Archived News Script
IRTS Radio News Bulletin Sunday 19 June 2022
Irish Language Net
Tony, EI5EM sends in this report: "Last Monday, a new Irish language weekly net was launched on the Kippure repeater (EI2KPR) at 8pm local time. It is hoped that this will encourage the use of the language among radio amateurs. The net will be an informal, friendly and bilingual get-together on the air. It will cater for all levels of fluency. Don't be shy, please join in and use the cupla focail that you have, or even listen in. It is hoped to expand this to 40m or 80m. Perhaps there are other EIs who would like to volunteer to start similar nets in their own areas? You hear rugby referees instruct scrum halfs who delay playing the ball to "USE IT!". If they don't, they lose it, as the opposition is awarded a scrum. Similarly, with the Irish language, let us EIs play our part by using it too."
2022 IRTS VHF/UHF Field Day
The 2022 IRTS VHF/UHF Field Day takes place over the weekend of Saturday the 2nd and Sunday the 3rd of July, from 1400 UTC Saturday until 1400 UTC Sunday. Last year after following consultation with contesters, to provide greater flexibility this field day was arranged to run as 5 separate contests - one on each band 50 MHz (6m), 70 MHz (4m), 144 MHz (2m), 432 MHz (70cm) and 1296 MHz (23cm). There is an Open 24-hour and a 6-hour Restricted option for each band, stations may enter one or more bands or all five bands. Also, entries on different bands from a station may be mixed between Open (24-hour) and Restricted (6-hour) sections. The deadline for submitting logs is Sunday July 17th. For more details and a full list of rules please see www.irts.ie/rules
Amsat News
AO-27 is a 29 year old “FM Repeater” in space. It has a crystal controlled FM receiver listening at 145.850 MHz and a crystal controlled FM transmitter operating at approximately 436.795 MHz with typically 0.5 Watts of output power into a 1/4 wave ground-plane. Polarization is nominally linear, the rotation and revolution of the spacecraft and propagation effects will cause the actual signal polarization at a ground station to vary widely during a pass. The satellite has developed some problems, so Amsat's Stephan Greene, KS1G makes a request for AO-27 Telemetry and Reception Reports. KS1G writes on amsat.org: "AO-27's on/off times run open-loop and have drifted a bit so that the information on ao27.net is out of date. We're trying to collect current telemetry before attempting to upload new settings. AO-27 sends 20 seconds of AFSK telemetry followed by 240 seconds of FM repeater operation during descending nodes, the North to South passes. As best we can determine from Satnogs observations, the satellite currently turns on when near the equator and shuts off at about 12-14 deg South latitude. Stations with UHF receive capability should be able to receive the telemetry and detect or use the FM repeater operation. We think the ascending node on-time begins when AO-27 is at a latitude of about 75 degrees North and ends around 85 degrees North as the satellite begins the descending part of the orbit. Stations probably have to be fairly far north with good northern horizons to hear anything. No telemetry is sent on ascending node passes. The AO-27 command team would greatly appreciate reception reports, especially with the times telemetry or repeater operation started and ended. Please provide station location, a six character grid square is sufficient. If you have AFSK reception and decode capability, any telemetry successfully decoded. Reports from northern stations able to copy the start or end of the ascending node on-time are also sought. Please send reports to ks1g /at/ amsat.org."
IARU Monitoring System
OTH, the "Over the horizon radar" systems continue to impinge on our HF allocations. The IARUMS Volunteers reported frequent incursions on the 80, 40 and 20m bands, and their latest report also documents data traffic, endless propaganda shouting matches and straying broadcasters. The detailed report can be downloaded from the "Spectrum" heading on www.iaru-r1.org
GQRP Convention
The GI-QRP Convention will take place on Saturday the 25th of June at the Tandragee Golf Club. This event is supported by the G-QRP Club. There will be trade stands, talks and presentations relating to QRP construction and operating. The talks will be streamed live online for those unable to attend. A Buildathon will also take place, where participants, under supervision, will construct a microprocessor-based Morse Code tutor. The workshops are being sponsored by RCF and others, so the attendees only pay the £3 entrance fee and the youngsters attending the workshop will be provided with a free buffet lunch. All tools and test equipment will be provided and mentors will be on hand to guide the builders. There are 20 places available, 10 for the morning, and 10 for the afternoon. In addition to the kit building workshops, there will be a series of talks about building and using radio, which the youngsters may also find interesting. The event takes place next Saturday, the 25th of June at Tandragee Golf Club, Markethill Road, Tandragee, Craigavon, BT62 2ER. Doors open at 09:00 and the event will close at 5 p.m. For more information see www.gqrp.com/GI_Convention.htm .
Around Europe
The Lithuanian Association of Radio Amoors, LRMD invites radio amateurs from Lithuania and other countries to participate in the annual Hamfest at the weekend of the 30th and 31st of July. The Hamfest location is at the Marijampole camping grounds, GPS coordinates: North 54.520054, East 23.342152 The Hamfest starts at 9.00 on Saturday, July 30th and ends Sunday afternoon. Possible arrival on Friday. More information at the link www.lrmd.lt/en
The Croatian Radio Amateur Federation, HRS is busy preparing for two events. HRS and the radio club "Croatian Flora Fauna" organize a radio amateur summer event aimed at 6th to 8th graders, taking place at the Hotel “Tomislav's Home” in Sljeme from the 10th to the 15th of July. The costs are borne by the Croatian Radio Amateur Federation. Students will get to know the basics of communication by using a radio station, building a Tesla coil, a dipole antenna, and learning Morse's alphabet. Three weeks later the International Radio Amateur Camp for Children and Youth Yota 2022 will be held at the Bedem Student Center in Karlovac, from 6th to the 13th of August. The campsite participants are young people from 15 to 25 years from the National Federations of the IARU region 1 and one team from IARU regions 2 and 3, and team leaders who make up a maximum of 4 people aged between 18 and 30. The number of camp participants is limited to 80, plus four young people from Croatia. All participants are expected to actively participate in lectures, daily work on the three radio amateur stations and various workshops.
HF Activities
The ARRL Field Day starts at 18:00 UTC next Saturday and runs through 20:59 UTC on Sunday on all bands from topband to vhf. See details at field-day.arrl.org
CWops Tests, or CWTs, are 60 minutes in duration and held on Wednesday and Thursday every week. There are now four events each week, at times that favor different geographic areas. Everyone is welcome – you don’t have to be a CWops member to join the fun. Six bands are used – 10, 15, 20, 40, 80 and 160m. Suggested frequencies are from 28 to 45 kHz from the band edges.
The IARU HF World Championship is coming up at the second full weekend of July, beginning 1200 UTC Saturday and ending 1200 UTC Sunday. Both Single and Multi operator and Headquarters stations may operate the entire 24-hour period.
Members of Algeria's Great Desert Djelfa Radio Club, 7X2VFK will operate the Special event stations 7R19MG and 7Y19MG from June 25th to July 5th for the 19th edition of the Mediterranean Games to be held in Oran. During July they will be on air as 7T60A to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Algeria's Independence Day. The Club promises activity on all modes and bands.
Ali, EP3CQ is the only active and licensed Ham in Somalia. Ali is QRV as 6O1OO from Mogadishu for about one month while working for the UN Department of Safety and Security. During his spare time Ali can be heard on 80 to 15 meters on CW, FT8 and FT4. For updates, it is suggested to watch EP3CQ on QRZ.com or Twitter.
The Propagation Horoscope
Although good night-time conditions on the lower HF bands match the good or excellent DX on the higher bands, but QRN from daily lightning storms in central and southern Europe makes for challenging listening. A large coronal hole is swinging into central view, so far it has been quiet. Eight active sunspot regions provide a steady ionization, together with a settled geomagnetic field, expect continued good DX on the higher bands, 12 and 10 are open most hours of the day with a mix of ionospheric and tropo propagation. 6m has seen some good tropo favouring France, Spain and Portugal throughout the week, expect even better conditions above 30 MHz in the week ahead, helped by a high pressure zone edging into western Europe.
That is the news for this week. Items for inclusion in next week’s radio news can be submitted by email to newsteam /at/ irts.ie for automatic forwarding to both the radio and printed news services. The deadline for next week's news bulletin is midnight on Thursday.
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