SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE NEWS SUNDAY 29 JANUARY 2017
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,
A LAST CALL FOR MOTIONS FOR THE 2017 AGM AND COUNCIL NOMINATIONS
HAMNET GAUTENG SOUTH AND EKHURULENI SIGN A MOU
and
EARLY REPORT ON PEARS NATIONAL VHF AND UHF CONTEST
Stay tuned for more on these and other interesting news items.
** Despite requesting the following information from League members via SARL Communication e-mails on 11 December 2016, 12 December 2016 and 13 January 2017 as well as SARL News of 8 and 21 January, only one nomination for Council and one nomination for a SARL Award has been received. No motions for the 2017 AGM or other nominations for SARL or Radio ZS awards have yet been received. The closing date for motions and nominations is midnight on Tuesday 31 January 2017.
In terms of Rule 11.3 of the Constitution and Rules of the League, a call is made to members to submit motions to be discussed at the 2017 Annual General Meeting. Motions should be clear, concise, include a motivation and require a proposer and a seconder.
In terms of Rule 16.9 of the Constitution and Rules of the League, a call is made to members for nominations to serve on the Council of the League. Four of the present Councillors will retire at the 2017 AGM, but can be re-elected if nominated and seconded. The following Councillors have indicated that they will retire but are available for re-election - Rassie Erasmus, ZS1YT, Geoff Levey, ZS6C, Nico van Rensburg, ZS6QL, and Shane Bailey, ZS6ZSB. Etienne Naude, ZS6EFN, who was appointed by Council as the League Secretary, has indicated that he is standing down, but has not yet decided if he will be available for election.
The requirements are a nomination form signed either by 10 seconders who are all members of the League or by a Club of which at least 10 members are also members of the League. The closing date for nominations and submission of motions is on or before Tuesday 31 January 2017 and must be sent to the League Secretary at secretary@sarl.org.za or by fax to 086 552 8487. For more information, please refer to the League Constitution and Rules, which is available on www.sarl.org.za.
Members and Clubs are invited to submit nominations for the following South African Radio League awards. Send your nominations with a motivation to the League Secretary at secretary@sarl.org.za on or before Tuesday 31 January 2017. The awards are Honorary Life Membership; the Willie Wilson Gold Badge; the Jack Twine Award; the Arthur Hemsley Two metre Trophy; the Barney Joel Trophy; the Icom Excellence Award; the Joseph White Plaque; the Bert Buckley Six Metre Trophy; the Radio ZS Four Metre Floating Trophy; the SAATI Award and the Tinus Lange 7066 Technical Excellence Award. The relevant information about each award can be found in the SARL Communication e-mail dated 11 December 2016 sent to all members.
The Editor of Radio ZS requests members to assist him in awarding two of the Radio ZS awards for the 12 issues of the 2016 series of the magazine. The first is the Gary Immelman RA Heritage Award Floating Trophy for the best article of a historic nature describing an event that occurred more than five years previously, or an interesting personality that has played an important part in the development of Amateur Radio in years gone by. The second is the JJ Pienaar Trophy for the best article published in Radio ZS during 2016. E-mail your suggestions as to who would be worthy recipients to radiozs@sarl.org.za by Tuesday 31 January 2017.
** Hamnet Gauteng South has worked for many years with the Ekhuruleni Metropolitan Municipality when asked to assist with xenophobic incidents, tornadoes, old age home fires and the like under the stewardship of the previous Hamnet Gauteng South Provincial Director, Chris Gryffenburg, ZS6COG. The fruits of his labour culminated this week with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between Hamnet Gauteng South and the Municipality. This places a formal protocol and responsibility between the two organisations into the future. Signing the document was the new Hamnet Gauteng South Provincial Director, Glynn Chamberlain, ZS6GLN, and Mr Moshema Mosia, the Head of Department: Disaster and Emergency Management Services EMM, and Bafana Mazibuko, Acting Director General Disaster Management EMM. Mr Mosia expressed his appreciation of Hamnets efforts in the past and said he looked forward to working with our organisation well into the future.
You are listening to a news bulletin of the South African Radio League. Did you tell anyone about amateur radio this week?
** Hamnet Database. If you are a member of Hamnet, you should by now have been asked to update your details using the new Hamnet Members Web Portal at http://portal.hamnet.co.za.
If you have not received such a request, it is likely that your e-mail address on the Hamnet database is outdated. Please contact your Hamnet Regional Director for instructions on how to correct this. We will consider all those who have not registered and updated their details on the Hamnet members portal as no longer being interested being members of Hamnet. Those persons will be removed from the Hamnet members database during the course of February.
** Notwithstanding the poor Tropo propagation during the contest, a number of log sheets have been received from several divisions for the PEARS VHF/UHF Contest. Nevertheless, Meteor Scatter from minor meteors enabled digital operators to break all previous contest distance records on 50 MHz and 70 MHz FSK441 with a new distance of 1346 km.
Here is a special request to all participants please submit your log sheet, even if you made only a few contacts, as all the logs will provide an analysis of VHF propagation as well as participation across the country. This type of observation can only be made during a countrywide VHF contest. Furthermore, PEARS would treat your log also as a thank you for their efforts in running the contest. The deadline for log sheets is on 15 February 2017 and you can submit it in any form.
** February is a busy month for local contests. The month kicks off with the Antique Wireless Association CW Activity Day, which runs from 13:00 15:00 UTC on Sunday 5 February 2017. The aim of the AWA CW Activity Day is for participants to contact as many amateurs as possible on the 20, 40 and 80 m amateur bands.
The South African Radio League National Field Day is on the air from 10:00 UTC on Saturday 11 February to 10:00 UTC on Sunday 12 February 2017. The aim is to work as many stations as possible on all the HF amateur bands (excluding the 2 200, 630, 60, 30, 17 and 12 m bands). In doing so, to learn to operate in abnormal situations in less than optimal conditions. A premium is placed on developing skills to meet the challenges of emergency preparedness as well as to acquaint the public with the capabilities of Amateur Radio.
On Saturday 18 February, the South African Radio League Youth Sprint will be on the air from 08:00 to 10:00 UTC. This is a fun activity to celebrate the Youth and to promote contacts between young radio amateurs in Southern African countries.
Moreover, the last local contest for the month is the South African Radio League Digital Contest and that takes place on Sunday 26 February 2017 from 13:00 UTC to 16:00 UTC, The aim is to establish as many contacts as possible between radio amateurs in Southern Africa using PSK31 and/or RTTY. The contest is open to all radio amateurs in Southern Africa
** The February 2017 issue of Radio ZS will be available for download from the league web site from Tuesday 31 January.
** It is nearly time to take your fleas to market! Come and join us for the East Rand Branch Summer Flea Market on Saturday 4 February at the ERB Club House at Arrowe Park, Ebenezer Street, Benoni. Sales start officially at 12:00! Please respect this and give everyone a chance to buy or take your wares! We once again call on members to come volunteer their services for the day to make it a success! Tables are R20 each and you can contact Armand at 079 465 3271 or zs6spr@gmail.com with your booking. As always, the cash bar will be open and our legendary boerewors rolls will be available. The "DMX Sound Machine ©" will be providing music for the day. Bring along all those white elephant items the wife complains about, someone will take it off your hands the white elephant items, not your wife! Spread the word and hope to see you there!
** Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the solar activity is expected to be at low levels. There are several sunspots visible but none is actively flaring. If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected effective sunspot number for the week will be around 7. The 15 to 30 m bands will provide lots of DX fun. Please visit the website spaceweather.sansa.org.za for further information.
Now for the diary of events
31 January closing date for AGM motions, Council nominations, SARL Awards and Radio ZS awards; the closing date for proposals for papers for the AMSAT SA Conference
4 February the East Rand Branch Flea Market
5 February - AWA CW Activity
11 February closing date for the SDR Workshop registration
11 and 12 February the SARL National Field Day and the Midmar Mile
15 February closing date for PEARS VHF/UHF Contest logs
18 February the SDR Workshop at the NARC and the SARL Youth Sprint
25 February West Rand ARC Flea Market
26 February SARL Digital Contest
27 February National Milk Tart Day
To end this bulletin, a recap of our main news item this morning:
Despite requesting the following information from League members via SARL Communication e-mails on 11 December 2016, 12 December 2016 and 13 January 2017 as well as SARL News of 8 and 21 January, only one nomination for Council and one nomination for a SARL Award has been received. No motions for the 2017 AGM or other nominations for SARL or Radio ZS awards have yet been received. The closing date for motions and nominations is midnight on Tuesday 31 January 2017.
** 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 podcast available from Dick Stratford, ZS6RO. A rebroadcast can be heard on Monday evenings at 18:30 Central African Time on 4 895 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
