SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE NEWS SUNDAY 4 SEPTEMBER 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 can tune in to the South African Radio League news bulletin on Sunday mornings at 08:15 Central African Time in Afrikaans and at 08:30 Central African Time in English on HF and on many VHF and UHF repeaters around the country. Echolink listeners can connect to ZS0JPL for a relay. A podcast is available from the Leagues web site.
This audio bulletin can be downloaded from the Leagues website at www.sarl.org.za. You will find this bulletin and previous bulletins in text format under the news link on the left-hand side of the web page. While you are there, you can sign up to receive future bulletins by e-mail.
In the news today,
OCTOBER RAE REGISTRATION CLOSING DATE IS THURSDAY 15 SEPTEMBER
SARL NATIONAL FIELD DAY NEXT WEEKEND
and
GREAT OPENING ON 144 MHz TO REUNION ISLAND
Stay tuned for more on these and other interesting news items.
** It is important for all prospective RAE students to note that registrations for the October RAE close on Thursday 15 September 2016. No late registrations will be accepted. The examination will be written on Thursday 20 October 2016.
ICASA has informed the SARL that the May RAE licences have been posted to all candidates that passed the examination. So please check your post boxes. If you have not received your licence by 20 September 2016, please notify the RAE manager at rae@sarl.org.za or Vonnie at admin@sarl.org.za.
** The second leg of the SARL National Field Day will be on the air from 10:00 UTC on Saturday 10 September to 10:00 UTC on Sunday 11 September 2016. Participants may use phone, CW and digital modes on the HF amateur bands, excluding 60, 30, 17 and 12 metres. Phone, CW and digital modes on a band are considered as separate bands and a station may be worked only once per band per mode under this rule.
You and/or your club can participate as Class A field station, multi operator; Class B field station, multi operator, QRP; Class C field station, single operator; Class D field station, single operator, QRP; Class E ultra light portable or Class F a general station. There is a six-hour section available, applicable to Class A, B, C, D, E and F if you cannot operate the whole period. Only one call sign per station is permitted.
The exchange is the number of transmitters, Field Day operating class and your provincial abbreviation, the RS(T) report is optional. Scores are based on the total number of QSO points times the power multiplier times the number of provinces worked times the class multiplier. Log sheets, in ADIF, Cabrillo or MS Excel format and labelled my call sign NFD, must be sent by e-mail to zs4bfn@mweb.co.za by Sunday 18 September 2016. Get the complete set of rules in the 2016 Blue Book or the September 2016 issue of Radio ZS.
** Free and unbureaucratic short-term cross-border amateur radio operation is set to be expanded to more countries outside Europe: Non-CEPT countries can now join the framework of the CEPT licence and the CEPT Novice licence in a much-simplified process thanks to an initiative of IARU Region 1 to change the relevant recommendations. At the same time, the syllabus for the Harmonized Amateur Radio Examination Certificate (HAREC) has been amended to include questions on the Radio Amateur Code of Conduct and on operating practices. The changes were approved by the Working Group - Frequency Management (WGFM) of CEPT and are now in force.
** John, ZS2AH, at East London heard the FR5DN beacon in the late afternoon on Monday 29 August on 144,418 MHz JT65b first period. Later that evening around 19:00 CAT, Hugo, ZS5HV, worked Phil, FR5DN, on JT65b, SSB and FM. Not bad for someone who only came on the air a year ago! Lee, ZS5LEE, joined him on digital with a recorded signal strength up to -17 dB. They copied the beacon signal throughout the night and it peaked at 03:00 CAT.
At 05:40 CAT, Andre, ZS2ACP, at Port Elizabeth hooked up with Phil, FR5DN, on JT65b and ten minutes later both Hugo and Lee worked Phil again on SSB with 5/7 reports both ways. John, ZS2AH, said that he could still hear the beacon at 09:00 CAT but he, Peter, ZS2ABF, and Hennie, ZS2HC, who are all three from East London, had to wait until Tuesday evening before they could work Phil on SSB. Peter could copy Phil at S9+ and then worked him on FM too, while John's 25 Watts only registered S5 in Reunion Island. Hennie made his first-ever DX contact on VHF. Congratulations to you all.
You are listening to a news bulletin of the South African Radio League
** The closing date for your SARL HF CW Contest logs is midnight tonight and they must be sent to zs4bfn@mweb.co.za.
** The TEP Season opens from September until November. The Trans-Equatorial Propagation season starts in September and lasts until November 2016. TEP produces very strong DX signals on 50 MHz (6 metres) SSB from Divisions 3, 4, 5 and 6 to Europe up to a distance of 9 800 km.
DX contacts are also possible on 70 MHz (4 metres) and 144 MHz (2 metres), whereas the one and only contact on 432 MHz (70 cm) was recorded in 1979 by Gerhardt Schlorf, ZS3B, in Luderitz with I4EAT over a distance of 7 784 km. For more info on propagation, download the colour chart that covers the VHF, UHF and SHF spectrum printed on the front cover of the September/October 2013 edition of Radio ZS.
** Provisional Results of the SARL HF Digital Contest. The Contest Committee received six logs for the SARL HF Digital Contest held on Sunday 21 August 2016. Participants should remember that this is two contests in one RTTY and PSK, so check your scoring.
1st Mitchell Mynhardt, ZS6YH, 124 points
2nd Jan Botha, ZS4JAN, 102 points
3rd Theunis Potgieter, ZS2EC, and Paul Greeff, ZS6IO, 54 points
5th Pieter Jacobs, V51PJ, 34 points
6th Dennis Green, ZS4BS, 20 points
** The Contest Committee did not receive any objection to the results of the SARL HF Phone Contest or the SARL YL Sprint as printed in HF Happenings 718. These results are now deemed to be final.
** The SARL VHF/UHF Contest will be on the air from 10:00 UTC on Saturday 17 September to 10:00 UTC on Sunday 18 September 2016 with phone, CW and digital modes on 50 MHz and higher. The All Africa All Mode DX Contest will be on the air from 12:00 UTC on Saturday 17 September to 12:00 UTC on Sunday 18 September 2016 with phone, CW and RTTY on 160 to 10 metres. The rules for both these contests can be found in the 2016 Blue Book and the September 2016 issue of Radio ZS.
** The editor of Radio ZS receives magazines and newsletters from the Netherlands by e-mail. League members interested in reading these Dutch newsletters can contact Dennis, ZS4BS, on radiozs@sarl.org.za to be placed on the mailing list.
** Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the solar activity is expected to be at low to moderate levels. New sunspot AR2585 is large but does not pose a threat for solar flares at this stage. If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected effective sunspot number for the week will be around 30. The 15 to 20 m bands will provide lots of DX fun with some 10 m openings also possible on sunlit paths. Please visit the website spaceweather.sansa.org.za for further information.
Now for the diary of events
Today the closing date for SARL HF CW logs
10 and 11 September SARL National Field Day
11 September SARL Youth Net
15 September closing date for October RAE registration
17 and 18 September the SARL VHF/UHF contest and the All Africa All Mode DX Contest
18 September closing date for National Field Day logs
24 and 15 September the CQ WW RTTY Contest
To end this bulletin, a recap of our main news item this morning.
It is important for all prospective RAE students to note that registrations for the October RAE close on Thursday 15 September 2016. No late registrations will be accepted. The examination will be written on Thursday 20 October 2016.
The second leg of the SARL National Field Day will be on the air from 10:00 UTC on Saturday 10 September to 10:00 UTC on Sunday 11 September 2016
** 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 17 660 kHz AM. There is also a podcast 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; 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 Dennis Green, ZS4BS, edited by Dave Reece, ZS1DFR, and read by
..
73 and 88, thank you for listening
/EX
