April 28 2019 - 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 TWITTER http://twitter.com/VK1WIA Please... If you are only submitting text and not audio, NEVER send just links & url's but write your story as you would expect to hear it being read back and then when you upload audio also email us the txt version. ---------------------------------------------------------------------* NATIONAL NEWS FOR WEEK COMMENCING Apr 28 2019 IN OUR 24th YEAR OF NON STOP NEWS WIA's Honour Roll of members who paid the supreme sacrifice. - WIA DIRECTOR Harry VK6YBZ comment. - WIA Merit Awards, last call. - WIA Annual Conference details with Raffy VK2RF. THIS & MORE IN THIS EDITION OF NEWS FROM THE WIRELESS INSTITUTE OF AUSTRALIA 2019 AND FOR WEEK OF APRIL 28 2019 Was great to hear the bands chirping on the 25th, Thursday, with plenty of AM and CW activity in remembrance of ANZAC Day. Although we were not as a news room 'kept in the loop' this is the annual event organised by VK4MIK and Tablelands Radio Group and certainly was gratifying to hear so many that did remember. Speaking of War, lets add Radio and Football to the mix. The three seem very removed from each other, but not on Wednesday when AFL team Richmond took to the field for their ANZAC eve match. Eagle eyed WIA supporter Tony, VK7VKT, noticed the jumper worn by the players featured morse code printed on the jumpers. The morse read of the third and fourth stanza of Laurence Binyon’s poem, For the Fallen. The Morse code replicates the architecture of the walls of the Education Centre courtyard at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne. Those stanzas being, "They went with songs to the battle, they were young, Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow. They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted; They fell with their faces to the foe. They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them. A beautiful mark of respect of our fallen hero's as well as recognising communications of that era embedded into poem. Honour Roll of WIA members who paid the supreme sacrifice Royal Australian Navy J.E. Mann VK3IE A.H.G. Rippon VK6GR Australian Military Forces C.D. Roberts VK2JV J.D. Morris VK3DQ J. McCandlish VK3HN S.W. Jones VK3SF D.A. Laws VK4DR J.G. Phillips VK5BW K.S. Anderson VK6KS Royal Australian Air Force F.W.S. Easton VK2BQ V.J.E. Jarvis VK2VJ W. Abbott VK2YK G.C. Curle VK2AJB T. Stephens VK3GO M.D. Orr VK3OR J.F. Colthrop VK3PL J.A. Burrage VK3UW J.E. Snadden VK3VE F.J. Starr VK4FS R. Allen VK4PR C.A. Ives VK5AF B. James VK5BL J.E. Goddard VK6JG P.P. Paterson VK6PP Merchant Marine N.E. Gunter VK3NG R.P. Veall VK3PV "They shall grow not old as we that are left grow old. Age will not weary them nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them." Hi this is Harry VK6YBZ holder of an advanced amateur radio license and a director of the Wireless Institute of Australia. I thought that I would talk a little today about my journey in Amateur Radio and how and why I ended up on the Board of the WIA. I started out in amateur radio in 1983, obtaining my license whilst a student undertaking a bachelor’s degree in electronics and a PhD in telecommunications in the UK. I travelled a lot and VHF FM mobile became my main mode of operation although I dabbled a little in RTTY in my home shack, writing my own software for these “digital” modes while packet radio claimed the innovative technical high ground. Sick of the politics, the drama of the miners’ strike and Thatcher’s Britain in mid-1989 I decided on impulse to migrate to Australia, a country I knew nothing about to a job at a university that I knew little of. I knew even less about the place I would live and work. I fell in love with Perth, a beautiful city and Australia a gorgeous land. My career developed, I undertook a postgraduate law degree and I travelled worldwide a lot and amateur radio quickly faded into the background and eventually disappeared altogether. Without realizing it at the time, I had a large property ideal for large antennas and a purpose-built shack. However, my interest in amateur radio at the time was nil. It remained this way for 30 years while I travelled and built a career and family. Work injury and early retirement came on me suddenly, I downsized in property and found time on my hands. I looked around for something to do and amateur radio came back into my life. Boy had things changed in 30 years. Digital modes, including FT8, PSK, Allstar and DMR all became exciting opportunities to communicate worldwide in an environment where large antennas were just not feasible. I’ve had a ball working places that I never dreamed possible to communicate with in my restricted antenna environment. I met some members of the WIA board and was invited to work with the WIA Education Group to develop the response to the tender for the deed to supply the licensing services for the ACMA. That bid failed, but a strategic education development for the WIA was born. You’ll hear more of that at the AGM and conference in Sydney and in the coming months. Out of my work with the Education Group came an invitation to fill a casual vacancy on the board for a period of one year. I was wary. I had heard about the politics and wrangling that had gone on with previous boards and some members and did not want to be involved in those kinds of problems. However, my discussions revealed a new board that was skilled, forward looking, strategically focused and beyond much of the politics that had been evident in the past. Considering that these people who work on the board, develop and implement policies and procedures missing in the past, and operate the committees and working groups are amateurs that hold down full-time jobs and families, their effort and dedication is something to be admired. They are a skilled, strategically focused group who are clear and independent of the baggage of the past and need your support to move the WIA forward into a very exciting future. I am pleased to serve the amateur community and work with such dedicated amateurs. That’s my view and I look forward to representing you as we progress out of the issues of the past into the opportunities of the future. Next week Board Comment will be by President Justin. The WIA Merit Awards are presented each year at the WIA AGM. The Board are keen to receive nominations for worthy recipients of these awards. Details on the awards and how to make nominations are on the WIA web site, wia.org.au Nominations are currently open and need to be submitted by the end of APRIL. CQ WIA Annual Conference The WIA Annual Conference is almost upon us, only four weeks to go, this year’s event will be held at the impressive Park Royal Hotel near Darling Harbour in the heart of Sydney. You don’t need to be a WIA member to attend and participate and all who register by midnight 11th May will be in the draw for a UHF type approved DMR and FM Analogue Handheld by FDP Radios. On Friday evening 24th May, the Waverley Amateur Radio Society will be holding its 100th year anniversary at the historic Marconi Room of Sydney Town Hall, with keynote speaker David Dufty, author of the Australian “Secret Code Breakers”, On Saturday morning 25th May, after a short formal AGM the conference proper will commence, There will be Open Forum. discussions and reports This is an opportunity to influence the future direction of Amateur Radio in Australia, After lunch, the theme of the conference technical presentations will be “a Spectrum of Opportunities”. There will be many technical sessions featuring fascinating insights and new ideas. The Conference Dinner will be served at the Parkroyal Hotel, with renowned keynote speaker Professor Fred Watson, astronomer extraordinaire, whose father was a ham. And on Sunday morning, we will QSY to Dural, the home of Amateur Radio NSW for a field day, with commercial exhibitors, technical demonstrations and talks, as well as complimentary lunch for registered attendees. There is abundant public transport to the Sydney CBD, and many surrounding hotels, Some billeting opportunities are also in place for interstate and regional NSW attendees. And if you live in Sydney and can spare a bed for a few nights, register your offer at the website of the Waverley Amateur Radio Society, VK2BV.ORG. This year's conference is back dropped at night by the spectacular public Vivid light and sound extravaganza. There is plenty of time after the two evening conference events to stroll to the dramatic displays. So for a really great weekend in Sydney, Register now to secure your place at www.wia.org.au under the WIA Information tab., or just google WIA 2019 Annual Conference, See you there! 73 from Raffy VK2RF ---------------------------------------------------------------------* INTERNATIONAL NEWS With thanks to IARU, RSGB, SARL, Southgate AR Club, ARRL, RAC, NZART AMATEUR RADIO NEWSLINE & the World Wide sources of the WIA. GUAM SpaceDaily.com is reporting Virgin Orbit, Sir Richard Branson's satellite launch company, announced that the Pacific island of Guam will become an additional launch site for the company's LauncherOne service. This will be in addition to California, Florida, Spaceport Cornwall in the United Kingdom, and Taranto in Italy. Virgin Orbit uses a customized 747-400 aircraft as its "flying launch pad," providing the ability to quickly transport the entire launch site to new locations around the world, launching each satellite from the optimal location. TURKEY IARU argues for protection from WPT spurious emissions IARU was again represented at a meeting in Ankara, Turkey, where committee SE24 (Short Range Devices) met to undertake further work on the Work Item concerning Wireless Power Transmission SE24 is considering both WPT for electric vehicles and also generic WPT applications. IARU has made extensive input on the potential impact on radio communications from spurious emissions from WPT devices and much of this is captured in CEPT ECC Report 289, published earlier this year https://www.ecodocdb.dk/document/8214 At the Ankara meeting further input was made by IARU and other interested parties and there will be a meeting of SE24 dedicated to WPT issues in early July. IARU was represented in Ankara by Don Beattie G3BJ, Region 1 President, who is leading the IARU work on WPT. IARU Region 1 http://iaru-r1.org/ NORWAY DXpeditioner Kenneth Opskar, LA7GIA, is Recipient of Intrepid Spirit Award Kenneth, LA7GIA, is the radio amateur who was detained in Chad for several days after his TT 8 KO DXpedition was shut down. Now he has won the Intrepid Spirit Award from the Intrepid-DX Group. “This award is to recognize Ken’s outstanding efforts to activate Malawi — 7Q7GIA; Comoros — D67GIA; Equatorial Guinea — 3C7A; Central African Republic — TL8AO; Congo — TN5E; Somalia — 6O6O, and Chad — TT8KO,” the group said. “We acknowledge Ken’s pursuit of operating excellence in making these difficult activations.” The Intrepid Spirit Award memorializes James McLaughlin, T6AF, an Intrepid-DX Group member, who died in Afghanistan in 2011. UNITED KINGDOM The RSGB Foundation Licence Manual is now available in the convenient electronic Kindle format The Foundation Licence Manual for Radio Amateurs is the RSGB course-book for those who wish to become radio amateurs in the UK. This book sets out to provide the very latest information required to obtain a UK Foundation licence. Broken down into 15 easy to digest sections Foundation Licence Manual for Radio Amateurs covers all you will need to know to be successful in the examination. This book provides insight into technical basics, receivers, transmitters, antennas, feeders and propagation. There are details of the operating practices & procedures you will need to know alongside safety considerations, electromagnetic compatibility and licence information. The practical assessments are explained and there is a helpful guide to how to best approach the Foundation examination itself. The manual is written for the new 2019 syllabus that will be used for exams from September. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07QS7C68V USA Ham Radio on I-40 The ARRL reports amateur radio is being promoted on a billboard that's passed by 6 million vehicles a year This new billboard on Interstate 40 in Tennessee promotes ARRL and Amateur Radio. Working with ARRL Product Development Manager Bob Inderbitzen, NQ1R, and Communications Manager Dave Isgur, N1RSN, ARRL Graphic Designer Sue Fagan, KB1OKW, completed a design for a the new 10 × 20 ft. billboard, owned by ARRL Life Member Cliff Segar, KD4GT. Segar says the average daily traffic count for the area along I-40 west bound, mile marker 336, is on the order of 6 million vehicles per year. arrl.org/news/view/arrl-radio-communications-billboard-promotes-ham-radio-on-i-40 --------------------------------------------------------------------* 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 2019 20th Harry Angel Memorial Sprint May 4 IARU HF World Championship 13-14 July. Trans-Tasman Low-Band Contest July 20 VK Remembrance Day Contest is August 17-18 -------------- Museum Ships Weekend Reminder that the Museum Ships Weekend this year will be held during the weekend of June 1 and 2. Transmissions will be sent from all sorts of historic and special ships worldwide, so as to enable unique QSO’s. All information about participating vessels and an optional certificate, can be found on the website url in our written word edition of WIA NATIONAL NEWS https://www.qsl.net/w/wa2tvs/museum -------------- THRU THE DX WINDOW Eurovision Song Contest special event The Israel Amateur Radio Club has activated the following special event callsigns around the 64th Eurovision Song Contest: 4 X 6 4S 4 X 64 O 4 X 6 4N 4 X 6 4G and 4 Z 64 EURO. QRV on HF is now till May 18 on CW, SSB, PSK, and FT8. An award will be available as well. QSL via ClubLog, LoTW, eQSL. https://www.iarc.org/livelog/ (SouthGate) Rich KE 1 B will be active from Bora Bora Island in French Polynesia as FO/KE1B until May 3 . Look for him on 20m using FT8. Prefix hunters will probably have heard Swiss stations using the prefixes HB 90 and HB 30 instead of the normal HB9 and HB3 calls. This to celebrate the 90th anniversary of USKA, the member society of the International Amateur Radio Union. Ali, EP 3 CQ, is active as 6 O 1OO until May 15th. Activity will be limited, he works for the UN Department of Safety and Security in Mogadishu. Operations will be all bands but mostly 40/20 meters using SSB and FT8. Last time he suggested that he will be on every day between 1800-2000 East Africa Time (EAT) and on the weekend (Friday and Saturday) between 1400-1800. See QRZ.com for more info QSL direct to: Ali Solhjoo, C/O Dr.de Vivanco, Schnackenburgstr. 3, Berlin 12159, Germany. ---------------------------------------------------------------------* INTRUDER WATCH - ENFORCEMENT ZONE Region III IARUMS Coordinator Peter Young VK3MV VK IARUMS reflector email to subscribe intruders@wia.org.au SUBMITTING a report? go to http://www.wia.org.au/members/protecting/intruderreport/ INTRUDER NETS Friday 0730 UTC 7.065.5 with VK4CEU David. Amateur exclusive frequencies where any non-amateur signal is definitely an intruder. Amateur HF Spectrum world wide 7.050 to 7.100 14.000 to 14.250 14.250 to 14.350 No broadcasters 21.000 to 21.450 24.890 to 24.990 28.000 to 29.700 Greetings from the Ipswich and District Radio club and its members. Has your club’s two metre repeater ever suffered from pager interference? Well it sure happened to ours recently, and as you can imagine it was extremely frustrating. So members did what had to be done. Here’s how it was solved. Firstly members gathered as much information as possible. Information was catalogued, the frequencies involved, the times, signal strengths, and even some good old direction finding to pinpoint the source. This was done using various pieces of equipment owned and operated by a number of our club members. Once all this had been done over a period of a couple of weeks, all the information gathered was duly noted down into a basic report and handed over to the ACMA Radio Inspectors. Within a few days the ACMA had visited the offending site, confirmed that they were indeed the culprits of the interference, and measures were then taken by the offender to rectify the problems highlighted to them by the ACMA Inspectors. The result was that the interference to our club’s two metre repeater ceased and has not returned and all are very happy! So the moral of the story here is, if you can provide as much information, technical and otherwise to the ACMA along with your complaint, you will find that results will happen much quicker than you might anticipate. The feedback received from the ACMA was that they were very thankful for all the data that was provided to them and it made their job so much easier and so much quicker to resolve. So if you do have an interference problem, don’t just complain, gather as much information as you can, and help to be part of the solution. The results will astound you! For the Ipswich and District Radio Club, this is Allan VK4HIT. Cheers and 73 from Ipswich. ---------------------------------------------------------------------* WORLD WIDE SPECIAL INTEREST GROUP NEWS - DIGITAL MODES New digital mode FT4 Joe Taylor K1JT has announced a new digital mode, FT4, which is 2.5 times faster than FT8 FT4 is an experimental digital mode designed specifically for radio contesting. Like FT8, it uses fixed-length transmissions, structured messages with formats optimized for minimal QSOs, and strong forward error correction. T/R sequences are 6 seconds long, so FT4 is 2.5 × faster than FT8 and about the same speed as RTTY for radio contesting. FT4 can work with signals 10 dB weaker than needed for RTTY, while using much less bandwidth. FT4 message formats are the same as those in FT8 and encoded with the same (174,91) low-density parity check code. Transmissions last for 4.48 s, compared to 12.64 s for FT8. Modulation uses 4-tone frequency-shift keying at approximately 23.4 baud, with tones separated by the baud rate. The occupied bandwidth, that containing 99% of transmitted power, is 90 Hz Further information on FT4 is at http://physics.princeton.edu/pulsar/k1jt/FT4_Protocol.pdf (SouthGate) WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS - FINAL FRONTIER FUNcube Data Warehouse URL Change The FUNcube Team announced as part of the migration of the FUNcube Data Warehouse migration to a new server a new URL is being used. They are now redirecting all dashboard data submissions to: http://data.amsat-uk.org (there is no need to change your dashboard settings) Looking forward, all information at http://warehouse.funcube.org will no longer be updated. The Leader Board scores will be merged at: http://data.amsat-uk.org/ranking You will be able to search for your site name (or callsign) and order the columns by clicking on the column header. Features as showing the colour coded age of submitted data will be added soon. If you have lost your Dashboard credentials please visit: http://data.amsat-uk.org/recover-authcode AMSAT-UK reminds FUNcube telemetry stations to keep an eye on their FUNcube Dashboard Summary Update page. Each satellite carrying a FUN- cube payload has a dedicated dashboard. AMSAT-UK has updated the one page summary (FUNcube Dashboard Summary v2) of those dashboards, their current version number and a dedicated download link: https://funcube.org.uk/2019/01/21/funcube-dashboard-summary-update/ Hope you like the new site and feedback will be welcome. [ANS] WW SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- RESCUE RADIO IARU REGION 3 Emergency Centre of Activity (CoA) frequencies 3.600, 7.110, 14.300, 18.160 and 21.360 MHz IARU Region 1 3760 7110 14300 18160 21360 kHz IARU Region 2 3750 3985 7060 7240 7275 14300 18160 21360 kHz The end of an era – WICEN Northern Rivers Region closes down At the annual General Meeting held 14th April, the motion was carried to dissolve the region. This came about mainly due to membership numbers declining below that required to maintain a region. Another factor was the difficulty of meeting the increasing demands of new training arrangements. State WICEN has very generously passed on the assets of the region to SARC, who will now undertake activities such as horse enduros and other community assistance. (sourced to sarc newsletter) SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS --- SOFTWARE DEVELOPEMENT 2 M 0 SQL Releases Pass Recorder Version 1.5 Pass Recorder is a small application that records audio from satel- lite passes based on tracking data it receives from the commonly used SatPC32 application. Pass recorder will sit in the background waiting for a pass to be above 0 degrees and record the audio to a wav file which you can use for logging purposes or just for storing passes to listen to later for enjoyment. SatPC32 tracking software setup for DDE via the DIVOptions.SQF file is required. Make sure this has been completed before starting to install Pass Recorder. Recordings are stored within the active users’ profile in Documents/Satellite Recordings, you can set your favourite cloud backup tools to access this folder or keep it for private usage. Version 1.5 released on April 15, 2019 includes bug fixes and adds the following functionality: + User selectable sample rate which allows you to reduce the audio quality to improve file size. + Allows you to select the save location of audio files + Added Limited support for WXTrack The download files, additional information, and installation instructions are available on Peter's web page: https://www.2m0sql.com/pass-recorder/ [ANS] ---------------------------------------------------------------------* 2019 Social Scene VK3 - Moorabbin & District Radio Club HamFest 2019 Saturday 11th May. VK 2019 WIA Annual Conference Sydney weekend 24-26 of May. (wia) https://www.wia.org.au/joinwia/wia/2019agm/ VK2 Oxley Region Amateur Radio Club Field Day June 8 and 9 (vk2zhe) VK5 - South East Radio Group 2019 Annual Convention and Australian Fox Hunting Championships 8-9 June (vk5hcf) VK3 - GippsTech 2019 13'14 July (vk3pf) VK4 - Townsville Amateur Radio Club's Cardwell Gathering 4 days commencing October 4 (vk4zz) VK3 - Yarra Valley Amateur Group HamFest, 13th October (vk3cnw) WW - JOTA 2019 Friday 18th, Sat 19 & Sunday 20 October (vk2gx) VK3 - Ballarat Amateur Radio Group, BARG Hamvention Oct 27 (vk3kqt) 2020 Social Scene ALARAMEET 2020 Bendigo (vk5yl) October 2020 in Bendigo Victoria. Heidi VK3FHID and Jenny VK3WQ are leading the team who are planning an eventful weekend. This team is meeting regularly and are looking forward to seeing you in Bendigo. Submitting news items If you would like to submit news items for possible inclusion in the VK1WIA broadcasts, please email your item in text to nationalnews@wia.org.au and don't JUST send url's links or posters, but take the time to pen YOUR contribution. To submit audio email nationalnews@wia.org.au and ask for the current password then 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. 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 it in the 3rd person. ---------------------------------------------------------------------*