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SARES Repeater Group

The Sunnyvale Amateur Radio Emergency Service (SARES) Repeater Group (SARES-RG), an ARRL affiliated club, intends to maintain a set of open repeaters that will be used as a Santa Clara County resource in disaster response activations, mutual aid, and public service.

Formed in November 2007, this group is composed of the SARES Emergency Coordinator (EC) and Assistant Emergency Coordinators (AEC).

K6SNY Repeater (70cm FM)

  • 443.275 Mhz, 107.2 Hz PL, positive offset
  • Open repeater
  • Wide area coverage, located on Crystal Peak, Santa Clara County
  • Emergency generator

Santa Clara County ARES/RACES

The control operators of the AA6BT 2m repeater have the capability of linking that repeater to K6SNY, for purposes of mutual aid during times of disasters and other emergencies.

In September 2024, K6SNY was designated as the primary repeater to cover the County Resource Net - South.

Open Repeater

This is an open repeater and we welcome all licensed amateur radio operators.

Frequency (Mhz) PL Tone (Hz) SARES Channels
443.275 + 107.2 8, 9, (39)

SARES-RG Officers

Title Name Call Sign
President Wolfgang Polak AI6SL
Vice President Karlis Veilands KN6GLT
Treasurer Roger Pease KE6PPI
Secretary Skip la Fetra AA6WK

FCC license info

Donations

SARES-RG is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization (EIN 26-1485698). We gratefully accept donations. All proceeds go towards operating and maintaining the repeater on Crystal Peak. Expenses include, tower rental, utilities, and insurance.

You may contact us by email at (info at k6sny dot org).

History of the Repeater

W6AMT

The Association of Mountain Toppers (AMT) Amateur Radio Club are the former owners of SARES-RG's first repeater. We wish to thank AMT for their generous donation of equipment and copious documentation.

W6AMT's log of their earlier repeater work (PDF).

When SARES-RG receieved the repeater from AMT, the radio need some initial frequency adjustment — in which Edison, WB6IQN, graciously provided his services to get the radio back into alignment.

Callsign KI6NIH Granted

The Repeater Group was initially granted the call sign KI6NIH. This call sign was never really used and we applied for a new vanity call on December 9, 2007.

Callsign K6SNY Granted

On December 28, 2007 the FCC granted the vanity call K6SNY to the SARES Repeater Group with Bob Gundrum as trustee. The KI6NIH call has been canceled.

We now have a call sign for our repeater. We can also use this call sign as a permanent Field Day call. Other uses of this call will be from our EOC radio room, and field drills where the radio room is not being used.

Minutes of Initial Repeater Group Meeting

November 10, 2007

The meeting was attended by:

  • Howard Krawetz, K6HM
  • Skip La Fetra, AA6WK
  • Rick Eversole, N6RNO
  • Dewey Churchill, KG6AM
  • Neal Enault, WA6OCP
  • Bob Gundrum W6MOL

Briefly we agreed to become ARRL affiliated (EC /AECs only) as the SARES Repeater Group (SARES-RG). We agreed to assume ownership of the W6AMT, 440 repeater on Crystal Peak. The repeater is considered by the group to be "an extended range" SARES repeater. Due to the problems with south county ARES / RACES being able to contact outside there area, this repeater is a good fix for them. Therefore this will be a cooperative effort with the Garlic Valley Amateur Radio Club (GVARC). We must still work out the funding implications with GVARC. SARES-RG has agreed that the repeater will be open for all to use, as well as a county resource as needed. A member of the SARES-RG will be the official repeater trustee and one control operator (at least), GVARC will also have control operator ability.

We agreed to obtain a supplemental power source to retain the logic in the repeater equipment during any possible momentary power interruptions, as opposed as having a more robust system for the 30 or so seconds between power loss and generator takeover.

We will be sending the current repeater trustee a letter acknowledging acceptance of the equipment and requesting there signature agreeing to the transfer. We are also asking for the keys so we may service the repeater and get it back on frequency and fully functioning as soon as possible.

Expenses as we determined are:

Back up Logic power ~ $50 (startup only)
Insurance ~ $400 (Ongoing)
Rent / year ~ $500 (Ongoing)

The ARRL affiliation will be recorded with the following officers:

  • Bob Gundrum - President
  • Rick Eversole - Vice-President
  • Howard Krawetz - Treasurer
  • Skip La Fetra - Secretary

Respectfully submitted bg