SARL NEWS SUNDAY 28 JULY 2013

You are listening to ZS6SRL, the official radio station of the South African Radio League, the national body for amateur radio in South Africa. The SARL broadcasts 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 there to receive future bulletins by e-mail.


IN THE NEWS TODAY:
SARL RTA COMES TO DURBAN NEXT
NEW AMATEUR VIDEO GEAR IS ON THE ISS
SOMETHING FOR THE COLLINS RADIO FANS

You are listening to ZS6SRL. Stay tuned for more details on these and other important and interesting items.

SARL RTA COMES TO DURBAN NEXT

The second SARL Radio Technology in Action Symposium was held in Gauteng yesterday at the Innovation Hub in Pretoria. It was attended by some 80 radio amateurs and radio enthusiast. Members of the Kempton Park Technical Society were well represented and made up the single largest group representing a club. It just goes to show if a club committee gets behind an event and mobilises its members how well members respond. The club also made a special effort to include their RAE students who benefitted from attending by getting additional input for their RAE studies. Congratulations to the Kempton Park Technical Society, this is HAM spirit in action.

The next RTA will be held at the University of kwaZulu-Natal in Durban on 14 September 2013. Full details and the booking form are available on the web at www.sarl.org.za. Please book early to facilitate the arrangements for catering and to ensure that the kit and CD are available at the event for delivery. As with the other RTA's five digital multi meters can be won donated by Corel-I.

NEW AMATEUR VIDEO GEAR IS ON THE ISS

The ARISS Amateur Video transmitter is now on board the International Space Station and located in the Columbus Module. The transmitter was delivered by Japanese cargo spacecraft which launched in early August. Installation will be done by astronaut ham Michael Hopkins, KF5LJG, who has been trained for the commissioning of the ARISS Amateur Video equipment. This could take place as early as sometime in October. When the new S-Band transmitter becomes operational, it will be used mainly for ARISS educational school contacts. Video will be for downlink only. Uplink will continue to be VHF FM audio.

SOMETHING FOR THE COLLINS RADIO FANS

Four club stations honouring the famed Rockwell Collins collaboration will be celebrating the 80th anniversary of the Collins Radio Company with a special event operation during the last two weekends of September.

Stations W0CXX and N0CXX Cedar Rapids, Iowa; W5ROK Richardson, Texas; W4CRC Melbourne, Florida and W6CXX Tustin, California will be on the air September 21st to the 23rd and again on September 28th to the 30th to take part in the event.

A special QSL card for the overall event will be available to all making contact with any of the stations. A commemorative certificate will be obtainable for those working 3 or more club stations on any combination of bands and modes. More information on the operation and QSL instructions is on the web at www.w0cxx.org.

LEAGUE NEWS

PAID YOUR MEMBERSHIP?
If you have not paid your membership for this year, it means that technically speaking you membership benefit ended yesterday. You will however be given another two weeks to pay your dues. If you have not yet renewed please do so as soon as possible. If you need details of how much to pay and banking details, call Mariska on Monday at 011 675 2393

RADIO ZS IN THE POST THIS WEEK
The July/August edition will be posted in the next few days and is available on the web. Members can read and download various articles individually. The links can be found on the members only pages of www.sarl.org.za.

This edition is again full of interesting articles including : Roll-your-own homebrewed amateur radio by Victor du Preeez ZS6EA, A modern approach to characterise the possible new 60 m (5 MHz) band by Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, APRS in Aircraft by Henry Chamberlain, ZS1AAZ, Collecting Radio Stamps by Dennis Green, ZS4BS, Rapid Deployment Amateur Radio (RaDAR) by Eddie Leighton, ZS6BNE and a new column by Mike Bosch: The World of VHF, UHF and Microwaves plus all the regular columns and news items. Of special interest is an article by the aurhor of many books on antenna Doug DeMaw, W1FB entitled "Antenna Accessories for the Beginner".

CLUB NEWS

No club news was received last week.

SARL News invites clubs and individuals to submit news items of interest to radio amateurs and short-wave 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.


CONTEST NEWS

SARL HF DIGITAL CONTEST
The Contest Committee received 9 logs for the SARL HF Digital Contest held on Sunday 18 August 2013. The results are as follows:

1st Bernie van der Walt, ZS4TX, 150 points 2nd Jan Botha, ZS4JAN, 101 points 3rd Nico Oelofse, 88 points.

Best score on a Single band:
Bernie van der Walt, ZS4TX, with 118 points on 20 metres


HF PROPAGATION REPORT

Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the solar activity is expected to remain at low levels despite chances for an M-class flare from Sunspot AR1817. All other sunspots remain stable or in a state of decay.

If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected effective sunspot number for the week will be around 51.

All the bands from 20 to 10 m will provide lots of DX fun with 20 m providing the best openings with 15 m not far behind. There can also be some short 10 m openings on east-west sunlit paths.

Please visit the new website h t t p://spaceweather.sansa.org.za for further information.

DIARY OF EVENTS

3 September – West Rand Flea Market
14 September – RTA KaZulu-Natal
25 – 28 September – SARL Exhibit at ESKOM EXPO for Young Scientists

The SARL 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 17 660 kHz. There is also a podcast by 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 16:30 UTC on 3 230 kHz. The website also lists various other retransmissions. Reception reports, comments and suggestions are invited. Send an email to artoday@sarl.org.za. Sentech sponsors the transmissions on the non-amateur frequencies.

You have listened to a bulletin of the South African Radio League compiled and edited by Louis Kirstein, ZS1LK.

Thank you for listening, 73.

/EX