SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE NEWS SUNDAY 22 JUNE 2014

Good morning and welcome. You are tuned to ZS6SRL the official voice of the South African Radio League. The South African Radio League broadcasts a weekly news bulletin on HF and many VHF/UHF repeaters every Sunday morning at 08:15 CAT in Afrikaans and at 08:30 CAT in English. Listeners on Echolink may connect to ZS0JPL for a streamed version.

You may download an audio version of this bulletin by following the link on the front page of the South African Radio League website at www.sarl.org.za. While you are there, you may also obtain a text version of this bulletin. You may also sign up to receive future bulletins via e-mail.

This bulletin is read by …………………………… (your name, call sign and QTH where applicable)

We start this news bulletin with news of a silent key.

It is with regret that the Pretoria Amateur Radio Club must announce the passing of Joe (Jannie) van der Lingen, ZS6AIC, on Thursday 5 June.

We extend our sincere condolences to his wife, Ellen, family and friends.

PAUSE

In the News today

THE IARU HF CHAMPIONSHIP

DR DAVID WARDLAW, VK3ADW, RECEIVES THE MICHAEL J. OWEN, VK3KI, MEMORIAL AWARD

and

THE 39TH INTERNATIONAL "HAM RADIO" EXHIBITION

The leading story this week


==> The call sign ZS9HQ was assigned to the South African Radio League by ICASA and will be operated from the National Amateur Radio Centre during the IARU HF Championships. South African Radio League President, Geoff Levey, ZS6C is inviting radio amateurs to join him for the contest. Both phone and CW contesters are required. Please send an email to Geoff at contest@sarl.org,za with your call sign and contact details. He will contact you to discuss the operational schedule.

The IARU HF Championship takes place on the second full weekend of July. The contest begins on Saturday 12 July at 12:00 UTC and ends on Sunday 13 July at 12:00 UTC. The objective of the IARU HF Championships is to contact as many other amateurs, especially IARU member society HQ stations, around the world as possible using phone and CW on 160, 80, 40, 20, 15 and 10 metres. The contest exchange - IARU member society HQ stations send signal report and official IARU member society abbreviation, e.g. 59SARL. Members of the IARU Administrative Council and the three IARU regional Executive committees send "AC," "R1,""R2," and "R3" as appropriate. All others send signal report and ITU zone. A complete ex-change must be logged for each valid QSO. The ITU zone for South Africa is 57


==> Former IARU Vice President, Dr David Wardlaw, VK3ADW, received the Michael J. Owen, VK3KI, Memorial Award during a recent reception at the Wireless Institute of Australia (WIA) headquarters. David, VK3ADW, the second of the two inaugural recipients of the honour, was recognized for his contributions to the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU). Wojciech Nietyksza, SP5FM, received the Michael J. Owen Award last month.

IARU President Tim Ellam, VE6SH/G4HUA, who presented the award, called David "an effective representative of both Amateur Radio and the Australian administration at the ITU."

Michael Owen, who served as the IARU Region 3 chairman and WIA president, died in 2012. With Michael, David was part of Australia's delegation to the World Administrative Radio Conference 1979 (WARC-79), in which Amateur Radio gained access to 30, 17, and 12 metres. In the 1980s and 1990s, David served as an IARU Region 3 director before becoming Vice President. Ironically, it was David who, years earlier, got a young Michael Owen interested in amateur radio.

At the 2013 IARU Administrative Council meeting in Mexico, the Administrative Council unanimously chose Wojciech, SP5FM and David, VK3ADW, as joint recipi-ents of the Michael J. Owen Award.


==> On Saturday 14 June 2014, the first HF and first UHF summit-to-summit QSOs in South Africa took place. The HF QSO took place at 09:09 UTC on 7 090 kHz with 59 signals both ways. The QSO took place between Willie, ZS6WBT, on Wynberg, MP-005 and Dennis, ZS4BS, on Mount Paul, FS-012.

The UHF summit-to-summit QSO took place at 10:13 UTC on 437,900 MHz FM via the parrot repeater on-board the HABEX balloon. Gert, ZS6GC, on Wynberg, MP-005 and Dennis, ZS4BS on Mount Paul, FS-102 made this QSO. Thank you to the HABEX team for your assistance!

The Secunda ARC activated Wynberg, MP-005 on Saturday 14 June, Kanonkop, MP-007 on Sunday 15 June and Ossewakop, MP-004 on Monday 16 June. Dennis, ZS4BS, activated Mount Paul, FS-012 on Saturday 14 June and Surrender Hill FS-013 on Monday 16 June.

UHF ACTIVITY

Etienne, ZS6Y, informed the News team that he worked Willem, ZS6WAB, on Saturday morning 21 June on 1 296 MHz FM as well as SSB. The signals were mostly 55 with 59 on the peaks. The distance between ZS6Y and ZS6WAB was 264 km.

You are tuned to a news bulletin of the South African Radio League and now we look at what some consider Europe's answer to the Dayton Hamvention®


==> The 39th International "Ham Radio" exhibition, gets underway on Friday 27 June in Friedrichshafen, on the shores of Lake Constance in southern Germany. Thou-sands of radio amateurs and electronics enthusiasts will converge on the Messe Friedrichshafen convention centre and surrounding fairgrounds for the event. Some 200 exhibitors and organizations from more than 2 dozen countries will be represented in the exhibit hall. The Deutscher Amateur Radio Club (DARC) has chosen "Creative Amateur Radio - Build It Yourself" as the theme for this year's show.

ARC spokesman Axel Voigt, DO1ELL said that Building things yourself has played an important role in Amateur Radio for a long time. The pioneers of Amateur Radio experimented, built their own equipment, optimized it, and laid the foundations upon which Amateur Radio operates today.

The DARC will hold its 65th Lake Constance Conference during the weekend of Ham Radio. The Continent's biggest ham radio show will wrap up on Sunday 29 June.


==> Thursday 19 June saw the successful launch of the FUNcube-3 satellite from Dombarovsky near Yasny in the Russian Federation. It was one of 12 satellites car-rying amateur radio payloads and part of a constellation of 37 satellites on the aboard the Dnepr rocket.

Described as a fast-track mission to provide a transponder-only payload on a 2U CubeSat, FUNcube-3 is part of the precursor programme for the forthcoming QB50 mission. The satellite carries a FUNcube inverting 400 mW SSB/CW linear trans-ponder with 70 cm input and 2 m output, plus a telemetry beacon on 145,815 MHz. A second QB50 precursor satellite, QB50p2, has beacons on 145,880 and 145,840 MHz, plus a 70 cm to 2 m FM transponder that is expected to be switched on in the coming months.

More details can be found at http://funcube.org.uk/

THE PROPAGATION REPORT

Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the expected solar activity will be at moder-ate to low levels. All of the visible sunspots are currently stable and do not pose a threat for strong solar flares.

If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected effective sunspot number for the week will be around 40.

All the bands from 20 to 10 m will provide lots of DX fun with 20 m providing the best openings with 15 m not far behind.

Please visit the website spaceweather.sansa.org.za for further information.

WHAT IS IN THE DIARY OF EVENTS TODAY?

Midnight UTC tonight is the end of the South African Radio League Top Band QSO Party
27 to 29 June – 2014 Ham Radio in Friedrichshafen
1 July – SARL Subscriptions due
12 and 13 July – IARU HF Championships
19 July – Winter QRP Contest

You can get more information on these and other happenings on the South African Radio League website at www.sarl.org.za

We end this week’s news with a look back at our top story

The call sign ZS9HQ was assigned to the South African Radio League by ICASA and will be operated from the National Amateur Radio Centre during the IARU HF Championships. South African Radio League President, Geoff Levey, ZS6C is inviting radio amateurs to join him for the contest. Both phone and CW contesters are required. Please send an email to Geoff at contest@sarl.org,za with your call sign and contact details. He will contact you to discuss the operational schedule.

That brings us to the end of this week’s news

The South African Radio League invites you to listen to Amateur Radio Today every Sunday morning at 10:00 local time on 145,750 MHz in the Pretoria area, and on the 145,650 network in Johannesburg with relays on 7 082, 7 205, and 17 660 kHz. There is a podcast by Dick, ZS6RO. For web-streaming and Echolink by Chris, ZS6FCS, visit www.sarl.org.za, click on 'Amateur Radio Today', go down the green column and click on 'LISTEN ON THE WEB'.

A repeat transmission can be heard on Mondays at 16:30 UTC on 3 230 kHz. The website also lists various other retransmissions. Reception reports, comments and suggestions are invited. Send an email to artoday@sarl.org.za. Sentech sponsors the transmissions on the non-amateur frequencies.

South African Radio League News invites clubs and individuals to submit news items of interest to radio amateurs and short-wave listeners. Submit news items, if possible in both English and Afrikaans, to www.sarl.org.za/newsinbox.asp, no later than the Thursday preceding the bulletin date.

You have listened to a bulletin of the South African Radio League compiled by Dennis Green, ZS4BS.

Thank you for listening.

/EX