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Sunday Morning Breakfast Club
9AM-12PM 2M SSB net starts 9:30AM Learn how to operate our club stations and the logging software ... What project are you going to bring ? See ya there… -- WI2W |
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 Bring your own goodies ! |
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Sunday Morning Breakfast Club
9AM-12PM 2M SSB net starts 9:30AM Learn how to operate our club stations and the logging software ... What project are you going to bring ? See ya there… -- WI2W |
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Bring your own goodies ! |
MONDAY * FLARC "Near and Far" net
From 20:00 (8pm) ET * Come join us |
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Master Control for W2NPT to ISS radio link. [who says we do "wireless"? !! ] L-R: Steve WI2W, Noel W2MSA, Ria N2RJ |
Photo credit: Philip DeVencentis/NorthJersey.com The Record article, by Philip DeVencentis, is very well written and can be accessed at the link below: CLICK HERE Video recording of the ten minutes with the ISS, recorded by Ria N2RJ, can be seen at the YouTube link below: https://youtu.be/ESsD1xES-s0 |
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Save the date... for FLARC's |
| Welcome to the Fair Lawn (NJ) Amateur Radio Club Click on image to get full PDF  |
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The present Fair Lawn Radio Amateur Radio Club (FLARC) organization has a long and glorious history. [see below].
Originally founded in 1956 as the Fair Lawn Radio Club, it was later reorganized in the spring of 1960 and became the Fair Lawn Amateur Radio Club. Thus, this group is one of the oldest radio organizations in Northern New Jersey. It is now North Jersey's fastest growing ham radio club. The club call sign, W2NPT, is held in honor of Frank Leonard - a co-founder of the club.
The organization is a general interest radio organization; but the Fair Lawn Amateur Radio Club (FLARC), during its more than a half century history, has always been dedicated to helping our community and our country when needed in times of crisis. In the early days it was Civil Defense and RACES [Radio Amateur Civilian Emergency Service] - today it is OEM [Office of Emergency Management] and ARES [Amateur Radio Emergency Service] as well as RACES.
The Fair Lawn Amateur Radio Club organization can be considered part of the Borough's available emergency resources. Many of our members are also RACES members and CERT members (Community Emergency Response Team). We are presently hosted by the Fair Lawn Parks & Recreation Department at the Fair Lawn Community Center.
We are one of the few amateur radio organizations in New Jersey that has a permanent location. Our facilities include two large rooms, workbenches, test equipment and five operating positions.
The club station (W2NPT) is equipped with two Flex 6400 Software Defined Radio (SDR) HF stations that can use a high-quality 5-band HF beam and an 80m through 6m vertical antenna.
An additional HF operating position is set up for digital communications, such as FT8 and FT4.
For VHF, we have a 2-meter sideband station with an 11-element beam. The beam antennas are all mounted on a 20-foot tower that is on the roof of the two-story building. We have operating equipment for all three types of VHF digital operation – D-STAR, System Fusion (C4FM) and DMR. We have a VHF repeater that supports analog and DMR communications.
Other equipment includes a 2-meter FM station, 2-meter APRS station, 2-meter packet station, 2-meter/440MHz D-Star station, 220MHz FM station, and a 900MHz station -- with antennas for all. A second tower is also on the roof with a 5-element 6-meter beam. (220MHz and 440MHz beams will be added to this tower in the future.)
Our latest additions are an AREDN mesh network installation operating on 900 MHz, 2.4 GHz and 5.8 GHz.
There is a full test bench with all kinds of test equipment, including a station monitor, oscilloscopes and antenna analyzers. For photos of the various operating positions and the club museum, click here.
With over 100 members, we are actively engaged in a wide variety of amateur radio activities. The club supports the local community by providing communications for public events and emergency response. Field Day in June sees a large group of participants. Our annual auction on the day after Thanksgiving draws sellers and buyers from all over the tristate area. Interest in radio contesting is steadily growing and it offers the ham with more modest home facilities the opportunity to learn from and operate with experienced contesters. We regularly host well-known speakers who educate and inform us on a variety of topics. Our monthly newsletter, The Resonator, is one of the finest club publications around, and it is available for free on this website.
We hope to see you soon at one of our Friday evening gatherings or at an operating event.
Membership is open to any person interested in Amateur Radio, whether licensed or not.
For membership information please send e-mail to w2npt@arrl.net or visit our membership page.
Would you like to get your Amateur Radio License??
We can help! PLEASE contact us for class dates and info --
send an e-mail to w2npt@arrl.net
This newspaper photo, from the Bergen Evening Record in 1957, shows some of the earliest members of the Fair Lawn Radio Club -- some who are still active with us !! Back then, the club was full of high school teenagers - mentored by older hams who taught them electronic basics, operating techniques, contesting and DXing, as well as Morse Code (which at that time was required in addition to the written test to obtain an FCC Amateur Radio license). On the right in the photograph is Lowell Vant Slot, W2DLT (who has not changed his callsign over all these years!)
And below is a certificate issued to Harold Kennedy WA2QPW (now N4GG) which clearly confirms the existence of the Fair Lawn Amateur Radio Club at least in August of 1960. (Webmaster note: I tried all my tricks to remove the flash reflection but have been unable to do that.)
And shown below is the real Harold Kennedy WA2QPW at his home station in 1960 or so ...
We're hoping to have more exciting history and reminiscences of the club from our old-timers. They are sharing memories and working on writing it all up this very moment !
Our Fair Lawn club has been affiliated with the local civil defense (now called OEM) and RACES (still known by that name) for all the years of our existence ... here's a photo (thanks again to Van, W2DLT) from back in 1956 - when there were weekly in-person operating drills and even mobile patrols around town ...
Below is the original WB2RLO QSL card --
