It is with great sadness that we announce the recent and unexpectedly sudden passing of Steve Stebbing, VK2AAV.

Steve was a committed Amateur and good friend to many. His work in Radio and Electronics spanned many decades. As a long-term member of the Hornsby and Districts Amateur Radio Club, he was a regular presenter, challenging us all to learn and refine our electronics skills. In 2024, he stepped up to become President of HADARC and ran the Club with new and interesting topics.

More recently, Steve applied his passion of engineering to design LORA and Meshtastic networks. In the past year Steve also designed online access to the HADARC Repeater for power management and enjoyed time on 6 meters and 2 Meter bands.

Steve will be dearly missed by many Amateurs.

Funeral Service: Friday 8th August @ 1PM in St. James Church, Turramurra – If attending contact Matt VK2BAI (0401 992 430) to allow for catering requirments. Live streaming is planned. Details later.

Just a reminder that this year's Christmas in July will be held at Magpies Waitara from 18:00 (6pm) on Tuesday 8th of July 2025 in lieu of the usual mid-monthly meeting.

On Saturday 26th April, HADARC will be operating the special event callsign VK2IMD to celebrate International Marconi Day.

We'll be setting up at our usual place at Golden Jubilee Field in North Wahroona.

We'll be operating on or around 7100kHz starting from 12noon (0200 UTC).

This month’s presentation will be by Matthew Ayres VK2BAI about Radio Repairs, Filters, and How to Cook a Codan. The session will be some lessons, insights and loads of practical help along with Matt’s special spin on things.

This month's presentation is by David Burger VK2CZ who will be delivering an engaging talk on the world of Hardcore Contesting. David will cover various subjects including logging, QSLing, submissions and the "gossip network" - as that is still a mystery for many who do frequent contests!

It is with great sorrow that we announce the passing of Bob Mayer VK2BMU. Bob was a long time and much admired HADARC member.

The funeral is to be held this Friday, 24th of January, at 1PM:

Kellyville Anglican Church, President Road, Kellyville. [Google Maps]

Bob's wife Wendy has said that all HADARC members who would like to attend will be warmly welcomed.

On Tuesday, 26th of November we'll will be holding its final meeting for the year, starting at 8pm at the Mount Colah Community Centre.

Rob VK2DIO will be making a brief introduction to Meshtastic which is a mesh-type routing layer that runs of top of the LORA wireless telemetry protocol.

Walter VK2XWB will be presenting briefly about tuning and servicing some data radios that are used on trains.

Steve VK2AAV will be presenting on how to calculate path-loss between transmitters and receivers; there are some good and easy to use tools available online and Steve will demonstrate two examples: a coverage map for the VK2RNS 2m repeater and also how to make path-loss calculations between two member's stations.

If you'd like to have a go at doing some path-loss calculations for yourself, the online software is here.

HADARC's Christmas Luncheon for members and their partners is to be held at Magpies Club, Waitara on Saturday 7th December. Due to the time of year, seating is likely to be very limited so please RSVP ASAP to reserve a spot.

Saturday 23rd November at our usual location of Golden Jubilee Field.

We'll be operating on our usual bands of 6m, 2m, 70cm and hopefully will be on 23cm too for the first time

The contest starts at 12 noon, so we'll be looking to set up from 11am onward. Sausages and other sustenance will be provided.

Some pictures are here.

The team from HADARC had a very successful JOTA this year with many interested youngsters keen to have a try on HF radio.

We put them in contact with other JOTA stations in VK2 and VK4, on 40m and 20m.

There are some pictures from the day here.