DXCC Rules Changes. At its 16 and 17 January Meeting, the ARRL Board of Directors decided to tweak "the DX Century Club (DXCC) rules to clarify and expand their recognition of remotely controlled station technology. It also has added a rule that puts greater ethical responsibility on operators with respect to remotely controlled operation.” The following was published on the ARRL's website on 21 January.            The DXCC Rules changes, which affect Section I, subsections 8 and 9, explain and extend how contacts with remotely controlled  stations  now  may be  applied  toward  the  DXCC  award. As ARRL CEO David Sumner, K1ZZ, explained the changes are subtle but significant. The modified rules make clear that contacts with legally licensed, land-based, remotely controlled stations count for DXCC, but the control point - the operator's location - of a remotely controlled station no longer has to be land  based; the operator can be literally anywhere.

"It has always been permitted for a QSO to count for both stations, if either station was operated remotely from a control point within the same DXCC entity," Sumner explained. "Now the location of the operator doesn’t matter; the operator could be on the far side of the Moon if he or she could figure out how to remotely control a station on land back on Earth from there." Transmitter location continues to define a station’s location and for DXCC purposes, all transmitters and receivers must be located within a 500-meter diameter circle, excluding antennas.

Under the old rules, if either station was operated from a control point in another DXCC entity, the contact did not count for DXCC for either station. "This was unenforceable unless someone was transparent about what they were doing," Sumner said.

The Board further adopted a new rule, now Subsection 11 (subsequent rules will be renumbered  accordingly), that acknowledges the reality of the technology enabling remote operation, and it puts greater responsibility on individuals when it comes to applying that technology ethically and responsibly.

 "Issues concerning remotely controlled operating and DXCC are best dealt with by each individual carefully considering the ethical limits that he/she will accept for his/her DXCC and other operating awards," the new rule states. It adds, in part, "The owner of these achievements needs to be comfortable standing behind his/her award and numbers. Peer attention has always been a part of awards chasing, of course, but in these times with so many awards and so many players, it is more important than ever to ‘play the game ethically.'"

Subsection 11 acknowledges that technological advances "add to the difficulty in defining rules for DXCC," but stresses that the intent of the rules is what are important. "It will continue to be up to the operator to decide what types of legal remote control  operating he/she will use (if any) to contribute to an operating award," the new rule concludes. 

QRZ supports LoTW. QRZ Logbook now recognises contact confirmations from ARRL's Logbook of The World and users now can download their contacts from Logbook of The World directly into their QRZ Logbook. QRZ.com has posted a LoTW Download Quick Start Guide. The QRZ.com User Support Centre can provide help with any problems or answer questions.

Malawi. Karl, DK2WV will be active again as 7Q7VW from Radio Dinosaur FM - Karonga Museum (WW Loc. KI60xb), Malawi, from 26 January to 6 February. He plans to be active on 160 to 6 metres. Some suggested frequencies: 50,105 MHz – 1,827 (1,817 only JA) – 3,507 – 7,007 SSB (QRM permitting). QSL via DK2WV. Website www.qrz.com/db/7Q7VW  

Namibia. Mario, DL4MFM, is going to work on 2 and 3 February from Fort Curt von Francois-Feste (von Francois Fort) (WCA V5-00005), Namibia. He plans to work as V5/DL4MFM. QSL via home call, Bureau or direct. 

# Link to SARL VHF, UHF & MICROWAVES DX TABLE Click here 

AN EARLY ANALYSIS OF THE PEARS NATIONAL VHF/UHF CONTEST – Weather once again affected conditions along the east coast, with rain on Friday night and gale force winds at East London on Saturday afternoon, including power outages in some areas. Nevertheless conditions were reasonable in other divisions based on logs so far received. The Hilites appear to be the number of digital contacts made from Namibia to Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and the Gauteng area on both 50 MHz and 144 MHz and the long distances covered. Another surprise was the first-ever Aircraft Scatter contact made in South Africa during a VHF contest between Ettienne ZS1AX and Pine ZS6OB on 50 MHz Digital. As the logs start coming in we will have a better idea about analogue long distance activity, and how the new divisional 144,400 MHz FM category fared. But it appears that a number of ROVER stations were also active. 

What we did notice in Division 2 is that local activity was down with reference to last year mainly due to the absence of our star field stations Allan ZS2BO and Terence ZS2VDL who kept the bands alive. Terence informed us that due to commitments they had to miss the PEARS contest this year but will be back with a bang next year. Over the years it has been observed that field stations do have a tremendous effect on local participation. In the early days the SARL VHF contests blossomed because many Club stations participated. 

Please make a sincere effort to submit your log sheet as long as it contains the date, time, station worked, signal report received and grid locator. We will sort it out and calculate the distance. Your log is also needed for us to analyze and assess the footprint of VHF activity in this country. 

FIRST-EVER AIRCRAFT SCATTER CONTACT DURING A VHF/UHF CONTEST – History was made on Sunday when the first-ever Aircraft Scatter (AS) two-way digital QSO was made in South Africa during a VHF contest, and a WSJT screenshot depicted the event dated 2015 JAN 18 10:19:46. This feat was accomplished by Ettienne Vosloo, ZS1AX, at Cape Town and Jan “Pine” Pienaar, ZS6OB, at Pretoria with their FSK441 contact on 50,233 MHz over a distance of 1290 km. This is also a new SARL Aircraft Scatter record on 50 MHz. ZS1AX wish to express his thanks to ZS6OB for his guidance that made this contact possible. Congratulations to both of you 

REPORT OF PEARS VHF/UHF CONTEST FROM CAPE TOWN –  “Thank you to PEARS for organising this contest - it was a lot of fun getting "out and about", and a good opportunity to test out my homebrew portable Yagi antenna. 

“I could unfortunately not operate from the same location for both sessions, and as such submit a log for 2 different locations - one for each session.  Both stations were portable field stations - the first at a residential property, the 2nd on top of Tygerberg hill. My initial plan was to enter in category F as a mobile station, but with few stations on frequency, I abandoned that idea and QSY'd. 

“Therefore not sure which category this now fits into?  Maybe the limited mobile category if contact #4 is excluded?  Whichever way, feel free to enter it in any category that you deem fit. Next time I'll be ready with a "real" radio. Thanks again! 73,  Stéan ZS1SGS”. 

EARLY TEP OPENING ON 50 MHz – Pierre van Deventer, ZS6A, recorded an unexpected and early opening into Europe on 50 MHz that lasted for almost 2 hours. He managed to work: 9A, CT, EA, EA6, F, HA, HB9, I, OE, OM, S5, SV, YT and YU (sadly, no EP6T). 

VHF ACTIVITY TO CONTINUE AFTER THE PEARS VHF/UHF CONTEST – Ben ZS5QM at Hilton suggested that we must keep the VHF activity alive now that the PEARS VHF/UHF contest is over, and watch the Hepburn Forecasts. Mike ZS1TAF at Cape Town agrees and says he will be looking out for ZS6JPY (Div. 3), V51PJ, V51LZ and V51B. In Port Elizabeth Andre ZS2ACP and Ken ZS2OC are regularly on the air, but ZS2FM’s beam antennas are still down. Peter ZS2ABF, John ZS2AH and Hennie ZS2HC are active in East London while Dave ZS5DJ holds the fort in Ramsgate. Of course, there are many VHF-ers in Gauteng area. 

NO RADIO SIGNALS FROM KEPLER 116454b PLANET – The planet is known as Kepler 116454b, and orbits an orange dwarf star in the constellation Pisces. It is 180 light-years away. Jon Richards, of the SETI Institute's Center for SETI Research, used the Allen Telescope Array to look for signals over the frequency range of 1000 – 2250 MHz. The planet orbits its home star in 9 days in an orbit three times smaller than Mercury's orbit around the Sun. Consequently, temperatures on this world – which is a so-called "super Earth" and larger than Earth but smaller than Neptune – are expected to be too hot for life as we know it. Nonetheless, and as centuries of experience have shown, observation sometimes trumps expectation, and that is why new exoplanets – whether they seem promising for life or not – are routinely observed by the SETI Institute with the Allen Telescope Array.

The PEARS National VHF/UHF Contest: Introduction - The PEARS National VHF/UHF contest will take place from 16 to 18 January 2015 and is open to all licensed amateurs in the Republic of South Africa, as well as non-members of the South African Radio League, including those from the neighbouring states. The aim of a VHF/UHF contest is to stimulate activity on these bands, make many long distance contacts possible, establish new records, encourage the improvement of VHF/UHF equipment and advance amateur radio. Dates and Times: The first 22-hour session of the VHF/UHF contest starts at 16:00 UTC on Friday 16 January and closes at 14:00 UTC on Saturday 17 January. The second 22-hour session commences immediately after 14:00 UTC on Saturday and ends at 12:00 UTC on Sunday 18 January 2015.

Hungarian DX Contest: Goals: to promote the traditionally good friendship between the radioamateurs. Date and time: The 3rd full weekend of January, between Saturday 12:00 UT to Sunday 11:59 UT.Participants: any licensed radioamateur station or SWL. Frequencies:  1,8 - 28 MHz (no WARC bands). Modes: CW and SSB. Contacts: Any station can be contacted during the contest. Every station can be contacted once per band and mode. Exchange: RS(T) + QSO number starting with 001. MM stations shall use separate serial numbers per band, starting with 001.

SARL QRP Contest: Aim - The QRP contests are intended to be fun activities to promote QRP operation between radio amateurs. Using homebuilt equipment or operating as a portable / field station and using temporary antennas is encouraged, but is not a requirement. Dates and times - Summer – from 12:00 to 15:00 UTC on Saturday 24 January 2015. General Info - Modes: SSB and CW, Power: 5 watts (PEP) output or less. A station may be worked once per band per mode. There are no antenna restrictions. Frequency - The first hour is limited to the 40 m band only, the remaining two hours the contesters are free to use any HF (non-WARC) band as they see fit. Exchange - RS(T) and Grid locator.

French HF Championship:  Objective - Foreign amateurs work as many F stations in as many of the 97 metropolitans departments (including F6REF HQ) and overseas French territories (DOM/TOM) as possible. Contest period -  CW: Last full weekend in January. Contest Period: 36 hours Starts 0600 UTC Saturday; ends 1800 UTC Sunday Bands and modes: 80, 40, 20, 15, 10 m,  Exchange:  F stations send RST+Dept (or Prefix for overseas French stations)  Non-F stations send RST + serial number (beginning with 001)

BARTG RTTY Sprint: Date and Time: 1200Z, Jan 24 to 1200Z, Jan 25. Bands: 10, 15, 20, 40 and 80 metres. EXCHANGE: 3 or 4 figure Serial number only. (No RST – This is a SPRINT Contest) e.g. 001 or 0001……..or 199 or 1024……

UBA DX Contest: Purpose - To contact as many Belgian and other amateurs as possible and to provide a way to achieve the WABP and the EC Awards in the "UBA Contest". Periods - SSB - January 31 - February 1, 2015 - From 13:00 UTC on Saturday to 13:00 UTC on Sunday. 4 – Bands - 80, 40, 20, 15 and 10 metres. 

Battery Clinic Midrand: Car batteries; truck batteries; alarm/gate motor batteries; Intelligent chargers & other accessories; new or ‘Re-new’ batteries. Discounts where possible for Ham Radio operators.  www.batteryclinic.co.za Contact Nigel (ZR6NGB) 011 028 1146, Email: nigel@batteryclinic.co.za 

MEGE electrical control & automation
Mege electrical control & automation is in the business of designing and manufacturing of control panels for the industry. Installation of frequency drives, PLCs, mimic panels. Temperature controllers, thermocouples, RTDs, electric and gas ovens.  Gas detectors, hygrometers. Fire, heat and smoke detectors. Back-up generators. Solar panels, regulators. Earthing and lightning protection. Contact Eddie (ZS6DAY) at 082 330 3558, or megecontrol@gmail.com 

Tell me more  about Amateur Radio

Radio Amateurs, or "Hams" use two-way radio communication to make contact with other radio amateurs all over the world. They are even able to use satellites and on occasion speak with astronauts. Radio Hams can do this from home or while mobile in cars, boats or on foot.

Radio Hams have a full range or communication modes at their disposal. These include plain voice, Morse code, numerous digital computer modes and even graphical modes like television. As a licensed amateur radio operator you will be able to join in experiments using all these modes.

Amateur radio can be enjoyed by young and old, male and female, even the most severely disabled can make friends around the world from their own home. This hobby knows no boundaries.

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