W4WHW William H. 'Bill' Weinel Raleigh, NC QCWA # 37455

I first became interested in ham radio while employed in broadcast engineering in 1976. My then Elmer, William Fenn (N4TS), encouraged me to get involved in the amateur radio hobby. Unfortunately, I went to another job before I completed my Novice training. However, I finally got my Novice license on December 23, 1986. Soon afterward I upgraded to a Technician class license.

My activity in amateur radio hit a low point from 1991-1998 due to the arrival of two children in the family. I found that the majority of my free time needed to be devoted to being a father. In 1999, with the kids needing less attention, I decided to get active again with a little help from my friends. I also upgraded again to a General class license and the new call W4WHW.

"Ok, so where did I get the W4WHW call?" you ask? Well, it happens that my initials are WHW. In fact, the call W4WHW has quite a history. Here's a little bit of it presented by K4ZM:

"I was checking the use of some of my old time friends calls and found that you have W4WHW. That callsign was issued originally to an old friend and elmer of mine. His name was Everett Schauf and he was a great guy. Everett never bought a piece of ham equipment in his life as long as I knew him. He homebrewed all his equipment and it all looked professional and worked equally well. He was an electrical engineer working at a local Air Force base here in Mobile, AL and was always willing to help us newcomers to ham radio. I used to ride with him on our Friday night transmitter hunts on 10 meters. My dad would drop me off at the assembly point and Everett would drop me off at home after the hunt and social hour. I first met him at the ripe age of 15 and he had great patience in helping myself and several other young hams. Everett was known to all of us as Wheel House Willy. I just wanted to tell you what a wonderful ham he was."

I currently hold an FCC Commercial RadioTelephone General Class License (I was also a First Class RadioTelephone licensee when first licensed in 1974) as well as an Amateur Extra Class License. I am also an ARRL VE. I have a variety of technical interests that include amateur radio, vintage radio gear restoration, computer programming, and circuit prototyping, and construction.

I also participate in the Swan Radio Users Network on 14.293Mhz every Sunday at 1600 EDT. Collecting, operating, and repairing old Swan radio gear is one of my favorite pastimes.

I am an active ARRL member and am locally active in the Franklin County Amateur Radio Club. I operate on HF, 6m, 2m, and 70cm weekly. If you're in the local area, stop by the FCARC repeater on 147.315 on 2m and give me a shout.

73 Bill

June 17, 2017