Sked:// A meeting or event that has been 'scheduled' for a specific or regular time.
I have a number of regular skeds with other radio amateurs on a regular basis at set times.
The Monday Net
The Monday Net is held on either 40m (during the summer months) and 80m (during the winter months).
It initially started with myself and Peter Hulthe (SM6KFY) as a CW sked. In the early days we were running up to three skeds per week and were running exclusively CW. Our first contact was on the 22nd April 1993 and we run CW continually until around the middle of the year 2000. After that we turned to a mixture of PSK 31 and CW and contacts slowed to a stop in 2012.
In 2014 my good friend Steve came on the air as M6NBT (now 2E0MMY) and my interest in ham radio was kindled again. In that year a contact with Peter SM6KFY was re-established but the regular sked didn't get going until April 2016 - experimenting with a number of digital modes including PSK 31, BPSK 63 and Thor 11 amongst others.
Steve joined the net on a regular basis from July of 2017 with SA7CND - Poul, joining us in May of 2018. Since then we have been running Thor 11 in our skeds pretty much every Monday morning (7am UK local time) for around an hour. On Christmas eve of 2021 Hanspeter (HB9BFM) joined us for the first time from Switzerland and has been with us ever since.
Listen out for us on 3.585 or 7.045 with Thor 11
CW Nets
VARC beginners net
At present the VARC CW net is held on a Sunday evening at 20.30 local time on 50.040. The coverage is mainly aimed at the St Albans and surrounding area, although I am out nearer Luton. The intention is to encourage other club members to join in a 'slow' rag chew style of QSO. All are welcome and we are very happy to run slower speeds if necessary (just send QRS). For this I run a straight key with the intention of trying for high accuracy sending.
High Speed Practice
On a Friday morning (07.00) I run a regular sked with Poul SA7CND (part of the Monday Net above) to try to improve our speed in sending and receiving. For that I use a paddle key type and run around 23 to 25 wpm. In the past I have run up to 30wpm, but after a short time at that speed my sending becomes more erratic than usual!
Slow Speed Practice
Steve 2E0MMY is learning CW and has a regular sked with Poul also but on a Thursday morning. There is talk of us (as in me and Steve) running slow CW on a Wednesday morning - so maybe worth a listen out for that!
G3UDI
While up at the DDRC rally that was held back in May this year (2022) I ended up chatting with Bob G3UDI. He was very interesting to talk to and was learning CW himself, so I suggested that we could have some QSOs. Recently we have had some good long chats on 80m, so would be good to keep that a regular sked too?
CW is my favourite mode - so if you would like to organise a sked, then I would be most happy to oblige!