SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE NEWS FOR SUNDAY 25 JUNE 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 may 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 as well as on many VHF and UHF repeaters around the country. Echolink listeners may connect to ZS0JPL for a relay. A podcast is available from the League’s web site.
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,
THE NEXT SDR CONVERSATION ON 28 JUNE
HAMMIES ARC PRESENT RAE COURSES
and
THE NEXT SDR WORKSHOP WILL BE HELD ON 12 AUGUST
Stay tuned for more information on these and other interesting news items.
THE NEXT SDR CONVERSATION ON 28 JUNE
The SDR Conversation continues Wednesday 28 June 2017 at 20:30 and takes place on Skype. To join the conversation, send an e-mail to admin@amsatsa.org.za by Monday evening with your skype details. It is important that participants run the latest version of Skype.
HAMMIES ARC PRESENT RAE COURSES
The Hammies Eastern Cape Amateur Radio Club, ZS2ZU, will once again be holding a “Boot Camp”. This is a fun camp where we go through all the requirements for children/young adults under 20 years of age to write the ICASA class B radio licence. This allows them to own radio equipment and to talk on the radio. The course is open for anyone between 10 and 20 years of age and will be held from Friday 14 to Monday 17 July at the Voortrekker Camping ground near Lady's Slipper. For more information, contact Dave Higgs, ZS2DH by e-mail at om@zs2dh.co.za
The Hammies ARC, ZS6ZU, will be hosting a Class A RAE course for youngsters under the age of 25. The course will be held at the National Amateur Radio Centre in Radiokop. Lectures will take place on Saturday mornings, starting from 1 July. Persons older than 25 may also apply. For further details please contact Noel, ZR6DX, or Graham, ZS6GL, by e-mail at zr6dx@iafrica.com or grahambusse@vodamail.co.za respectively.
THE JULY RADIO ZS
The closing date for your article for the July Radio ZS is Tuesday 27 June 2017 and can be sent to radiozs@sarl.org.za.
THE NEXT SDR WORKSHOP WILL BE HELD ON 12 AUGUST
The date for the joint SARL/AMSAT SA workshop about enhancing the SDR experience has been set for Saturday 12 August 2017 at the National Amateur Radio Centre. The workshop will focus on getting more fun from a VHF SDR dongle. The second part of the workshop will focus on how to kick start the South African Radio League monitoring of the increase in the RF noise floor level project using the SDR waterfall. Both a HF and VHF dongle will be available as well as a memory stick with the required SDR and some fun software.
More details will be published soon. If you are interested in attending the workshops, please send an e-mail with your details to admin@amsatsa.org.za and you will be added to a mailing list to keep you up to date with details of the workshops in Gauteng and the Western Cape.
You are listening to a news bulletin of the South African Radio League. Take your hand-held to work this week.
SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE NEWBIE PARTY
This is a fun activity to encourage all new radio amateurs to become radio active. The first Newbie Party will be held from 08:00 to 20:00 UTC on Saturday 01 July 2017. This is a phone only contest with activity on 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.
The exchange is a RS report and phonetic character as follows - Alpha - less than 6 months; Bravo - 6 months to one year; Echo - one to two years; Golf - two to three years; India - three to four years or November - more than four years.
Each contact is worth the number of points as shown - Alpha - 7; Bravo - 5; Echo - 4; Golf - 3; India - 2 or November - 1 point. If the contact is made with a newbie radio amateur, who is an amateur less than one year, the points are doubled. A station can be contacted once per band. Log sheets in MS Excel format shall be submitted by 17 July 2017 by e-mail to ZS3vdk@webmail.co.za. A certificate will be awarded for first, second and third places. The log sheet is available from the League web site under the competition information.
THE ZS5 SPRINT
This is a fun activity to promote contacts between radio amateurs in Kwazulu-Natal and radio amateurs in Southern African countries. The Sprint runs from 14:00 to 15:00 UTC on Sunday 2 July 2017.
ZS5 stations will give a RS or RST report and their town name or abbreviation. All other stations will give a RS or RST report and their provincial or country abbreviation. The ZS5 Sprint is a phone and CW contest on the 40 metre band using 7 000 to 7 040 kHz for CW and 7 063 to 7 100 and 7 130 to 7 200 kHz for phone.
ZS5 stations score 1 point for a QSO with a ZS5 station and 2 points for a QSO with a station in other ZS call areas or Southern African countries. All other stations score 2 points for a QSO with a ZS5 station and 1 point for a QSO with stations in their own or other ZS call areas (excluding ZS5) or Southern African countries. QSOs with the Highway ARC, ZS5HAM, the Durban ARC, ZS5D, the Hibiscus Coast ARC, ZS5HAC, the Zululand ARC, ZS5ZLB, the Midlands ARC, ZS5PMB, or the Noord Natal Amateurradioklub, ZS5NAK, are worth 5 points each. Only one contact per station is allowed.
Logs, in ADIF, Cabrillo or MS Excel format and labelled “your call sign ZS5 Sprint,” shall be submitted by 10 July 2017 by e-mail to zs5contest@harc.org.za. A certificate will be awarded to the first, second and third places in the competition.
ASTEROID NAMED AFTER RADIO AMATEUR
The International Astronomical Union rewarded the space physicist and radio amateur Asta Pellinen-Wannberg, SM3UHV, on 13 April, by designating a celestial body in her name, Asteroid 11807 Wannberg.
The Swedish National Amateur Radio Society SSA reports: Asta Pellinen-Wannberg is a professor at the Department of Physics at Umeå University. She has made a ground-breaking effort to use scattering radar when studying meteors that are activated when small particles penetrate the atmosphere. The method is now applied at about ten stations around the world. It increases the ability to study different large flows, smaller particles and details in their interaction with the atmosphere, says Asta Pellinen-Wannberg. Asta is chair of the Swedish National Committee for Radio Science (SNRV) and has researched together with Gudmund Wannberg, SM3BYA, who served as Technical Manager at EISCAT Radar in Kiruna and Associate Professor at Umeå University.
PROPAGATION REPORT
Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the solar activity is expected to be at low levels. There is currently no threat of strong solar flares. If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected effective sunspot number for the week will be around three. The 17 to 30 m bands will provide lots of DX fun. 60 m will be the best band during day time for shorter distance local contacts. Please visit the website spaceweather.sansa.org.za for further information.
Finally, a diary of some upcoming events:
26 June – submit your details for the SDR Conversation
27 June – closing date for July Radio ZS articles
28 June – the SDR Conversation
1 July – the SARL Newbie QSO Party; the start of the ZS6ZU Hammies RAE course
2 July – the ZS5 Sprint
8 - 9 July – the IARU HF Championships
14 to 17 July – the ZS2ZU Hammies RAE Boot Camp
15 July – the RADAR Challenge and the ZS2 Sprint
To conclude our bulletin a quick overview of our main news item
The SDR Conversation continues Wednesday 28 June 2017 at 20:30 and takes place on Skype. To join the conversation, send an e-mail to admin@amsatsa.org.za by Monday evening with your skype details. It is important that participants run the latest version of Skype.
This 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 podcast available from Dick Stratford, ZS6RO. A rebroadcast can be heard on Monday evenings at 18:30 Central African Time on 3230 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 Dennis Green, ZS4BS, edited by Dave Reece, ZS1DFR, and read by ..............
From the news team, best wishes for the week ahead.
/EX
