Whether you are new to SCARS, new to amateur radio, or you have been around for decades, welcome to SCARS, and thank you for your membership.
Meetings
SCARS has meetings daily, weekly, monthly, and periodically. We meet in person, on-the-air, and electronically. All of the detailed information is available on the https://w5nor.org/meetings/ page.
Events
SCARS members have access to a great number of amateur radio events throughout the year. The https://w5nor.org/events/ web page has a great number of these events listed.
SCARS has a very active presence on Facebook, and we encourage you to join us at https://w5nor.org/facebook/ for 24×7 information.
Contact Us
There are many ways to contact SCARS. Emailing [email protected] is usually the way to start. However, there are more contact methods at https://w5nor.org/contact/.
ARRL Membership
The American Radio Relay League (ARRL) is the national association for amateur radio. It serves as our national voice, whether lobbying for frequency spectrum in Washington, supplying magazines, or books, or other media, or by helping a member with a licensing question. All of this for an annual membership of only $49. You can join or renew ARRL by visiting https://arrl.org/join/. We encourage your membership in the ARRL.
Elmer Nights
A great way for you to get involved with the club and amateur radio is to visit our weekly Zoom Elmer Nights on Tuesdays. We meet at 6:30 pm on Zoom at https://w5nor.org/zoom/. All of the details are on our https://w5nor.org/elmernights/ page.
Website
This SCARS website has a lot of information and we would like to help you use it better. At the top-right of the page is a small ‘looking glass’ icon that you can use to search the site. At the very top of the page are the icons to go to our social media systems. Below that, and at the right are a pair of menu options that let you look for something. When you view this on a mobile device, a ‘hamburger menu’ (three horizontal bars) appears and you will find the search and menu items there. And, the topics below have a bunch of links to information on the website.
Antenna Building
One of the first tasks that hams usually start with is to increase their antenna systems. Our tape measure antenna kits are a great way to start. When you want to really start building, take a look at our antenna page.
Digital Mobile Radio (DMR)
DMR is one of the easier and cheaper ways to expand your amateur radio efforts. Using a small hand-held radio, you can connect through repeaters to hams all over the world. Our Oklahoma DMR page will help you make sense out of this mode.
Codeplugs (Radio Programming)
Most of the newer handheld or mobile amateur radios are programmed using a Windows-based computer. The configuration files used to make this happen are called Codeplugs. Our Codeplugs page will help you find the information that you need to program your radios.
New Radio Credit
To help our new SCARS members get into the hobby, we offer either a $25 Baofeng handheld radio or a $25 credit on the $75 GD-77 DMR radio. More information is available on the New Radio Credit page, or contact the treasurer for more details if you are a new SCARS member.
Membership Listing
As a member, you receive access to the online SCARS membership list. This list is updated monthly, around the middle of the month, and is available in Excel’s (xlsx) format and Adobe’s PDF format on the https://w5nor.org/membership/ page.
We restrict the membership list to SCARS members by using a username and a password. These credentials were emailed to you and are available by contacting any SCARS officer or emailing [email protected].
If you need to update your contact information, please send an email to [email protected].
Radio Etiquette
Since radio waves are shared between all of humanity, it is important to mind your P’s and Q’s when operating a radio. Hundreds of people may be listening to your signal and you will want to follow the norms of your hobby. We have created a web page to give you some guidelines for proper on-the-air operation.
Secret Handshake
While there is no SCARS secret handshake, our hobby, like most technical operations, is full of slang, lingo, and codes that are known only to those that have been around for a while. To help you learn some of these we have created:
Learn Morse Code
If you want to learn how to use the CW mode, you will need to learn Morse Code. Sign up for our online email reminder system that will help you learn Morse Code.
Weekly Newsletter
We will add the email address that you provided to our weekly newsletter distribution list. If you wish to add an additional email address, you can do that at https://w5nor.org/email/.
73, and thank you for being a part of our community.