Welcome to BARG!

“Welcome to BARG!”

This is a quick introduction to the Ballarat Amateur Radio Group for new members, also serves as a reminder to existing members.

BARG

There is evidence of a Ballarat Amateur Radio society being in existence over 100 years ago.

The current organisation can continuously trace it’s incarnation back to the early 1980’s.

The club is a properly incorporated entity under Consumer Affairs Victoria. It has a Committee of management which includes an executive comprising the President, Vice President, Secretary and Treasurer.

The Committee is charged with the proper and running of club affairs. The current committee membership is listed on the Club’s Website. See below.

The club holds an Annual General meeting in August of each year at which time elections are held, and membership fees are set.

Club Rooms

The club rooms are located at 31 Boomerang Road, Mitchell park. The clubrooms are part of  now heritage listed structures that were constructed and used during the second World war as training facility for the Wireless personnel. The training  school was known as 1WAGS , the No 1 Wireless Air Gunners School Ballarat. You can read more here : https://www.1wags.org.au/courses/

The clubrooms boast

  • A well equipped workshop and metal working facilities
  • A Club library
  • A radio room with remote access ( via the internet) to operational equipment. information on how to gain access and setup is available from *Members Only area*  of the website.
  • Small kitchen and catering facilities,
  • A fully stocked first aid kit
  • Antenna systems covering all Amateur bands
  • Extensive Security Camera surveillance and Recording
  • Overhead projection equipment for training and demonstration purposes
  • WiFi and internet access

The rooms and facilities can be accessed by financial members via normal key as well as coded entry. Access can be  provided as required. Contact a committee member for details. It is very strongly recommended that visits to the club room are arranged to coincide with another member for safety reasons. Entry and egress from the clubrooms require a signin/signout

Meetings:

The club holds meetings at the Club Rooms: These meetings include:

  • Monthly formal meetings where club business is discussed and decided by the membership. These are held on the last Saturday of the month at 11am. All welcome to come along. These start at 11:00AM and are usually followed by an opportunity for a chin wag over a couple of Snags ‘n Sauce in bread. If you arrive early you will  find the doors open about 30 minutes earlier.
  • Construction events where club and individual projects are addressed. These are held on the first Saturday of the Month at 1 pm. A fantastic opportunity to tap into the wealth of experience of club members. We encourage everyone to take advantage of the Construction gatherings
  • Committee meetings are held online.

Social Activities

  • Weekly coffee mornings at a central local Ballarat location.
  • Monthly dining events at various eating establishments around Ballarat and environs.  During daylight saving time these are Friday nights and weekend lunches otherwise. These are an opportunity to include “the other halves”  in the social aspect of club activities
  • Ladies Coffee mornings once a month.

Radio Activities

Depending upon availability, club members involve themselves in National contests and field days as well as BARG sponsored field days. Involvement is decided by club membership.

There are two formalised “nets” held during the week to encourage and maintain contact with members who might not be able to attend other activities.

  • FM via the local VK3RBA repeater each Tuesday from 2000 to 2030 local
  • LSB on 3608KHz each Thursday from 2000 to 2030 local

details are noted on the club web page.

Fund raising Activities

Fundraising to cover ongoing costs, maintenance, equipment, insurance and future costs, is an important part of our activities. The level of your membership fees is influenced by the ability to fund raise. These activities are based on:

  • Hamvention, our once a year landmark Hamfest where we have in excess of 350 attendees and 50 traders.
  • Bunnings BBQ events, where we also have the opportunity to introduce and showcase the various aspects of Amateur Radio
  • The inhouse George Fowler Auction, named in recognition of one of our past presidents This event attracts a multitude of participants from far and wide. A great opportunity to socialise, sell off some of your own gear, make some money to pick up some great bargains.
  • Small raffles at General meetings,
  • Gold Coin payments for occasional refreshments.

Mailing lists

The club runs communications amongst its members via email using the GROUPS.IO platform.

There are 2 mailing lists. One is called MEMBERS, the other is CHATTER.

  • Members This mailing list intended for items directly related to club  “business” emails and conversations that affect financial club members.
  • Chatter Ballarat Amateur Radio Group Chatter mail group.  This mailing list is used for emails that aren’t directly related to club business.

You may have received an invitation to join these lists or been directly added.

As a subscriber

  • You can control your membership via email commands.
  • Request an administrator to adjust your subscription
  • Create a ( free ) GROUPS.IO account to where you will be able to control your subscription and access the past archives of all emails. Thoroughly recommended.

You can elect to receive every email as posted or receive a digest per day. Note that the membership of each mailing list is identical and there is no need to post the same item to both lists

Facebook Page

The club has a   public presence via the FACEBOOK offering available at:https://www.facebook.com/groups/VK3BML

This is useful for quick information; membership requires agreement to posting and interaction rules .

Please read and support  the Group  rules.

All new postings are subject to moderation.

Website Presence

The club has a static public presence via a website at www.barg.org.au

The information here is actively maintained.

  • The calendar of events contains all known events. Refer to this to know what’s on.
  • Recent and Past Newsletters (1980 to 2004 scanned from paper)
  • Information about local repeaters, club nets and rosters for Club nets
  • Club Office bearers
  • Training

There are some *members only areas* holding

  • Minutes of past AGM and General meetings
  • Details of the Remote Access radio software
  • Photographs, old and new that document some of BARG activities
  • Historical information, an ad hoc collection related to BARG

Access to the *members only areas* is controlled by passwords.

These passwords  are subject to change. If you have not received the password please contact Colin/VK3NCC for details.

These areas should be explored at your leisure;

Other Club organisations

BARG has a fraternal  informal link to all other Amateur radio clubs; we aim to support each other as possible.

Historically BARG was involved with WICEN, though this activity has waned over the years. There are past members of WICEN in our membership. Chat to them if you have an interest here.

BARG supports the aims of Amateur Radio advancement as espoused by national organisations such as the Wireless institute of Australia and the Radio Amateur Society of Australia. BARG holds ‘affiliated club’ status with the WIA .

Further Information

Remember there are no silly questions, Ask a question via MEMBERS or CHATTER

Contact a committee member directly or email BARG@BARG.ORG.AU

BARG New Member Guide Welcome Pack Rev PA2

2024-02-07