SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE NEWS SUNDAY 17 July 2016

Good morning and welcome to the South African Radio League weekly news
bulletin for 17 July 2016, 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 Local Time in Afrikaans and at 08:30 Local
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.

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.

We sadly kick of this bulletin with news of a silent key this morning.
It is with sadness that we note the passing of Tom Cooper, ZS1PS, early
on Tuesday morning. Tom was first licensed at the age of 17, he died at
age 82 - an active ham for many years. He came to Cape town from
Pretoria around 2001 where he held the call sign ZS6TC and was
instrumental with Buddy, ZS1MP, in starting the FBARC at Fish Hoek high
school 30 years ago.

Tom was an active council member of FBARC and Editor of the club
magazine "Dialog" for many years. He joined the SARL in July 1951 with
an unbroken membership of 65 years.

Tom was a member of the Engineering Council of South Africa for many
years and was an expert in the registration of Professional Engineers
and Technicians. Employed by Armscor. he also worked for periods in
England and Italy. Our sincerest condolenses to his relatives and
friends [PAUSE]

IN THE NEWS TODAY

SIXTH YOUNGSTERS ON THE AIR WEEK

SARL HALL OF FAME NOW ON THE WEB

BURSARY FOR RAE STUDENTS

** Yesterday Saturday 16 July, the 6th Youngsters on the Air week
started with over 100 youngsters from 30 Region-1 member societies,
including an IARU Region-2 team from USA, and a team from South Africa.
The YOTA week is being hosted by the Austrian member society, OeVSV at
Wagrain in the Austrian mountains. OeVSV is proudly celebrating their
90th anniversary. The youngsters will be having a lot of fun with
amateur radio, there will be many workshops, they will be optimising
their skills in electronics and contesting and will make new
international friends. Some activities are - SOTA, COTA, propagation in
an ice cave, constructing a homebrew HF antenna and using the antenna
for a SOTA station, working with a Raspberry Pi and making a WSPR
beacon or using it with DV4mini for digital voice, HAMNET (amateur
radio and internet network) and the famous inter-cultural evening where
everyone brings food and drinks from their home country. On Monday 18
July at 10:25 UTC, there will be a telebridge ARISS contact with
astronaut Jeff Williams, KD5TVQ, which will give the youth an
unforgettable experience. More information and live updates of the
event are available at www.ham-yota.com/austria/. If you would like to
make a QSO with one of the youngsters, listen out for OE2YOTA which
will be on air on most bands using several different modes.

** At the SARL Annual General meeting Awards Dinners the first
inductees into the SARL Amateur Radio Hall of Fame were announced. A
short article on each person is now available on www.sarl.org.za.
Follow the link from the home page. The SARL Amateur Radio Hall of Fame
is on the agenda of the Special General Meeting. Tjerk Lammers ZS6P
will explain the election process followed during the first round. He
will also table a proposal to amend the rules to allow for another 10
persons to be inducted at the next AGM. If approved the nomination
process will open for the 2017 round shortly after the SGM. The South
African Amateur Radio Development Trust Tony Reumerman bursary fund is
making two bursaries available for radio amateur examination students
under 25 years old who are planning to write the October 2016
examination. Each bursary is valued at R1000 to pay for examination
fees and towards tuition fees. To apply complete the form which is
available on www.amateurradio.org.za. Closing date is 15 August.

** To date the South African Radio League already has 971 members for
the 2016/2017 financial year. Twenty-six clubs have renewed their
affiliation. Membership fees were payable on 30 June, but the database
will only be cleared at the end of August. If you wish to pay in
instalments, please arrange with the League office.

Applications for membership of the SARL have been received from the
following persons: ZS1LJ Liam Jordan. Any objections to the acceptance
of the applications must reach the Secretary before or on the Tuesday
after this bulletin.

** This is the coldest winter that we have experienced for many years
with many cold fronts coming up from the cold South Atlantic Ocean and
crossing the South and East Coasts. Under these conditions the air
temperature recorded on the Earth's surface gradually decreases as the
altitude increases, when there are no layers of warm air present that
can create temperature inversions, then Tropo Enhancement and Ducting
cannot exist. Fortunately the warmer days will start coming back in
August and for the next eight months or longer we will enjoy again very
strong openings on Tropospheric propagation making very long distance
contacts possible on VHF.

** The organizers of the ZS5 sprint expresses their thanks for the
great participation in our ZS5 Sprint. Conditions were very trying, on
the day, with a lot of different divisions in each others skip zones,
but never-the-less a great result judging by the number of logs they
received. A total of 26 logs were received. The first three places go
to: 1) ZS2DK Mitch Rundle 91 Points 2) ZS5DCF Deon Fraser 69 Points 3)
ZS1TMJ Sydney Smith 66 Points

** The Centurion Radio Amateur Club held its 41st AGM on Saturday 9th
July, 2016 and the following members were elected to the committee:
Chairman: Pam Momberg ZS6APT Vice Chairman: Wally Moll ZS6BCI
Secretary: Billy Strumpher ZS6WPS Treasurer: Pam Momberg ZS6APT
Technical: Johan Keulder ZS6CAQ Social: Gert Viljoen ZR6BV

Congratulations to the new committee.

** At the 60th AGM of the West Rand Amateur Radio Club held on the 9th
of July 2017 the following committee have been elected: Chairman: Geoff
Levey - ZS6C Vice Chairman: Nic Van Duffelen - ZR6AEZ Treasurer Gert Du
Plessis - ZS6GRT Secretary Phillip Van Tonder - ZS6PVT Members Rory
Crouch - ZS6RBJ, Michelle McNelly - ZS6MEM, Graham McNelly - ZS6GPM,
Mileham - ZS6WTF Co-opted members Keith Liddle - ZS6AGF, Willem
Weideman - ZS6X, John Brock - ZS6WL, Nick Dreyer - ZS6NCK
Congratulation to the new club committee and a big thank you to the
outgoing committee.

** The ZS2 Sprint is a fun activity to promote contacts between radio
amateurs in the Eastern Cape and radio amateurs in Southern African
countries. The Sprint will take place next Sunday 24 July 2016 from
14:00 to15:00 UTC. It is a phone and CW contest on the 40-metre band
with CW between 7 000 to 7 040 kHz and phone between 7 063 to 7 100 and
7 130 to 7 200 kHz and the exchange is a RS or RST report and
provincial or country abbreviation. Scoring for ZS2 stations is 1 point
per contact with stations in ZS2 and 2 points per contact with stations
in other ZS call areas or Southern African countries. For all other
stations it is 2 points per contact with stations in ZS2 and 1 point
per contact with stations in own or other ZS call areas (excluding ZS2)
or Southern African countries. Contacts with the Port Elizabeth Amateur
Radio Society, ZS2PE, or the Border Radio Club, ZS2BRC, are worth 5
points each. Only one contact per station is allowed. Log sheets in
ADIF, Cabrillo or MS Excel format and labelled "your call sign ZS2
Sprint," must be submitted by 31 July 2016 and sent to
. Certificates will be awarded to the 1st 2nd and
3rd place. This will only happen if more than five logs are submitted

** The SARL newsteam consists of a group of volunteers who compile the
news stories sent in via the SARL webpage into a news bulletin for
consumption by all on a Sunday morning. The group started out a few
years ago with just two members but have grown steadily to the present
12 members. We would like to grow the group some more and now invite
our amateur friends to join the group with your special skills.

The team is divided into groups. Each team is responsible for the
bulletin roughly every three weeks. Should you feel you can dedicate
about an hour every third or fourth week to amateur radio and you wish
to join our team in bringing the rest of the South African amateur
radio community up to date with the latest happenings on the amateur
radio front, please contact Dawie, ZR6DHC, via email on


PROPAGATION REPORT Hannes Coetzee, ZS6BZP, reports that the solar
activity is expected to remain at low levels. All the visible sunspots
are currently stable with very little chance of serious solar flares.
If you want to do your own frequency predictions, the expected
effective sunspot number for the week will be around 28. The 20 m band
and will provide lots DX fun. Please visit the website
spaceweather.sansa.org.za for further information.

Before we sign off let us look at some important upcoming events: From
now until 23 July - the IARU Region 1 Summer Youth Camp in Austria 24
July - the ZS2 Sprint 30 July - South Afrian Radio League Special
General Meeting 30 July - Centurion Amateur Radio Club 41st Anniversary
30 July - SARL SGM at the NARC 30 and 31 July - RSGB IOTA Contest And
that 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 not later than the Thursday preceding the bulletin
date.

Persons interested in becoming involved with the SARL news team may
contact for more information.

We also invite you to join us every Sunday morning for the weekly
amateur radio magazine programme 'Amateur Radio Today' at 10 hours
local time, 08 hours UTC. The programme may 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
. Sentech sponsors the radio transmissions on the
non-amateur frequencies. You have listened to a news bulletin compiled
by Dawie Conradie, ZR6DHC, edited by Dick Stratford, ZS6RO, and read by
............... From the news team, best wishes for the week ahead.

/EX

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