SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE NEWS SUNDAY 31 JULY 2016

Good morning and welcome to the weekly news bulletin of the South African Radio League read by ................ [your name, call sign and QTH]

You may tune in to the South African Radio League news bulletin on Sunday mornings, at 08:15 Local Time in Afrikaans and at 08:30 Local Time in English, on HF as well as on many VHF and UHF repeaters around our country. Echolink listeners may connect to ZS0JPL for a relay.

This audio bulletin may be downloaded from the League website at www.sarl.org.za where you will find this as well as previous bulletins in text format under the news link on the left-hand side of the web page. While you are there, you may sign up to receive future bulletins by e-mail.

IN THE NEWS TODAY:

SARL SPECIAL GENERAL MEETING

SARL HF CONTESTS

RADIO ZS

NEW TRANSATLANTIC TESTS STARTING BETWEEN NAMIBIA & BRAZIL IN AUGUST

WHILE THE HF BANDS ARE DEAD VHF IS VERY MUCH ALIVE

AMSAT SA TO DEVELOP A ROADMAP FOR AN SDR SATELLITE PROJECT

ZULULAND AMATEUR RADIO CLUB AGM

HF PROPAGATION REPORT

and

UPCOMING EVENTS

** The SGM started at 10:00 with 179 members present and by proxy, 172 members were needed for a quorum. Etienne, ZS6EFN, was elected as chairman of the meeting.

Shane, ZS6ZSB, presented the financial reports as available on the League web site. The reports were approved with the provisions made in the reports. The names of the League Members elected to Council were made known.

Hans, ZS6AKV, and Johann, ZS1JM, gave feed back about the Antenna Defence Fund and the status of the work being done. Tjerk, ZS6P, gave a report on the SARL Hall of Fame.

At the first Council meeting held after the SGM, the following appointments were made:

President: Nico van Rensburg, ZS6QL
Vice President: Chris Turner, ZS6GM
Secretary: Etienne Naude, ZS6EFN
Treasurer: Shane Bailey, ZS6ZSB
Members: Dennis Green, ZS4BS
Paul van Spronsen, ZS1V
Rassie Erasmus, ZS1YT
Geoff Levey, ZS6C
Louw Erasmus, ZS6LME

** On Sunday 7 August from 13:00 to 16:30 UTC the South African Radio League's premier HF Contest series will start with the HF Phone Contest. The aim of the HF Phone Contest is for participants to contact as many amateurs in Southern Africa as possible on phone between 14 125 to 14 300 kHz, 7 063 to 7 100 and 7 130 to 7 200 kHz and 3 603 to 3 650 and 3 700 to 3 800 kHz. You can participate as a Single Operator Single Band station, a Single Operator All Band station, a Multi Operator Single Band station or a Multi Operator All Band station.

The exchange is a RS report and a consecutive serial number starting at 001. Multi-operator stations must read General Rules Rule 5.(c). Phone contacts count 1 point. Count two points for each call area worked on each band and count 2 points for each station contacted on all three bands.

Submit your log in ADIF, Cabrillo or MS Excel format and labelled "your call sign HF Phone", by 14 August 2016 by e-mail to zs4bfn@mweb.co.za. Do not use any other e-mail address. Certificates are awarded to the first three places and the highest single band score in the contest as well as the Silent Keys Memorial Trophy SSB and the Joseph White Trophy.

** The South African Radio League YL Sprint is a fun activity to celebrate Women's Day between radio amateurs in South Africa. Call "YL Sprint" on 9 August 2016 from 09:00 to 10:00 UTC. It is a phone sprint with activity between 7 063 to 7 100 and 7 130 to 7 200 kHz and the exchange is a RS report and YL or OM.

Contacts between YL stations are worth 5 points. Contacts between YL and OM stations are worth 3 points and contacts between OM stations are worth 1 point. Log sheets in ADIF, Cabrillo or MS Excel format and labelled "your call sign YL Sprint", shall be submitted by 16 August 2016 by e-mail to zs4bfn@mweb.co.za.

Get all the information in the 2016 Blue Book for both these contests.

** New trophies for the SARL HF Contest series. The Contest Committee wants to introduce two new trophies for the SARL HF Contest series. The criteria for the first trophy is that it will be awarded to the YL who achieves the highest score in the three HF Contests and for the second trophy, that it will be awarded to the young person who achieves the highest score in the three HF Contests. Is there someone who would like to sponsor such a trophy? Please contact Dennis, ZS4BS, at zs4bfn@mweb.co.za.

** The 48-page August issue of Radio ZS is available for download from the Members Only section of the League’s web site. Chris, ZS6EZ, takes us on a trip to the Far East in the 9M0Z Story (there is a URL to get an English copy of the article). Henry, ZS1AAW, and Kevin, ZS6KMD, provide you with a number of projects to work on during the winter evenings and Kevin reviews the mcHF SDR Transceiver. Read about the Russian Woodpecker and find out about Spy Radio sets. This and more in the August issue.

** Pieter Jacobs, V51PJ, in Namibia and Marcos Jose Da Silva Almeida, PY1MHZ, in Brazil will be running daily skeds throughout August 2016, and attempt to make the first ever two-way contact across the Atlantic Ocean on 144 MHz. Pieter is equipped with 2 x 13 element stacked Yagi array and 1,2 kilowatt of power, whereas Marcos will be using a 43 element horizontal Yagi at his seaside holiday home. Pieter says they will test around sunrise at Namibia and again at sunset at Brazil when cool air across the Atlantic could enhance Tropo Ducting. Apparently there will be several amateurs along the East coast of South America who would be monitoring the signals, as well as a few along our West coast as far down as Cape Town. The bridging of the Atlantic has been attempted many times before without success, and the Brendan Trophy has been waiting for years in Belfast for the first amateurs to accomplish it!

** Carl Minne, ZS6CBQ, at Krugersdorp reports that while the HF bands are dead with mostly poor conditions, VHF is very much alive. He was on 144,300 MHz during the week from about 19:30 CAT and every evening there were a few stations on the air such as ZS6BUN, ZR6CMG, ZS6QTF, ZS6CBQ, ZS6UB, ZS6BSB and Keith ZS6TW on Friday evening. Please try calling on this frequency if you are in the Gauteng area when you don't hear anything on HF.

Saturday and Sunday mornings we concentrate on working far away stations: Rickus ZS4A in Bethlehem, Pierre ZS4PF in Welkom, ZR4MF Michael in Bloemfontein, also stations from Kriel, Secunda, Ermelo and Phalaborwa. Rickus is also reporting that he is helping a few stations to build antennas and soon we can look out for more stations from Division 4.

"This Sunday morning 24 July I worked Pieter ZS4PAW in Koppies using a Slim Jim with reports of 5/1 to 5/5, conditions were not very good. Pieter has almost finished a horizontal Yagi, and hoping to hear him 5/9 in the near future. Quintin ZS6QTH at Onderstepoort also managed to make a contact with ZS4A, but conditions were just not good enough for Jaco ZR6CMG to log the contact. Pierre ZS4PF from Welkom was 5/9 at Krugersdorp, he logged Rickus and was heard in Pretoria by Jaco and Quintin, but the fast and deep QSB from Tropo Scatter did not allow them to make a contact. Come and join the fun on weekends and during the week."

** During the first AMSAT SA SDR conversation the participants discussed various aspects of changing transponders on future satellite missions to Software Defined Radio. The first step in the process is to develop a roadmap. The first roadmap proposals will be discussed at the group's next Skype conversation on Wednesday 10 August at 20:30. The group is also working on setting up an information sharing platform. Visit www.amsatsa.org.za for more information on how to become a member of AMSAT SA and to join the SDR conversation.

** Applications for membership of the South African Radio League have been received from the following persons:

ZS6XK John Hilton
ZS6AQW Evert van der Horst
ZS6LCC Lodewyk Pieterse
ZSL1166 Gerhard Brand Fourie

Any objections to the acceptance of the applications must reach the Secretary before or on the Tuesday after this bulletin. The League now has 1194 confirmed members for the next term; there are still many renewals outstanding. If you have not yet renewed your membership, please do so now. At the end of August you will cease to be a member if you have not renewed. Thirty-three clubs have already renewed their affiliation.

** At the AGM of the Zululand Amateur Radio Club, held on the 24th July 2016 at Tattenham, the following Committee members were elected to serve the members of the club for the forthcoming year:

Chairman: Warren Snyders ZS5WOZ
Vice Chairman: Gerald Scrooby ZS5GS
Treasurer: Willie Axford ZS5WI
Secretary: Dawn Snyders ZS5ME

Members: Jo Snyders ZS5PO (News Editor)

We wish them well during their term of office and thank the outgoing members for their hard work during their term of office.

** Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the solar activity is expected to be at very low levels. There are currently no sunspots visible.

If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected effective sunspot number for the week will be less than 5.

The 20 meter band will provide lots of DX fun.

Please visit the web site spaceweather.sansa.org.za for further information.

** Let’s look at some upcoming events:

30 and 31 July – RSGB IOTA Contest
7 August – SARL HF Phone Contest
9 August – SARL YL Sprint
13 and 14 August – International Lighthouse and Lightship Weekend
14 August – SARL Youth Net
21 August – SARL HF Digital Contest
28 August – SARL HF CW Contest

** To conclude our bulletin a quick overview of our main news item: At the first Council meeting held after the SGM, the following appointments were made:
President: Nico van Rensburg, ZS6QL
Vice President: Chris Turner, ZS6GM
Secretary: Etienne Naude, ZS6EFN
Treasurer: Shane Bailey, ZS6ZSB
Members: Dennis Green, ZS4BS
Paul van Spronsen, ZS1V
Rassie Erasmus, ZS1YT
Geoff Levey, ZS6C
Louw Erasmus, ZS6LME

And that brings us to the end of this bulletin

Clubs and individuals are invited to submit news items of interest to radio amateurs and shortwave listeners, if possible, in both English and Afrikaans, by following the news inbox link on the South African Radio League web page. News items for inclusion in the bulletin should reach the news team no later than the Thursday preceding the bulletin date.

You are welcome to join us every Sunday morning for the weekly amateur radio magazine programme 'Amateur Radio Today' at 10:00 Central African Time. The programme can be heard on VHF and UHF repeaters countrywide and on 7 082 kHz lower side-band and on 7 205 kHz and 17 760 kHz AM. There is also a pod cast available from Dick Stratford, ZS6RO. A rebroadcast can be heard on Monday evenings at 18:30 Central African Time on 3 230 kHz AM.

We welcome your signal reports, comments and suggestions; please send these by e-mail to artoday@sarl.org.za. Sentech sponsors the radio transmissions on the non-amateur frequencies.

You have listened to a news bulletin compiled by Emile Venter, ZS6V, and read by ..............

From the news team, best wishes for the week ahead.

/EX