SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE NEWS FOR SUNDAY 10 JUNE 2018
Good morning and welcome to the weekly news bulletin of the South African Radio League read by ................ [your name, call sign and QTH]
The South African Radio League broadcasts a news bulletin each Sunday in Afrikaans as well as English, at 08:15 and 08:30 Central African Time respectively, on HF as well as on various VHF and UHF repeaters around the country. The bulletin is relayed via Echolink by ZS6JPL. A podcast is available on the League website.
Audio and text bulletins may be downloaded from the League website at www.sarl.org.za where you can also sign up to receive future bulletins by e-mail.
We start the bulletin this morning with news of a silent key.
It is with deep regret that Boland Amateur Radio Club must announce the passing of Clyde Hyman, ZS1CS on Wednesday 6 June 2018.06.09
We extend our sincere condolences to his wife Linda, family and friends.
PAUSE
In the news, today:
THE HAMMIES SPRINT THIS AFTERNOON
NEW TEAM TAKES OVER KLETSKOUS SPACE FRAME DEVELOPMENT
and
ILLW REACHES 200 MARK
Stay tuned for more information on these and other interesting news items.
THE HAMMIES SPRINT THIS AFTERNOON
The Hammies Sprint is a fun activity to promote contacts between Hammies and radio amateurs in Southern African countries with an emphasis on ZU stations and takes place from 14:00 to 15:00 UTC this afternoon with phone activity between 7 063 to 7 100 and 7 130 to 7 200 kHz. The exchange is RS report and provincial abbreviation, stations outside South Africa will give a RS report and DX.
Contacts with stations in the same ZS region are worth 1 point and contacts with stations in other ZS regions or DX stations are worth 2 points. Contacts with the Hammies ARC, ZS1ZU, ZS2ZU, ZS3ZU, ZS4ZU and ZS6ZU or any other Hammies ARC that may be registered at the time are worth 5 points. Contacts with any ZU station are worth 3 points and contacts between ZU stations are worth 5 points.
Logs, in ADIF, Cabrillo or MS Excel format and labelled “my call sign Hammies,” shall be submitted by 17 June 2017 and sent by e-mail to chairman@zs6zu.org.za or zr6dx@iafrica.com. Certificates will be awarded to the First, Second and Third place and certificates will be awarded to the First, Second and Third place for ZU stations.
NEW TEAM TAKES OVER KLETSKOUS SPACE FRAME DEVELOPMENT
At the AMSAT SA Kletskous annual face to face team meeting a new team was appointed to take over the Kletskous Space Frame development and manufacture from the Cape Town based team. It will be led by Frik Wolff, ZS6FZ supported by Ton van den Bon, Riaan Greeff ZS4PR and Andries Smuts.
The first locally produced space frame was manufactured in a garage workshop by Deon Coetzee, ZR6DE. Deon engaged a student, Francois Oberholzer, at the University of Stellenbosch to take the original design further and develop a space frame that could be produced in quantities. Francois’ space frame flew on the October 2017 BACAR flight and performed exceptional well. The new team will further improve on the design. Last year Francoise Oberholzer graduated with master's degree based on Kletskous space frame design. Deon has no longer a garage workshop available but will continue in an advisory capacity. The new team's first task is to finalise and prove the design for the antenna and solar panels deployment system.
For more on this and other satellite stories visit www.amstasa.org.za
IARU HF CHAMPIONSHIPS AND WRTC-2018
The IARU HF Championships and WRTC-2018 will be on the air from 12:00 UTC on Saturday 14 July to 12:00 UTC on Sunday 15 July. Multipliers in this contest are Member Society HQ stations and IARU Officers. The SARL participates every year using the call sign ZS9HQ and the rules allow for multiple operators on different bands operating the call sign using CW and phone.
Please contact Geoff Levey, ZS6C on contest@sarl.org.za if you want to be part of the ZS9HQ team.
ILLW REACHES 200 MARK
It has been a very interesting week in our journey towards this year’s International Lighthouse Lightship Weekend (ILLW) event, which is now only two and a half months away.
The 200th entry was received from a YL in Wales who is going to activate the East Usk lighthouse which was built in 1893 on the East side of the river Usk. Margaret’s call sign will be GB4EUL.
According to the entry list, there are four South African Lighthouses on the list – Cape Hangklip, Green Point, Cape Point and Robben Island. We are on schedule for another great weekend, but it would be helpful if you could get your entry in as soon as possible rather than leave it to the final couple of weeks.
You are listening to a news Bulletin of the South African Amateur Radio League.
RSGB CONVENTION SDR LECTURE NOW ONLINE
The RSGB has released another 2017 Convention presentation into its online video portal. In his presentation “SDR - the station of the future”, John Linford, G3WGV looks at what software defined radio offers us as radio amateurs and what our stations might look like in a few years' time. SDR is as much a disruptive technology as were the advent of semiconductors or synthesisers. It is said that in five years it will no longer be possible to buy a new radio that is not SDR based. The presentation is available via www.rsgb.org/videos
EAST RAND RADIO CLUB FLEA MARKET
The East Rand Radio Club will be hosting their next flea market on Saturday 16 June starting at 12:00 CAT at the Club house in Ebenezer Road in Benoni. There will be a call in on 145,675 MHz. Bring all your unwanted stuff. There will be the best boerewors rolls and nice cold beverages. Bring the family or an upcoming radio amateur. E-mail zs6erb@gmail.com for more information or to book a table at R20 per table
CENTURION ARC AGM
The Centurion ARC, ZS6CEN, AGM will be held on Saturday 14 July 2018 at their Hatfield Clubhouse at the corner of Jan Shoba and Prospect streets. For further information, please contact Ken ZS6KN on 083 383 9281
PROPAGATION REPORT
Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the solar activity is expected to be at low levels. Currently there are no sunspots visible. If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected effective sunspot number for the week will be around one. The 20 and 30 m bands may provide lots of DX fun. Please visit the website spaceweather.sansa.org.za for further information.
Finally, a Diary of some upcoming events:
This afternoon - Hammies Sprint
16 June – the East Rand Club Flea Market
17 June - Father’s Day, World QRP Day and the closing date for Hammies Logs
21 June – the Winter Solstice
22 to 25 June – the SARL Top Band QSO Party
To conclude our bulletin a quick overview of our main news item:
The Hammies Sprint is a fun activity to promote contacts between Hammies and radio amateurs in Southern African countries with an emphasis on ZU stations and takes place from 14:00 to 15:00 UTC this afternoon with phone activity between 7 063 to 7 100 and 7 130 to 7 200 kHz. The exchange is RS report and provincial abbreviation, stations outside South Africa will give a RS report and DX.
This concludes our bulletin for this morning.
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 program, 'Amateur Radio Today' at 10:00 Central African Time. The program 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 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 Andy Cairns, ZS6ADY, edited by Dick Stratford, ZS6RO, and read by ..............
From the news team, best wishes for the week ahead.
/EX
