About

We generally meet on two Sunday afternoons a month, either in people’s homes or at The Collective Hub in Johnsonville (1/33 Johnsonville Road), with a Christmas Dinner event in December and a BBQ lunch in January replacing regular meetings.  A social group also meets every 4th Tuesday of the month.  Increasingly, we are organising Special Interest Group meetings, to support members with common interests (e.g. DMR hotspots).

Anybody is welcome to attend any of our meetings.

In 2020 we relaunched our trading table after many years of recess.  The first item to be offered “on the table” was Bernard ZL2BD’s well regarded high voltage (5Kv) butterfly capacitor suitable for use with HF magnetic loop antennas.  Thisi kit is no longer available from Branch 50, but will shortly become available from another supplier.   We also now have four books written by members available to purchase for $25 a copy:  Vintage Radio, Magnetic Loop Antennas, Test Equipment, and our comprehensive ZC1 Manual.

In 2018 we inaugurated our monthly “Shed Workshop” events.  These are normally held on the first Sunday of most months from 1pm -3pm in one of our member’s garages.  Come along and get some more hands-on knowledge … whether that is calibrating your multimeter, or finding out about power supply designs, or building an SSB QRP rig or a magnetic loop antennas.   Today these tend to include more practical build sessions.  This might include building a Flowerpot Dualband antenna, a Tape Measure Beam, or a 49er CW transceiver.   Instead of a Shed Workshop, we may also schedule Special Interest Group meetings at the beginning of a month.

Around the middle of the month we hold our regular monthly meeting. We may have a presentation or activity that complements our Shed Workshops, but we normally have some formal club business as well, although we try to keep that to a minimum!   Sometimes we will visit a site of interest.  Once a year, in October, members compete for the Blackwood Cup with their homebrew projects.   The regular monthly meeting  is held at the Collective Community Hub in Johsonville on the third Tuesday of most months (February through November) starting at 7pm.