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#Post#: 5835--------------------------------------------------
TGIF Net Transcription - 2026-03-27
DIR By: VE3RD
Date: March 28, 2026, 6:54 am
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W2SHR: Good evening, and welcome to the TGIF Amateur Radio Net
for Friday, March 27, 2026.
My name is Steve, my call sign is W2SHR, and my QTH is Kill
Devil Hills, North Carolina,
which is located in the Outer Banks. I'm just down the road from
the Wright Brothers Memorial and First Flight Field.
We meet here every Friday at 8:30 p.m. Eastern Time on talk
group 31665, "The Mothership,"
and we chat about a chosen subject and anything else that is
related to amateur radio.
Tonight, we'll discuss how we've overcome the antenna
limitations caused by living in
a highway, an apartment, a condo, a townhouse, or just the
limitations that are put on us
by a spouse who hates the look of an antenna.
During this net, emergency traffic will be indicated by a triple
break, and that of course
will be accepted at any time during the net. At that point, all
transmission will cease
until the emergency is resolved.
Please remember that this is a directed net, so only transmit
when directed to by net control.
When you check in, could you do me a favor? Give me your call
sign normally and phonetically.
For example, I'd log in saying, "Whiskey Two Sierra Hotel Romeo,
W2SHR."
This way, I make fewer mistakes, and I have time to enter you
into my logging software.
Also, let's not tailgate. This, I believe, has been an issue
recently.
Try to leave a second in between transmissions because you know
it will lock that other person
out. They will think they have been logged in when they haven't,
and I know even with myself,
I've gotten frustrated when it takes me three times to get into
the net.
With all that taken care of, do we have any stations with
announcements, news, or important
information for the net? If we do, I'd like you to key your mic
now.
NT4M: Yeah, I do have a little bit of an announcement.
It's all yours.
Thank you, sir, and good evening, everybody. Just a short one. I
want to let everybody know
that Group 117 will be reopening, and it's open for everybody.
Anybody that wants to go in
and discuss MeshTastic, HF, and any other topic, we're working
on it. So, if you guys have
any questions about this new MeshTastic stuff that's been going
around, we are working on
Group 117, and everybody is welcome. Thank you, and back to
NetControl, NT4M.
WB3IHY: I don't mind it at all. I mean, I'm not sure if you were
concerned because
you know that I'm currently running for HOA board. And if any of
you voted for me, I will
come over and beat you on the head. I believe it could be
possibly one of the stupidest
things I've ever done and I hope I lose. ... But in the state of
North Carolina, it's pretty
hard not to have an HOA ... I will tell you, I want to open this
for everybody else, but
I did see some stuff on YouTube. I'm not plugging Chameleon
Antenna, but chameleonantenna.com,
it has published a brochure of ways to beat HOAs, whether it's a
flowerpot antenna,
a flagpole antenna, whatever, and I believe it is free for the
asking. ...
Notwithstanding. And, Mike, I understand that circumstances do
change ...
Don't fight the HOA. Become the HOA. That's a strategy.
KF5DIV: Well, I'll tell you how I got around it. I own a tire
shop and that's where
all my ham radio equipment is located. So it's not at the house,
and it's not around the
HOA for anybody else except who I work with and my customers.
And that's just the way
I get away with it, I guess. KF5DIV, back to you.
NP4M: Well, not too long ago, I was discussing the same theme,
same topic with Doc,
and there are many things that can be done about it... You can
make a flower pot. You can
use a tree. You can use the gutter antenna. In the attic, you
can hide a dipole inside
of the attic. Vertical, using a tree, make a vertical. So many
things that you've just
got to want to. Get creative.
One behind. This one is a good one. That thin wire, I made an
antenna out of a very,
very thin welding wire. And when you put it up in the air, man,
you cannot see it.
It's invisible.
N9RUT: Say good evening, everyone. What I did, we live in the
HOA, and I had my
ICOM 7300 in a box for like two years, and one day I decided,
you know what, I'm going
to figure something out where I can put me an antenna up. So
what I did, I looked outside,
I had some speaker wire, and I just made a dipole out of speaker
wire, and it talks all
over the world. I only get three bands out of it, but at least I
got to 10-meter and 12
and 15. I can tune that up pretty good, so it works out pretty
good for me. Back to net.
W3ATN: You know, this isn't getting around it so much as
ignoring it. I'm in a place
that has admittedly a mild HOA... I took gray PVC, reinforced it
with a dowel, got a
two-foot high pipe, and strapped it onto the gable. So it's just
this nondescript little
pipe sticking up. And then I ran an EFHW antenna 110 feet out to
a shed... It's just
14-gauge gray insulated wire, and you can't even see it. ...
Against the sky with the
gray insulation on it, you can't even see it. ... Our HOA is
kind of lax. They allow
Yagi TV antennas. W3ATN, back to net.
WB3GTM: Good evening, Steve. Good evening, everyone on the net.
This is WB3GTM.
I don't really have any restrictions, per se. And I kind of
agree with what Joe said earlier...
Things change. ... There's a lot of portable possibilities.
BuddyPole, StepIR motorized
antennas... DX Engineering sells an antenna wire called Stealth
Wire... Some people operate
off their gutters... just a few ideas. I'm sure there's a lot
more out there.
WB3GTM back to you, Steve.
K8XWA: Yeah, this is Rookie. November 8 X-Ray Whiskey Alpha.
Yeah, first name is Rookie.
Thank you.
KR4CDG (Shell): Yes, this is Shell. Kilo Romeo 4 Charlie Delta
Golf. I'm using my
husband's radio, so it's probably coming up under his name as
well, Joey.
W2SHR (Net Control - various): (Multiple segments including
check-in handling,
topic introduction, reminders about silent keys KF6F and Mitch
Savage EA7KDO, thanks to
team members, etc.)
Closing Remarks
W2SHR: To everybody who's still here on the net, thank you for
investing your time.
We try to do our best for you, and we really, really appreciate
you being here, and especially
your input on the topic of the evening.
Don't forget, by the way, that your ideas help to shape this
net. So if you've got ideas
for future topics, please share them with them. We are not
offended. We're very, very thankful.
And we'll try to keep this net fun, informative, and enjoyable
for everybody.
Thank you for joining the net this evening. We appreciate your
time invested. And you are
the best groups of hams on DMR, that's for sure.
My name is Steve. My call sign's Whiskey Two Sierra Hotel Romeo.
I am going to be signing
off from the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Join us again next
Friday night at 8:30 p.m.
Eastern on Talk Group 31665.
This is the end of our net for tonight, Friday, March 27th.
Let's return the Mothership
Talk Group 31665 back for worldwide amateur radio usage.
73 to everyone. God bless, and thank God it's Friday.
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