your convenience, you can complete the following application form and mail it to the address above, or bring it to the next club meeting.
Upcoming, Current and Past Events:
Annual Club Luncheon at Sealand Seafood & Steak in Brenham - Saturday January 10, 1-4 pm
Emergency Management Frequencies and Nets:
This page has some good info for Harris County and the surrounding region: https://stxd14ares.org/frequencies/
The UHF antenna at 270' on the Bellville tower become inoperable a few weeks back. This also caused the 100W amplifier to fail. Consequently, we are now using a UHF antenna at 208', and the amplifier has been replaced. Thanks and a tip of the hat to Dan White, who was able to locate a replacement amp on eBay. The issue with no audio coming to UHF from analog VHF transmissions has been resolved.
The
Bellville repeater system (C4FM on UHF and Analog on VHF) is connected to our XLX979 multiprotocol server on the internet. This
allows DMR and Yaesu System Fusion users to communicate on the repeater system via a
hotspot with an internet connection. Hotspots are a
small, inexpensive transceiver typically based on a Raspberry Pi with
an RF board running the Pi-Star software, and connects to the internet usually with a wifi
connection. For an overview and some basic instructions on how to
set up a hotspot see this PDF file.
You can also connect to the club repeater through the internet without a radio! You'll need a computer running the BlueDV software (https://www.pa7lim.nl/bluedv/), as well as a USB AMBE3000 vocoder dongle such as the DVMega DVStick 30 or the Northwest Digital Radio ThumbDV. If you're interested, move details can be provided via the club reflector.
Our group is affiliated with W5YI-VEC for administering tests. If you are a prospective ham, or already a ham looking to upgrade your license, send an email to info at w5sfa.org for information or to schedule your test. Note that the FCC is now charging a $35 fee for new licenses, renewals and vanity calls. License upgrades and changes of address are exempt from this new fee.
Club Officers for 2025-2026:
President: Bev Cucuzza, KB8PRC
Vice-President: Gary Baldwin, KF5ZRT
Secretary/Treasurer: Kathy Croker, KB5ITB
W5SFA Weekly VHF Net:
The Stephen F. Austin Radio Club weekly net meets every Tuesday at 7:00 PM on the Club's Bellville VHF repeater (analog FM) or the UHF repeater (C4FM digital). See the REPEATERS link to the left for frequencies. All licensed hams are welcome to participate.
Net Control Schedule:
1st Tuesday: KF5ZRT Gary
2nd Tuesday: KG5NCL John
3rd Tuesday: KE5FN Jim
4th Tuesday: N5RWK Roger
5th Tuesday (if there is one): N5RWK Roger
.
Stephen F. Austin Radio Club List serve (reflector) information:
http://mail.w5sfa.org/mailman/listinfo/w5sfa_w5sfa.org