AUG 5 2018 - VK NATIONAL NEWS BROADCAST ON VK1WIA ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE BEST NEWS YOU'LL GET ALL WEEK Oh... and to contact us with your news because If It Matters To You It Matters To Us! Email nationalnews@wia.org.au http://www.wia.org.au (click news in member area) Submit your audio news TWITTER http://twitter.com/VK1WIA Please... If you are only submitting text and not audio, write your story as you would expect to hear it being read back and NEVER send just links & url's. When you upload audio email us the txt version. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- NATIONAL NEWS FOR WEEK COMMENCING AUG 5 2018. IN OUR 23rd YEAR OF NON STOP NEWS WIA sponsor special event callsigns till end of 2018. - WIA Director Greg VK2GPK, with Board Comment. - WIA Flagship Contest NEXT weekend. THESE STORIES AND MORE IN THIS EDITION OF NEWS FROM THE WIRELESS INSTITUTE OF AUSTRALIA 2018 AND FOR WEEK OF AUGUST 05 Buy Swap and Sell and Wanted Note - there has been an increase in operators discussing buying and selling of equipment on Amateur Radio Frequencies. This is being done by operators holding any class of licence. You need to know this is a breach of Australian Law. Haggle, Discuss or Bargain face to face, or on the telephone. Be Responsible ! Now ! (Townsville Amateur Radio Club) Are you planning to communicate with a small satellite or CubeSat? ACMA have recently put up a self-help guide, aimed more at the people, organisations without ham radio licences. BUT all should read, and take heed. Small satellite / CubeSat design has brought with it dramatically lower construction and launch costs, enabling a larger range of organisations to participate in the satellite industry. Organisations such as universities, research bodies, and start-up companies that previously found it cost prohibitive to launch their own satellite can now build and operate satellites for a range of communication, earth observation and space exploration purposes. What do you need to do before launching or communicating with a satellite? Talk to ACMA about your requirements and what you need to do. The Australian Space Agency administers additional Australian regulations under the Space Activities Act 1998 which apply to the launch of a space object in Australia and the launch of an Australian space object overseas. Please contact the Australian Space Agency for further information about how these regulations apply to your space activity. The ACMA carries out compliance activities to ensure that radio communication activity in Australia is undertaken legally. It is an offence to operate a radiocommunications device in Australia without a licence. When this occurs, the ACMA is authorised to issue fines or, for serious offences, commence criminal prosecution. Operating a satellite without approval may cause interference to existing services and you are also at risk of receiving interference to your own satellite (which could result in mission failure). Read more on acma.gov.au (*/engage) The WIA is sponsoring several special event callsigns that will be available between now and the end of 2018. There are time slots available for operators to make use of the callsigns to commemorate the special events. Please note that each of the callsigns are advanced grade, and an advanced operator will need to make application. The three events are as follows: The WIA is commemorating Region 3 of the IARU 50 years of operation with the callsign VI 50 IARU 3. This event is currently running and will continue until the end of August 2018. The event involves all Region 3 amateur radio country representatives. There are August time slots available. September is the 100th Anniversary of the first radio contact between the Marconi station in Wales and with Mr. Ernest Fisk (AWA) Sydney Australia. This event is using VI # MARCONI special event callsign. The event will run from 0000UTC on the 1st September to 2359UTC on the 30th September. On November 11th 2018 is the 100th anniversary of the Armistice agreement that ended the hostilities in WWI. This is the culmination of the WIA ANZAC commemoration that the WIA has facilitated. The event will make use of two special event callsigns VI # LWF and VI # PEACE. The event will run from the 0000UTC on the 3rd November until 2359UTC on the 11th November. The time slots for this event are for 24 hours. There is more information relating to these events on wia.org.au Should you wish to participate please email vk3dac@wia.org.au WIA This is Greg VK2GPK, one of the directors of the WIA, with this week’s edition of the WIA Board comment. This week my focus will be the on the finalisation of the WIA LCD submission to ACMA and the final feedback survey results used to ratify the proposed LCD changes in our submission. Earlier this week, on Monday to be specific, the WIA submitted its response to the Australian Communications Management Authority (ACMA) consultation document regarding potential variations to the current (2015) Radio-communications Licence Conditions (Amateur Licence) Determination. This is a relatively rare periodic opportunity to update and improve the licence conditions for which the WIA has historically provided input for changes over many decades. In June the WIA sought the response of the amateur radio community in relation to the draft WIA Licence Condition Determination (LCD) submission to the Australian Communications and Media Authority. The 2018 LCD Submission is the non-trivial result of four years of effort by WIA volunteers including multiple surveys. The WIA in the compilation of these final documents over that time considered a large number of both member and non-member inputs and responses to surveys carefully. However, it must be stated that the submission represents a composite view that won’t please every radio amateur as a number of the suggestions were mutually exclusive. As wisely stated in John Lydgate’s proverb “ you can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”. However, from the feedback from the survey, we believe we achieved a compromise that met with the overall approval of the great majority of respondents. Some highlights are: That even though the survey was only open for two weeks there were over 500 responses from around Australia! Whilst this is a small percentage of the total amateur radio community, it is statistically significant, and is one of highest response rates we have ever received. Survey summary: Support for General Principles – 96% Support for Foundation Licence Conditions change – 83% Support for Standard Licence Conditions change – 88% Support for Advanced Licence Conditions change – 95% Main respondent group from Advanced licenced amateurs - 74% Good representation and correlation with licence numbers in all VK call areas Total survey respondents: 501 (3.5% of licenced amateurs in VK) 382 people left their email address for further information about the submission There were hundreds of supporting comments to each of the five submission questions. Whilst I don’t have time to elaborate on the detail of our LCD submission today in this broadcast, it will be available, as well as survey results and verbatim, on the WIA website. Please take a few minutes to read it, if you haven’t done so already – it’s your hobby! It won’t surprise many that evolving the Foundation Licence conditions was an area of keen interest in the input we received from the radio amateur cohort – particularly in making this entry path more relevant to newcomers to the hobby but without making the entry technical hurdle too daunting. The WIA is actively lobbying to get these LCD changes across the regulatory "abyss" for all amateurs in Australia. There is absolutely no certainty that any of our proposals will be granted by the ACMA. Indeed, the ACMA have already replied to the Five Year Spectrum Outlook submission. They have indicated that they are unlikely to accept many of the proposed changes even though these changes would align with current IARU / ITU international planning and agreements. You are encouraged to lobby the ACMA direct and also lobby your local federal member in support of important changes that directly impact your hobby.. Greg VK2GPK on behalf of the WIA board ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- INTERNATIONAL NEWS With thanks to IARU, RSGB, SARL, Southgate AR Club, ARRL, Amateur Radio Newsline, RAC, NZART and the World Wide sources of the WIA. UK NEW TEAM TO MONITOR AIRWAVES IN GREAT BRITAIN The Radio Society of Great Britain is making changes in how operator behaviour gets monitored. There, an official team of volunteers that has been reporting problematic on-air behaviour and equipment issues is being disbanded. The Radio Society of Great Britain, the RSGB, has long relied on the efforts of the Amateur Radio Observation Service for second opinions on a variety of these issues and has decided to re-focus on how to address these important operating matters. During the next few months the Society will convene a new team called the Operating Advisory Service, or OAS. OAS participants will monitor the bands for such misuses as call-sign pirating, abuse of repeaters and on-air harassment of amateurs. Announcing the change, the Society said it had taken a hard look at the previous way of doing things and decided to give the new team responsibility for developing written recommendations to be published on the website. The team will concentrate on ideas for best practice. The RSGB noted that this change does not have any impact on Intruder Watch which is the Society’s portion of the overall IARU monitoring system that reports on non-amateur signals that are heard on the HF amateur bands. USA The FCC has issued a Notice of Apparent Liability proposing to fine KC5CSG, $18,000 “for apparently causing intentional interference and for apparently failing to provide station identification on amateur radio frequencies,” the FCC said. In the wake of complaints, FCC agents visited the area, tracked transmissions on 146.130 MHz to KC5CSG's residence, and monitored them for up to 7 hours. The agent reported hearing “music on 146.130 MHz and warning other amateur operators that the local Amateur Radio club would not be able to conduct their net later that day.” That evening, at a location near the local W5BII repeater, the agent said, KC5CSG “began transmitting an amateur digital radio signal from a hand-held radio in his vehicle,” disrupting the net and failing to identify. Subsequently, the agent, accompanied by a deputy from the Sheriff’s Office, confirmed that he possessed a radio capable of operating on 146.130 MHz “Audio recordings captured by the agent demonstrate that the intentional interference ceased as the agent and the Sheriff’s deputy approached the vehicle,” the FCC said in the Notice Of Apparent Liability. Ruth Willet, KM 4 LAO, is 2018 Hiram Percy Maxim Memorial Award Recipient Nineteen-year-old Ruth Willet, KM4LAO, of Cana, Virginia, was named as the recipient by the ARRL Board of Directors. The Hiram Percy Maxim Memorial Award is given annually by the Board to a radio amateur under the age of 21 whose accomplishments and contributions to both Amateur Radio and the local community are of an exemplary nature. Ruth, who earned her Technician class license in June 2015 and upgraded to Extra in May 2016, was instrumental in re-establishing the Amateur Radio and Electronics Club (K 8 HPS) at Kettering University in Michigan, where she is a junior pursuing a double major in engineering physics and mechanical engineering while maintaining an A average. Back in May, she was presented with the Radio Club of America’s Young Achiever Award. Last spring, she was the keynote speaker at the 32nd annual SWODXA DX Dinner, held in conjunction with Hamvention®, where her topic was “Experiencing the Hobby of a Lifetime.” The Hiram Percy Maxim Memorial Award, which includes a cash award of $1,500 and an engraved plaque to the recipient, is intended to provide a tangible reward to those deserving young amateurs who contribute their time, skills, and energies daily through their commitment to Amateur Radio. As models for their peers, and inspirations to us all, these fine young people are highly visible boosters of Amateur Radio awareness Broadcast-Quality Audio Processor Donated for news. Those of us working in the Broadcast world know the name 'OPTIMOD.' Well now Orban Labs, has donated a state-of-the-art audio processor -- the all-digital 9300 OPTIMOD-AM -- to the ARRL. Orban Labs Vice President of Business Development Mike Pappas, W9CN, arranged for the donation with the intention of improving the audio quality transmitted by W1AW during its evening phone bulletins. The 9300 OPTIMOD-AM is used worldwide at broadcast stations that want the best possible "sound." W1AW Station Manager Joe Carcia, NJ1Q, installed the 9300 OPTIMOD-AM into W1AW's audio chain. After making necessary setup adjustments and working with instructions that Pappas provided, he determined that overall average modulation had increased and audio clarity was improved. HAM RADIO OPERATIONAL NEWS - IT'S A CONTACT SPORT All major Australian contests, rules and results, are on the Contest Section of the WIA website. wia.org.au/members/contests/about THE SARL YL SPRINT The 2018 SARL YL Sprint will take place on Thursday 9 August from 12:00 to 14:00 UTC! It is a phone contest on the 40 metre band and exchange is a RS report and YL or OM. Logs in ADIF, Cabrillo or MS Excel format with a summary sheet labelled "my call sign YL Sprint," shall be submitted by 16 August 2018 by e-mail to zs4bfn@mweb.co.za. (SARL) August 11-12 – VK - Remembrance Day Contest  Yep, the Remembrance Day contest date and time is set for 1.00pm Saturday 11 until.00pm) Sunday 12 August 2018 AEST Full contest rules are available in the contest section of wia.org.au As we heard a few weeks bcack the most important thing is to submit a log. Even if you only make a few contacts, please submit a log. Every log submission helps. If you have HF capability, just use the frequencies on the bands you have available. For those that have VHF and UHF capabilities, there are some simplex calling frequencies that will make life easy. These are, 6M 52.525MHz, 2M 146.500MHz, 70CM 439.000MHz and 23CM 1296.1MHz. The normal mode for these frequencies is FM. Most importantly, the RD contest remembers those that have served and those that have fallen. We must never forget them. (Extracts from the article by Vince Henderson, VK7VH in VK7WI News) SO:- August 18-19 – WW - Lighthouse and Lightship Weekend August 25-26 - VK - ALARA YL CONTEST D-STAR QSO Party 2018 D-STAR or Digital Amateur Radio QSO Party global event will take place between September 22nd at 0.00 and September 24th at 24.00 (UTC). The format of the party will be the same as in previous years with the goal of encouraging D-STAR operators to communicate with as many other operators across the world via D-STAR repeaters. October 6 – WW - Oceania DX contest A LOOK THRU THE DX WINDOW GET YOUR PARK ON! Announcing GET YOUR PARK ON! A new North America WWFF Park Event. Three WWFF countries have joined together for Get Your Park ON!, a North America WWFF parks event that coincides with Earth Science Week activities around the globe. Purpose: Get as many parks as possible in Canada, USA and Mexico on the air from Oct. 14-20, 2018 and Hunters throughout the world calling to log as many QSOs as possible with those parks during the event. Join the Get Your Park ON! Facebook Group on: http://getyourparkon.com/ to stay current with details and announcements about this exciting new event. Everybody Get Your Park ON! and get into the log. (SouthGate) THAILAND, HS. In celebration of the 50th anniversary of IARU Region 3, members of the Radio Society of Thailand are QRV as HS 50 IARU until October 31. BRUNEI, V8. Members of the Brunei Darussalam Amateur Radio Association are QRV with special event station V850IARU until October 31 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of IARU Region 3. QSL via V85TL. AUSTRALIA, VK. The WIA has been able to secure a special call sign VI 50 IARU 3 which will be on air until 31st August to celebrate the 50th anniversary of IARU Region 3. Christian is operational as D 44 EK from Sal Island in the Cape Verde Archipelago from 23rd July – 7th August. QSL to his home call, M 0 UPL Radio Caroline 2018 The 'Martello Tower' group will once again be running a special event station GB 5 RC from the Radio Caroline ship the MV Ross Revenge over this weekend 3rd to 5th August. (Sourced to SouthGate) GB1NHS permanent special event call sign "Essex Ham" reports the official launch of GB 1 NHS. This unique permanent special event call sign is being looked after on behalf of the National Health Service by Paul Devlin G1SMP Paul has plans to put the call sign to good use promoting both amateur radio within the NHS, and NHS initiatives using amateur radio. (Sourced to SouthGate) 9X, Rwanda DXpedition Members of the Italian DX Team will be active as 9 X 0 T between September 27th and October 10th 2018. Activity will be on 160-6 meters using CW, SSB and RTTY, RTTY will only be on 14084 kHz. QSL via I 2 YSB direct only. (Sourced to SouthGate) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- DEFENCE On the front cover of Amateur Radio magazine for this month are some photographs of Military Radios, many no doubt used during the 'AM & CW on ANZAC day event which, under the guidance of VK4MIK Mike Patterson, who came up with this great idea a few years back. In this week’s text editions of the WIA National News is a link to a you tube video, a now declassified WWII manpack radio instructional film. It's worth a view and it's amazing how much and how little has changed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODxBa0b556Y&feature=youtu.be WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- DIGITAL Significant changes in store for FT8 and MSK144 with WSJT-X Version 2.0 WSJT-X co-developer Joe Taylor, K1JT, has announced that major changes are coming to the FT8 and MSK144 digital protocols when WSJT-X version 2.0 arrives in a few months. Taylor said version 2.0 should be ready for prime time by January 2019. "Much of the necessary programming is finished," Taylor said in a post to the Packrats reflector. "Many of the new features have been tested on the air and we find them to work well." Taylor was quick to point out that the new capabilities are not yet publicly available, not even in beta form. He said that he, Steve Franke, K9AN, and Bill Somerville, G4WJS, have been developing "enhanced versions of the MSK144 and FT8 protocols that extend the message payload to 77 bits." "Do not rush to download something," he cautioned. "There is more testing and code optimization to do." He said current plans call for a beta-testing period "probably starting in mid-to-late September," with a full release "possible a couple of months later." (SouthGate) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS - FINAL FRONTIER https://ariss.batc.tv/ (under test) AMSAT EA will be on air on all available satellites with the callsign AM1SAT from September 10 to 17 to celebrate IberRadio 2018 - IV Radiocommunications Fair, the biggest HAM party event in Spain and Portugal (http://www.iberradio.es/en/) The event will open its doors during the 15-16 weekend. Main grid will be IN70 but other ones will be activated as well. please write to contacto@amsat-ea.org (AMSAT-NA) AMSAT OSCAR Number Administrator Bill Tynan, W3XO, Steps Down Citing poor health, AMSAT OSCAR Number Administrator — the individual who confers the alphanumeric designators on Amateur Radio satellites — has stepped down from the volunteer post after granting numbers to qualifying applicants for more than 2 decades. “I want to thank Bill for his many dedicated years of service to AMSAT,” said AMSAT President Joe Spier, K6WAO, who named AMSAT Vice President-Operations Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA, to succeed Bill. “Ever since the launch of OSCAR 1 in 1961, it has been traditional for Amateur Radio satellites to carry the name OSCAR — for - ‘Orbiting Satellite Carrying Amateur Radio,’” Spier explained. OSCAR satellites are customarily referred to by hyphenated names, the first selected by the builder, AMSAT-OSCAR 7, abbreviated as AO-7. Spier called OSCAR numbers “a proud tradition of Amateur Radio, one that we hope to keep going for many years to come.” A past AMSAT President, W3XO was licensed in 1946, initially as W 3 KMV. He requested W3XO in the 1970s because it was the call sign of Washington DC’s first FM broadcast station in the experimental years. (arrl) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- ILLW ILLW and even older lighthouses A few weeks ago the International Lighthouse Lightship Weekend team received an entry for this year’s ILLW event for a lighthouse built in 1747 at Skagen in Denmark and the comment was made that this was possibly the oldest lighthouse which had participated in the event. This 'record' has now been well and truly broken by a lighthouse on Lindau Island in Lake Constance, Bodensee, Germany, which was built around 1180. It was a fortified tower that protected Lindau for centuries and is reported to have also served as a lighthouse. It was replaced as a lighthouse in 1856 by a lighthouse located on the West mole at the entrance to Lindau Harbour. Both structures feature in this year’s event as the 300th entry. Entries are rolling in daily with 55 from Germany 46 from Australia 40 from the USA Some entrants have been in the event for many years including some continuously since 1998. One entrant in Australia has to walk 18 kiss to get to his lighthouse and carry all his gear on his back. It's this kind of detail where we, the ham community, miss the journalistic skills of Silent Key VK3PC Jim Linton who as well as heading up ARVictoria, and being Secretary of the WIA also kept WIA News well informed on ILLW. (SouthGate) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- RADIO AMATEUR OLD-TIMERS http://www.raotc.org.au Hallo everyone this is Clive VK6CSW reminding you that tomorrow is the first Monday of the month, time for the Radio Amateurs Old Timers Club of Australia’s August bulletin to go to air. This month Ian VK3JS will be giving us all the latest Club news together with two interesting items, one on Quantum radio, a new communications medium which works where ordinary radio waves cannot, plus another on ever slimmer phones. Everyone, RAOTC members and non-members alike, is most welcome to tune in and to join in the call backs afterwards. The broadcast originates in Melbourne at 10 am local time on the VK3REC 2m repeater with simultaneous relays on 1825 kHz and 7146 kHz. At 0100 UTC for eastern states listeners, Hans VK5YX will transmit the program on 20 metres on 14.150 MHz At 0200 UTC, for West Australian listeners the program is transmitted simultaneously on 7088 kHz and via the linked repeater network. At night the broadcast is repeated at 2030 hours Melbourne time on 80 metres on 3650kHz, in Tasmania at 1930 on the VK7RAA and 7RTC networks plus a TV presentation by Tony VK7AX at 2030 hours Tasmanian time. From Tuesday you can download the audio file from the Club website at www.raotc.org.au where you also find full details about our Club. Tune in tomorrow for the August RAOTC bulletin. 73 from Clive VK6CSW. Social Scene 2018 Aug 4 VK3 Gippsland Gate Radio & Electronics Clb HamFest 10 (vk3bft) Aug 25-26 VK6 NCRG HAMFEST WEEKEND (armag) Aug 26 VK2 SARCFEST (armag) Sept 8 VK4 SUNSHINE COAST HAMFEST WOOMBIE SCHOOL OF ARTS 9AM (vk4kx) Sept 9 VK3 SadarC Hamfest/Comms day (armag) Sept 21-23 VK4 Central Highlands AR Club AGM weekend Lake Maraboon (TARC) Sept 21-23 VK4 Central Highlands AR Club AGM weekend Lake Maraboon (TARC) Sep 28-Oct 1 VK4 Cardwell Gathering (TARC) Oct 14 VK3 Yarra Valley Amateur Radio Group HamFest (vk3kqt) Oct 28 vk3 Ballarat Amateur Radio Group HamFest (vk3kqt) Nov   11  VK5 - Adelaide Hills Amateur Radio Society HamFest Nov 17 VK7 - VK7Hamfest Miena Community Centre (vk7wi) Nov 18 VK3 - The Rosebud RadioFest (vk3pdg) 2019 Social Scene May 3 - 6 VK4 - Claireview Gathering, between Mackay and Rockhampton (tarc) Submitting news items A reminder when supplying HamFest info we obviously can't plug commercial traders "on air", but we at the WIA will put your supporters in this text edition "no worries." If you would like to submit news items for inclusion in the VK1WIA broadcasts, please email your item in text to nationalnews@wia.org.au and don't JUST send url's links but take the time to pen YOUR contribution. To submit audio read "how to submit items" in the weekly news page on http://www.wia.org.au/members/broadcast/contribute/ We would appreciate items no longer than 2 minutes in length as we only have a half hour time slot window. Remember the sooner you submit material the more the likelihood of it being broadcast in the very next edition of WIA National News. Each item will only be broadcast once, if you want a couple of mentions, please submit different slants to keep your event 'fresh ‘and always if the news room is to read your item write in the 3rd person. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ============================================================================= WIANews - we've reported...YOU decide. TWITTER http://twitter.com/VK1WIA Societies and Club News Letter Editors can EXCHANGE a feed prior to the actual broadcast date, e-mail nationalnews@wia.org.au Call-backs follow the RF editions, but also for text readers you may lodge a quick reply to let us know you read it, who knows, you might even get a "cheerio call". Thanks to our dedicated band of broadcast volunteers who utilize their time and equipment in bringing you this weekly broadcast. Who and where are they? http://www.wia.org.au/members/broadcast/where/ The purpose of "WIANews" is to rapidly provide news of interest to active amateurs residing in Australia and the globe. We strongly encourage membership in the Wireless Institute of Australia and participation in the activities of local clubs. Opinions expressed in "WIANews" are those of the writers who submit material and do not necessarily reflect those of the rebroadcasters, nor the National WIA, but are broadcast in the spirit in which they were submitted." Material may be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form, a credit to WIANews wouldn't go astray... If you have call-backs to contribute to the National News call back tally then please send through your call-backs to callbacks@wia.org.au. Who listens to radio? A weekly 'tally sheet' is sent to all rebroadcasters and interested listeners, to get your free copy send a blank email to:- wiabroadcasters-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.au Put the word subscribe in the title or subject field How do I join this National News List? (subscribe for an automatic weekly feed.) Email to vk1wia-news-join@lists.wia.org.au from the email account that you wish the emails to go to. How do I leave this National News List? (unsubscribe your weekly feed) Open mail program which sends mail from the address you want to unsubscribe. Send mail to the list unsubscribe address vk1wia-news-leave@lists.wia.org.au You will be sent a confirmation mail and must follow the instructions given in that mail to complete the unsubscription. Once your unsubscription has been processed, you will probably receive another message confirming your unsubscription from the list, and at that point you should stop receiving messages. . -------------