Welcome to the Wonderful World of Amateur Radio!

Local clubs offer Ham Radio Course

Would you like to talk to astronauts in the International Space Station?  Make friends around the world?  Build electronic projects?  Assist your community in times of disaster?  Keep in touch when traveling off the beaten path?  If so, then welcome to wonderful world of Amateur Radio!

Round Island 2018
Upper Canard resident Fred Archibald operating his portable station from the remote Round Island in the Aleutian Islands chain off Alaska in the summer of 2018.

Amateur Radio operators, also known as “hams”, are licensed by the Federal Government to communicate with similarly authorized enthusiasts in almost every country in the world.  They come from all walks of life – from the teenager next door, to people you know at work, to Nobel Prize winning scientists, astronauts, and famous entertainers.  They all share a love for the magic of radio!

Continue reading

Signals from space – Annapolis Royal students learn amateur radio for June launch

©Lawrence Powell

ANNAPOLIS ROYAL – Al Penney can bounce radio signals off the moon, but right now he’s working with high school students who want to send live video back to Earth from the edge of space.

Annapolis West Education Centre student Abigail Bonnington holds a video camera hardly bigger than a sugar cube. It’s attached to a small transmitter that will send signal to a laptop.

It stopped working and now Penney and Bonnington are troubleshooting. It has to be operational or replaced by sometime in June when the Annapolis Royal Space Agency launches its second ‘package’ deep into the stratosphere – 30 or 40 kilometres up.

Penney is with the Annapolis Valley Amateur Radio Club and has been working with the students since the fall.

Read the full story in the Annapolis County Spectator

 
 

AWEC Antenna Class

Amateur Radio antenna class for students from the Annapolis West Education Centre in Annapolis Royal. We covered the theory of transmissions lines and antennas first, then made some practical measurements, and finally went outside to set up a portable HF station. With 100 watts from a battery-powered transceiver and a simple dipole antenna, we worked stations all over Europe and North America.

[gallery_bank type=”images” format=”masonry” title=”false” desc=”false” responsive=”true” display=”all” sort_by=”random” special_effect=”none” animation_effect=”bounce” album_title=”true” album_id=”8″]