SARL NEWS - SUNDAY 8 July 2012
You are listening to ZS6SRL, the official radio station of the South African Radio League, the national body for amateur radio in South Africa, with a news bulletin every Sunday at 08:15 CAT in Afrikaans and at 08:30 CAT in English. To listen to a web stream, visit www.sarl.org.za, click on “Amateur Radio Today” and follow the links for details. For audio via Echolink, connect to ZS0JPL-R.
You can download this bulletin and previous ones from www.sarl.org.za and also subscribe to receive future bulletins by e-mail.
Your newsreader this morning is (name), (call sign), on 145,725 MHz FM from Pretoria with relays on 7 066 and 3 695 kHz SSB. (Other news readers change to suit).
IN THE NEWS TODAY:
GET READY FOR THE IARU HF WINTER CHAMPIONSHIPS
BOOK NOW FOR THE RTA IN DURBAN ON 21 JULY
A NEW RECORD FOR THE AGEING AO-7 SATELLITE
G3PSM AWARDED THE DARC GOLDEN BADGE OF HONOUR
You are listening to ZS6SRL. Stay tuned for more details on these items and other important and interesting items.
GET READY FOR THE IARU HF CHAMPIONSHIPS
Many radio amateurs are gearing up for the winter's biggest HF competition: the IARU HF World Championship. This 24 hour long contest is the highlight of the winter HF contesting season, with plenty of opportunity to work DX from all around the globe on CW and SSB. Participants also get the chance to make QSOs with many IARU Member Society club stations and officials.
The IARU HF Championship is one of radio sport's unique events. It is the only major contest that uses International Telecommunication Union (ITU) zones as part of the exchange, and the only contest that gives special multiplier status for IARU Member-Society stations and their officials.
Amateurs can get in on the fun in a variety of ways. You may choose to enter as either a single operator, using either SSB only, CW only or a mixture of both modes. Single operator stations can choose from three power levels: High Power (greater than 150 W), Low Power (between 5 and 150 W) or QRP (5 W or less).
The SARL as an IARU Member Society has applied to ICASA for the call sign ZS9HQ as a special event station. If you would like to be part of the activity at the NARC send an email to Geoff Levey, ZS6GRL, at contest@sarl.org.za. If you can not be at the NARC, you can also operate the SARL call sign from your own stations. Geoff is coordinating the time slots.
Individual radio amateurs are encouraged to participate. The rules can be found on www.sarl.org.za. The report is RS57 or RST57 South Africa is in ITU zone 57.
One of the fun things to do is see how many of the IARU special stations you can work during the event. While most stations give their ITU zone as part of the contest exchange, IARU Member-Society stations give the abbreviation for their IARU society name. In addition, IARU officials can give one of four unique exchanges: AC if they are on the IARU Administrative Council, or R1, R2 or R3 for the ITU Region that official serves. It is always special to see so many nations represented on the air by their national organization. It reinforces the global nature of Amateur Radio and the common bonds we all have as amateurs.
The IARU HF World Championship begins at 12:00 UTC Saturday, July 14 and goes until 12:00 UTC Sunday, July 15. Complete rules may be found on www.sarl.org.za link from the news item on the home page.
There are a number of SARL prizes to be won. The station that achieves the highest score on SSB or CW will receive a certificate and an ARRL Handbook. Stations achieving the highest score on each band will receive a certificate and all participants who send in a log will receive a certificate of participation. Please copy your log to contest@sarl.co.za to participate in the local of the championships.
BOOK NOW FOR THE RTA IN DURBAN ON 21 JULY
Full details of the SARL Radio Technology in Action symposium to be held in Durban on 21 July are now available on line at www.sarl.org.za. You can pre book and take part in an additional prize draw. If you like a programme to be sent to your inbox send an email to rta@sarl.org.za with RTA Durban in the subject line a PDF copy will be mailed to you.
A NEW RECORD FOR THE AGEING AO-7 SATELLITE
A new DX record has been achieved on the ageing OSCAR-7 amateur radio satellite between Wyatt Dirks, AC0RA, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa and Bill Dzurilla, OM3BD, in the Slovak Republic. Their GPS-measured 7849 kilometre QSO between grid squares EN31vx and JN88mf surpassed the prior 7843 kilometre record set by Luciano Fabricio, PY5LF, and Joe Spandler, K3SZH, by 6 kilometres back in 2010.
To make this record happen Wyatt had to wake up at 03:00, drive to a hill an hour away from his home, set up his station, and work OM3BD before sunrise at 09:55 UTC on July 2nd. To make the path, OM3BD was running a Yaesu FT847 with SP2000 preamp fed by a pair of 10 element yagis on 2 metres, and an 8 element yagi for 70 cm. On the other side of the Atlantic AC0RA also used a Yaesu FT-847 transceiver with a 7 element yagi on 2 metres and a 12 element yagi on 70cm.
YOUTH DAY SPRINT RESULTS
The winner of the SARL Youth day Sprint is Karel Bezuidenhout ZU6KB. Karel is 18 year old and will receive a certificate and a hardcover ARRL Handbook. Second was 16 year old Hendrik Veldman, ZU6LD . He will receive a certificate and ARRL Basic Antennas and third was 15 year old Dean Coetzee ZS6DPC. He also receives a certificate and the ARRL ABCs of Software Defined Radio Guide. The lucky draw prize, a 40 metre receiver kit was won by Mishaat operating from ZS2PE and the year SARL student membership was won by Tom Lewis ZU5TOM.
Congratulations to all the winners. Their prizes will be in the mail during next week.
G3PSM AWARDED THE DARC GOLDEN BADGE OF HONOUR
UK radio amateur Colin Thomas, G3PSM, has been awarded Germany's Deutscher Amateur Radio Club Golden Badge of Honour for his work in achieving an amateur radio allocation at 472 kHz. According to the German national amateur radio society, G3PSM was involved in the European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations or CEPT preparatory process meetings and at the WRC-12 conference itself. As a result of his skilful lobbying at many meetings, the CEPT proposal for an amateur radio allocation near 600 meters was fully supported and eventually granted.
OCTOBER RADIO AMATEUR’S EXAMINATION
The Sandton Amateur Radio Club will again offer a course leading to the Radio Amateur's Examination to be held in October 2012.
This course will be of interest to anyone who wishes to obtain an amateur radio licence, and also to anyone travelling around Southern Africa who makes use of radio communication.
The course begins on 26th July 2012 and extends over 12 weeks, up to the examination on 18th October.
Lectures are held every Thursday evening at the National Amateur Radio Centre, Octave Street, Radiokop.
The course includes the required HF assessment, and an optional practical Antenna Building Day.
Registration takes place at the first session at 19:00 on 26th July, and includes a general introduction to Amateur Radio and to the course. There is no charge for this first session and anyone interested in finding out what amateur radio is all about, is welcome to attend this introductory session.
For more information and pricing please contact:
Greg Maynard
Cell: 079 111 2850
Email: greg-m@mweb.co.za
CONTEST NEWS
The committee only received 10 logs from five Clubs for the digital leg of the SARL 80 metre Club Contest.
1st West Rand ARC - 26 points from 4 logs
2nd Sandton ARC - 17 points from 2 logs
3rd Port Elizabeth ARS - 11 points from 2 logs
The combined scores after three contest are:
1st West Rand ARC - 179 points
2nd Bloemfontein ARC - 46 points
3rd Port Elizabeth ARS - 21 points
The full details were published in HF Happenings 511.
HF PROPAGATION REPORT
Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the week's expected Solar activity will be at moderate levels. Behemoth sunspot AR 1 515 is crackling with M-class flares and appears to be on the verge of producing an X-class explosion.
If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected effective sunspot number for the week will be around 103, more than double that of last week.
All the bands from 20 to 10 m will provide lots of DX fun with 15 m providing the best openings with 20 m not far behind. 10 m openings will be more frequent due to the higher solar activity.
Please visit www.spaceweather.co.za for further information.
DIARY OF EVENTS
14 July – IARU HF Championship competition from 12:00 UTC 14 July till 12:00 UTC 15 July. Offer your service at the NARC station by email to Geoff Levey, ZS6GRL, at contest@sarl.org.za.
21 July - SARL Radio Technology in Action symposium in Durban. Get details from www.sarl.org.za, request program by email to rta@sarl.org.za.
26 July – RAE course by the Santon ARC. Contact Greg Maynard at 079 111 2850 or email to greg-m@mweb.co.za.
SARL News invites clubs and individuals to submit news items of interest to radio amateurs and shortwave listeners. Submit news items – if possible - in both English and Afrikaans to www.sarl.org.za/newsinbox.asp, not later than the Thursday preceding the bulletin date.
The SARL also invites you to listen to Amateur Radio Today every Sunday morning at 10:00 CAT on 145,750 MHz in the Pretoria area, with relays on 7 082, 7 205 and 17 760 kHz. There is also a podcast by Dick, ZS6RO. For a web-stream and Echolink by ZS6FCS, visit www.sarl.org.za, click on 'Amateur Radio Today', go down the green column and click on 'LISTEN ON THE WEB'. A repeat transmission can be heard on Mondays at 17:30 UTC on 4 895 kHz. Sentech sponsors the ARMI transmissions on the non-amateur frequencies.
You have listened to a bulletin of the South African Radio League, compiled by Johan ZS4SS, and edited by George Honiball, ZS6NE.
Thank you for listening. 73.
/EX
