SARL NEWS - SUNDAY 09 MAY 2010

You are listening to ZS6SRL, the official radio station of the South
African Radio League, the national body for amateur radio in South
Africa, with a news bulletin every Sunday at 08:15 CAT in Afrikaans and
at 08:30 CAT in English. To listen to a webstream, visit
www.sarl.org.za, click on ARMI and follow the links for details. PLEASE
NOTE: for audio via Echolink, connect to ZS0JPL-R.

You can download this bulletin and previous ones from www.sarl.org.za
and also subscribe there to receive future bulletins by email.

Your newsreader this morning is (name), (call sign), on 145,725 and
7,066 MHz from Pretoria, with relays on 10,130, 7,066 and 3,695 MHz
SSB.

SILENT KEY

It is with regret that the South-Cape Amateur Radio Club must announce
that the key of Joseph Rozploch, ZS2JSR, went silent on Saturday
morning the 24 April due to a fatal heart attack whilst he took his dog
for a walk. ZS1SKR and the SARL passes their condolences to all family
and friends.

(PAUSE)

In the news today:

JOIN THE SARL NOW AND GET MAY AND JUNE FREE

SARL COUNCIL PORTFOLIOS

SARL RTA TO OFFER THREE NEW CONSTRUCTION KITS

You are listening to ZS6SRL. Stay tuned for more details on these and
other important and interesting news items.

JOIN THE SARL NOW AND GET MAY AND JUNE FREE

Join the SARL now and get May and June on the house. The membership fee
for the 2010/2011 year is R360 for full members and R225 for Senior
members. The Annual General meeting held in Port Elizabeth in April
approved a marginal increase in the membership fees. The new rates are
now available on www.sarl.org.za . A significant change is the
affiliation fee for clubs. It has been reduced to R120 per year. If
your club is not yet affiliated to the SARL do it now. Contact Mariska
at 011 675 2393 to join now or get the form online.

SARL COUNCIL AGREES ON PORTFOLIOS

At the first meeting of the newly elected Council of the SARL, held by
teleconference, portfolios and responsibilities were agreed upon as
follows:

Dennis Green, ZS4BS - President, HF Manager, Radio ZS; Mark Zank,
ZS6YES - Vice President, RAE and Office Manager; Henry Chamberlain,
ZS1AAZ - Secretary, Forum enquiries, Digital modes and IARU liaison;
Louw Erasmus, ZS6LME - Honorary legal advisor; Laurie Devereux, ZS5DL -
Minute secretary and Div 5 Band planning; Hans van de Groenendaal,
ZS6AKV - Regulatory Affairs, Marketing, WRC-12 workgroup, On-the-air
activities; Fred Scheepers, ZS1FCS - Elmer, IARU Monitoring Service and
IPHA (Handicapped amateurs); Ivan Newman, ZS2ILN - Membership
development and Club liaison, deputy web administrator; Gerhard
Coetzee, ZS3TG - Youth Events, Education and STARS; Francois Botha,
ZS6BUU - SARL Hamnet and Office logistics; John Willescroft, ZS6EF -
Technology Development; Willem Weideman, ZS6WWJ - QSL Manager; Riaan
Greef, ZS4PR - VHF/UHF and Microwave Manager; Frik Wolff, ZS6FZ -
Repeater Database.

Appointees: Rassie Erasmus, ZS1YT - Treasurer; Tjerk Lammers, ZS6P -
Awards Manager; Richard Seddon, ZS2CLI - Webmaster; George Honiball,
ZS6NE - SARLNEWS and translations; Geoff Levey, ZS6GRL - Contest
Manager; Derek Gravett, ZS5Y - VHF/UHF Contests.

WERE YOU INVOLVED IN THE SARL DUFF ROAD ACTIVITIES?

Ray Webber, ZS6RSW, is arranging an informal get-together of radio
amateurs who were involved at the SARL Johannesburg Branch and the Duff
Road clubhouse on Friday 21 May at 12:30 at Nino's at San Ridge Square
in Midrand. It is an open invitation. Everyone pays his or her own way.
Join in to reminisce about the good times in the 807. Please email Ray
with your details. His email address is .

SARL RTA TO OFFER THREE NEW CONSTRUCTION KITS

The first SARL Radio Technology in Action symposium will be held in
Durban on Saturday 29 May 2010 at the Durban Campus of the University
of KwaZulu-Natal.

The programme offers exciting presentations and discussions. This year
three construction kits will be available at the RTA. The kits are only
available to persons attending the RTA but may be pre-ordered and paid
for online or purchased and paid for at the actual event.

This year it is also possible to pre-book and pay the RTA registration
fee online. The fee is R50 which includes light refreshments at lunch
time and entry into the attendance draw. It will still be possible to
book at the door.

Registration for the Durban RTA will open on Monday. Get the full load
down on www.sarl.org.za and select RTA from there follow the links.

The three kits on offer a

DSSS kit: 100 mW on 40 m band. Two Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum
transceivers built in open pcb fashion as a learning tool for DSSS. All
sections of each transmitter and receiver are able to be explored and
tested with simple gear found in the shack. CD containing assembly and
operating instructions is supplied but no cables, cost R350.

TDR, Time Domain Reflectometry 1 GHz Sampling Scope. Specifically
designed for TDR work but can be used for other applications. It is a
USB device that plugs into a Laptop or PC and runs a Windows program in
the image of a normal scope. CD containing software, assembly, and
operating instructions is supplied but no cables are supplied, cost
R350.

DSP kit: Digital Signal Processing Speaker kit. For use on speaker
output of any device to reduce or eliminate noise. It is ideal for HF
Receivers. Built in open pcb fashion and ideal as a DSP learning tool.
CD containing assembly and operating instructions is supplied but no
cable, cost R325.

This project is fully presented in a technical presentation at the RTA.


SPECIAL STATION - ZS85SARL

The SARL was founded on the 25th May 1925 in Cape Town. To commemorate
the 85th anniversary of this event in Cape Town, a group of radio
amateurs will operate a station with the birthday call sign ZS85SARL on
Saturday 22 May from Cape Town. The station will be on the air on 80,
40 and 20 m from 08:00 till 20:00 CAT.

The main aim of the station will be to obtain a WAZS within 12 hours.

A special QSL card will be printed for this event. SARL members will
receive the QSL card at no cost via the bureau. Non-members will have
to provide a franked and addressed envelope to cover postage.

The station will be located at the Ysterplaat Air Force Base. As from
11:00 fires will be available for visitors who wish to braai and
operate the special call sign station and take part in the other
festive activities.

NATIONAL RAE CANDIDATE LIST AND EXAMINATION NUMBERS TO BE PUBLISHED
SOON

The SARL will be publishing all of the relevant RAE examination numbers
as well as allocating the examination venues by the close of this
weekend 09 May 2010. Please keep your eyes on the SARL web page for
updates as soon as they become available.

Letters regarding the examination details will be sent to each
candidate. The SARL urges each and every candidate to carefully check
their details and to notify Mariska at the SARL office should any
information be incorrect.

RaDAR CONTEST - CATEGORY SCORES

Over a 100 individual stations were logged during the April 2010 RaDAR
contest. Most stations took part for fun. A few Potchefstroom club
members took part individually sharing the same facilities and
certainly can be commended for their high club spirit. From the logs
received to date , the following category points were awarded:

Home stations using normal antennas and mains power. Theunis, ZS2EC/3
(QRP) - 43 Derek, ZS2J (QRP) - 20 Francois, ZS6BUU - 5.

Home stations not relying on their normal antennas or mains power.
None.

Portable operation not relying on mains power, including all mobile
stations. Andries, ZS6VL - 174 Pierre, ZS6BB (QRP) - 117 Coenie, ZS6PCO
- 33 Carl, ZS6CFW - 21 Nico, ZS6NVR - 21 Kevin, ZS6KMD (QRP) - 15 Mike
,ZS6MEG - 6.

True RaDAR portable operations not relying on existing antennas or
mains power. Tienie, ZS6MHH - 124.

True RaDAR portable operations as above and using QRP. Output power
limited to 5 watts PEP. Eddie, ZS6BNE (QRP) - 250 Christo, ZR6LJK (QRP)
- 210 Allen, ZR1AAH (QRP) - 105 John, ZS5J (QRP) - 45

Check log. Geoff, ZS6GRL.

PROPAGATION REPORT

Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the solar activity is still at low
levels. Fortunately the days with no sunspots are broken and sunspots 1
069 and 1 070 are putting the smiles back on HF communicators. The
effective sunspot number is expected to be less than 20 for the coming
week.

15 m will provide the best opportunities for DX followed by 17 and 20
m. Conditions to India will be good from the afternoons onwards. During
the late afternoons and early evenings it will be good towards Europa.
Contacts with the USA are once again becoming challenging. Contacts
with Australia and New Zealand will be challenging. During the
afternoons and evenings good 15 m contacts may also be possible with
Brazil.

Local conditions are going to be good on 40 m during the day time. 80 m
may perform well during the early mornings and late afternoons over the
shorter distances. 30 m will perform well during the middle of the day.
20 m is very useful for contacts over the longer distances during the
majority of the day.

80 m is the frequency of choice in the evenings. With the change of
season the noise levels are also decreasing and some top band activity
will once again become possible.

Please visit www.spaceweather.co.za for further information.

DIARY OF EVENTS

9 May - AWA Valve QSO Party; 16 May - SARL 85th Anniversary Sprint,
12:00-15:00 UTC; 21 May - Ray Webber's and Duff Road old timers meet at
12:30 at Nino's; 22 May - ZS85SARL, Special station on the air at
Ysterplaat; 29 May - RTA symposium in Durban; 24 July - RTA symposium
in Cape Town; 21 August - RTA symposium in Port Elizabeth; 31 August -
Closing date for submission of proposals for the 2011 SARL Contest
Manual; 18 September - RTA symposium in Gauteng; 30 September - closing
date for phase 1 of the Innovation project.

SARL News invites clubs and individuals to submit news items of
interest to radio amateurs and shortwave listeners. Submit news items,
if possible, in both English and Afrikaans to
www.sarl.org.za/newsinbox.asp, not later than the Thursday preceding
the bulletin date.

The SARL also invites you to listen to Amateur Radio Mirror
International every Sunday morning at 10:00 CAT on 145,750 MHz in the
Pretoria-area, with relays on 7 082, 7 205 and 17 560 kHz. There is
also a podcast by ZS6RO. For a webstream and Echolink by ZS6FCS, visit
www.sarl.org.za, click on 'ARMI' and follow the links. A repeat
transmission can be heard on Mondays at 21:00 CAT on 3 215 kHz. Sentech
sponsors the ARMI transmissions on the non-amateur frequencies.

You have listened to a bulletin of the South African Radio League,
compiled by George, ZS6NE. Thank you for listening, 73.
/EX