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VK7AX > NEWS 02.11.08 23:05l 639 Lines 21299 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
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From: VK7AX@VK7AX.#ULV.TAS.AUS.OC
To : NEWS@WW
VK7 Regional News Broadcast for 2 November 2008
From: "VK7 Regional News Coordinator" <vk7tw(AT)wia.org.au>
Date: Sat, 01 Nov 2008 02:05:37 -0000
To: vk7regionalnews(AT)yahoogroups.com
VK7 REGIONAL NEWS BROADCAST
FOR SUNDAY 2ND NOVEMBER 2008
Maatsuyker ISLAND Activation
Roger, VK7ARN has established a regular sched with Tad VK2LNX/7
on Maatsuyker Island, IOTA OC-233.
On 3.590MHz, +-QRM, each Thursday evening at 19:30 local time.
Roger invites amateurs to join in and provide Tad with some on
air company and to hear of the island happenings.
(Roger VK7ARN)
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VK7 EVENTS CALENDAR
And a quick reminder of the events and broadcasts across VK7:
REAST ? November 5th ?Special General Meeting ? Queens Domain
Clubrooms ? 8pm
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#SGM
WICEN South ? November 8th ? Active Learning Workshop ? Coax
connectors ? VK7BW's QTH at 9:30 a.m.
http://tas.wicen.org.au/Diary/Diary.html
NTARC ? November 12th David Murray from Centrelink at Alanvale
TAFE at 7:30pm
http://www.wia.org.au/clubs/vk7/NorthernTasmaniaAmateurRadioClub/
REAST ? November 12th ? Tour of Heart 107.3 Radio Station ? 7pm
at Radio Station ? No ATV Night.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#HeartFM
REAST ? November 15th ? Repeat of the Aviation Theme tour of
Airport meet 9:30am.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#satarvos
VK7 HAMFEST ? December 6th ? Central Highlands of Tasmania
Hamfest ? Miena ? starts 10am.
http://www.qsl.net/charct/
NORTHERN NEWS
Northern Tasmanian Amateur Radio Club
There's been a slight change of plans for the NTARC November
meeting. The date remains the same at Wednesday the 12th, and
the venue remains the same at Alanvale TAFE. So what's changed
you ask? Well due to unforseen circumstances, the original guest
speaker has had to cancel, but not to worry. We have Ian Hart
from the Tasmanian Ambulance Service coming along to talk about
the communications they used during the Beaconsfield gold mine
disaster from last year, and to talk about the Tas Ambulance
Service communications system in general. Ian is a highly
dedicated professional and it will be an evening not to be
missed.
And of course our traditional Christmas BBQ in December at Myrtle
Park is always eagerly anticipated. No doubt there will be keen
competition for the informal `Slippery Trout' award, bestowed on
the person who catches the first fish. If you want to camp at
the site, this can be arranged, so start thinking about what you
want to do now.
Exams are to be held shortly, and if you'd like to sit any of the
exams, be it Foundation, Standard or Advanced, get in touch with
Al VK7AN or Peter VK7PD for more information.
The recent CQ World Wide DX competition saw John VK7XX and Laurie
VK7ZE participate with much gusto and hopefully their efforts
will be rewarded with good results in the competition standings.
NTARC would also like to offer a huge thank you to all who helped
in JOTA this year, with Tony VK7YBG, Ann VK7FYBG and yet-to-be-
licenced Tabitha, in the good company of Peter VK7KPC at Scout
Island doing a sterling effort. Not forgetting our outpost
stations of Bill VK7MX, Neil VK7NT, Phil VK7JJ and Lynn VK7FLYN
providing the scouts & guides a friendly voice to talk to.
Mark VK7FMWT finds himself in hospital at the moment. Hope you
recover soon Mark.
Lastly, have a think about office bearer positions for NTARC in
2009. If you're thinking of nominating for a position, but not
quite sure what it all involves, have a chat to one of the
present office bearers, we'd be more than happy to explain what
goes on.
http://www.wia.org.au/clubs/vk7/NorthernTasmaniaAmateurRadioClub/
Thanks from
(Jason, VK7ZJA, NTARC Secretary)
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Southern News
WICEN Tasmania (South)
The last WICEN meeting decided to run some practical basic skills
workshops especially relevant to WICEN's main focus of mobile and
portable operations. The first of these will be on the selection
and fitting of coax connectors, at VK7BW's QTH on Saturday 8th
November at 09:30. The second, on power connectors and emergency
power supplies, will be at VK7ARN's QTH on Saturday 13th
December, probably to be followed by an end of year barbeque at a
nearby location.
Visitors are welcome, subject to venue constraints and prior
notification via an email to secretary(AT)tas.wicen.org.au
http://tas.wicen.org.au/Diary/Diary.html
(Roger, VK7ARN)
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Radio and Electronics Association of Southern Tasmania
IRLP Information
Please be aware that node 6720 has been placed on the 7RAD/RHT
Repeater(s) due to hardware failures with node 6739.
Ben VK7BEN is currently attempting repairs, but has an unknown
ETA for resolution at this point.
Stay tuned for more information.
http://reast.asn.au/repeaters.php#IRLP
(Ben, VK7BEN)
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Saturday Afternoons at the Domain
By the time this broadcast goes to air, the Saturday afternoon
group would have completed their excursion to Hobart Airport. The
group visited the Rotor Lift facility, took a peek around the
exterior of the Bureau of Meteorology site, a tour to the tower
then down to the fire and rescue centre and visited Tasair where
they were shown the array of aircraft and learned of what is
required to become a pilot.
Disappointed that you missed out? Well cheer up as it is all
happening again in 2 weeks time but with a bonus! On Saturday the
15th at 9.30am a visit has been planned to the airport once again
with pretty much the same areas being visited but with an
emphasis on the Bureau of Meteorology site where we will be
observing from start to finish the launch of the wind finding
weather balloon and tracking its path and transmitted data with
the duty forecaster. We will be restricted to a group of around
15 for this trip so get in early as spots have already been taken
by people who missed out on the first trip. If this excursion is
again over subscribed we will simply do another one.
All enquiries to Tony, VK7FTCL by email at toneman(AT)bigpond.com or
on phone 62370700.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#satarvos
73's
(Tony, VK7FTCL)
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November Meeting - Special General Meeting
This Wednesday night - November 5th (AT) 8pm there will be a Special
General Meeting at the REAST clubrooms on the Queen's Domain.
The purpose for the SGM is to change the rules of REAST to create
a new Membership Category of "Life Membership" and the procedure
as to how a life membership is granted.
The proposed rule change is available on the REAST website for
member's perusal. Please take a look and all financial members of
REAST are encouraged to attend this meeting to make their vote
count.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#SGM
See you there from the?.
(REAST Committee)
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Tour of Heart 107.3 FM Studios
Brett Marley VK7FMMM has organised a tour through the Heart 107.3
FM Radio Station with Technician Chris.
Meet out the front of the station in Liverpool St (opposite the
bank arcade) at 7pm on Wednesday 12 Nov 2008.
Please let Clayton 7ZCR know if you are coming along on mobile
0466 588 193 or landline 6105 0446 or R2/R5.
Please note there will be no ATV experimenter's night that night.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#HeartFM
(Clayton VK7ZCR)
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Education and Training
Well last Tuesday night was the second instalment of the
Foundation Licence training and our six eager participants return
for more.
This Tuesday night is a recap and practical practice night with
the actual assessment night with both theory and practical being
run on the night on the 11th of November ? Armistice Day!
If you are interested in attending the course and/or the
assessment and it could be an assessment for other than just the
Foundation licence then please let Reg VK7KK know ASAP and he can
be contacted by ringing mobile: 0417 391 607 or email:
regemm(AT)ozemail.com.au ASAP.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#FoundationLicenceCourse
(Reg, VK7KK, REAST Education Officer and Assessor)
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ATV Experimenters Night
Last Wednesday night was whole bunch of stuff on ATV.
We played the linear amplifier presentation from Dave VK7DM with
an intermission from Justin VK7TW on the mirage phenomenon which
was very well demonstration by a French website.
http://jfcoliac.free.fr/Astro/Canigou/canigou.htm
The phenomenon was well documented on a website with many
impressive pictures and animations. The Canigou mountains are
250km from the mountains on the coast of Marseille. If you do the
calculations based on the height of the mountains and the curve
of the earth, you should not be able to see the Canigou mountains
on the horizon as they are well below the horizon. However under
certain conditions where there are varying density atmospheric
layers, the light rays are bent to almost match the curve of the
earth and the mountains appear on the horizon in an eerie
silhouette against the setting sun.
This is a fascinating phenomenon that I know some lighthouse
keepers have experienced with ship above the horizon well before
they actually cross the horizon and are visible line of sight.
ATV nights will be taking a short break of a fortnight and will
return on 19 November.
How do you receive ATV on an ATV night well, ATV goes out on
444.25MHz ? just below SBS on the UHF TV Band.
If you have an antenna pointed somewhere toward the Domain why
not try tuning down the low end of the UHF TV band and give us a
call on what you are seeing and hearing.
See you there.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#ATVnights
(Justin, VK7TW)
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SATELLITE News
ISS SSTV Pictures Abound
Over the last few weeks you have been hearing about the STTV
pictures from the ISS well the following comes from Miles Mann
WF1F and the team from MarexMG who made it all possible. It was
Miles team who work with NASA and ARISS to get the SpaceCam1
project off the ground.
Miles comments?.
I hope you enjoyed the SSTV project from the International Space
Station.
The MarexMG.org team has been encouraging the ARISS team to
support Slow Scan TV.
We believe this and other simple projects will have great
benefits to present and future amateur radio satellite
experiments.
The projects that were running on ISS during October 12 - 22
consisted to different SSTV project which complemented each
other.
The Primary project is called SpaceCam1:
And the MarexMG team received approval from ARISS for SpaceCam1
in January 2001. We have been working very hard to develop a SSTV
application that is very easy for the Crew to use and at the same
time provide features that the world will enjoy. MarexMG provided
the software application; the ARISS team provided the Laptop to
Radio interface and other supporting electronics.
Some of the key features of SpaceCam1 are:
Slide Show Mode: Sends a continuous stream of images in
unattended mode (disk storage or USB camera).
Image Repeater: Receive an image from Earth and then repeated the
image with a range of over 1000 miles.
Auto Receive of Images: Images will be auto received and saved to
disk for the crew to review later.
Support for SSID call sign: SSTV applications that Support SSID
will have their images saved to disk by call sign.
Time Stamp: All images sent are Time-Stamped for easy reference.
The Call & Time stamps are saved to the disk too.
The Second SSTV project was provided by ARISS and included the
Kenwood VC-H1 SSTV microphone. This system plugs into the
existing Kenwood TM-D700 transceiver. The VC-H1 can take live
snapshots every 3 minutes and transmit them to Earth
automatically.
It is always good to have a back up plan.
The Amateur Radio projects on ISS do not have access to a
dedicated laptop computer. Laptops are in very short supply on
ISS and are assigned based on priority. The VC-H1 is a handy SSTV
tool for when we do not have access to a dedicated laptop. It
also came in handy when we discovered a problem with the VOX box.
There is a special VOX (Voice Operated Control) box that connects
between the Laptop computer and the Radio. Due to some stray
signal levels, the VOX circuitry would keep the transmitter
constantly in the ON mode. We are still debugging this issue. We
hope that the problem can be corrected by a simple audio level
adjustment on the laptop.
The MarexMG team is proposing replacing the existing VOX box with
a production USB VOX box that should resolve the problem.
Your support is always welcome.
Sincerely
(Miles Mann WF1F for the MarexMG Team)
Take a look at the web address on the email and internet editions
of this broadcast.
http://www.marexmg.org/fileshtml/issimages.html
www.marexmg.org
www.issspacecam.org
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DX News
ANTARCTICA. Nicolas, F4EGX will be QRV as FT5YI from the French
base "Dumont d'Urville" on Petrel Island, IOTA AN-017, from
November to mid December. Activity is on the HF bands using SSB
in his spare time. QSL to home call.
ANTARCTICA. Bob, VK2ABP will be QRV as VK0BP on Davis Base from
November 1 to March 7. He will be active in his spare time. QSL
via VK2CA.
OPERATION APPROVED FOR DXCC CREDIT. The following operation is
approved for DXCC credit: Iraq, YI9PT, 2008 operation.
(ARRL DX Mailing List)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
weird and Wonderful
X-ray emissions found in an unexpected place
The following is from the Geek News Central website and appeared
on October 23.
Who knew that an ordinary roll of Scotch (TM) tape could be used
to create Xrays?
Apparently, the Russians did in the 1950's, but it was never
developed. Researchers at UCLA have been toying with the power
that comes from peeling tape from a roll in a vacuum. In fact, a
mere piece of tape can produce an enormous amount of power, which
surprised researchers.
In an article being published in the Journal Nature, researchers
are suggesting that the finding could lead to the production of
inexpensive and easy-to-use equipment that could be used by
paramedics on accident scenes or for places where electricity is
not available.
The researchers have applied for a patent to protect their work.
In this new research, a machine was used to peel ordinary Scotch
tape off a roll in a vacuum chamber at about 1.2 inches per
second. This caused rapid pulses of X-rays, each about a
billionth of a second long, to emerge from very close to where
the tape was coming off the roll.
And that is where electrons jumped from the roll to the sticky
underside of the tape that was being pulled away, As those
electrons touched the sticky part of the tape, they slowed down,
emitting readable Xrays.
So the question is, does this pose a danger for those of us
slaving over wrapping paper this coming holiday season? Not so
much. The research shows that this only works in a vacuum, and
most of us are not wrapping presents in a vacuum?HIHI.
http://www.geeknewscentral.com/archives/008355.html
(Sourced from the Geeks News Central Website)
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BPL NEWS
VK7 BPL Videos Still Popular
Even though it appears that 2008 may be the year that the nails
are put into the coffin containing BPL, the VK7 BPL videos are
still being viewed regularly.
In the last year the Mt Nelson video has been viewed over 21,500
times, the North Hobart video, over 9000 times and the South
Hobart video over 13,600 times.
That totals over 44,000 views of the VK7 BPL videos with many
good comments from hams all over the world.
Maybe that social networking phenomenon on the internet has some
value?.HIHI
(73, Justin, VK7TW)
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SPACE PHENOMENON
Magnetic Portals Connect Sun and Earth
During the time it takes you to read this article, something will
happen high overhead that until recently many scientists didn't
believe in. A magnetic portal will open, linking Earth to the sun
93 million miles away. Tons of high-energy particles may flow
through the opening before it closes again, around the time you
reach the end of the article.
"It's called a flux transfer event or 'FTE,'" says space
physicist David Sibeck of the Goddard Space Flight Center. "Ten
years ago I was pretty sure they didn't exist, but now the
evidence is incontrovertible."
Indeed, on the 30th of October Sibeck told an international
assembly of space physicists at the 2008 Plasma Workshop in
Huntsville, Alabama, that FTEs are not just common, but possibly
twice as common as anyone had ever imagined.
Researchers have long known that the Earth and sun must be
connected. Earth's magnetosphere (the magnetic bubble that
surrounds our planet) is filled with particles from the sun that
arrive via the solar wind and penetrate the planet's magnetic
defenses. They enter by following magnetic field lines that can
be traced from terra firma all the way back to the sun's
atmosphere.
Several speakers at the Workshop have outlined how FTEs form. The
portal takes the form of a magnetic cylinder about as wide as
Earth. The European Space Agency's fleet of four Cluster
spacecraft and NASA's five THEMIS probes have flown through and
surrounded these cylinders, measuring their dimensions and
sensing the particles that shoot through. "They're real," says
Sibeck.
Active FTEs are magnetic cylinders that allow particles to flow
through rather easily; they are important conduits of energy for
Earth's magnetosphere. Passive FTEs are magnetic cylinders that
offer more resistance; their internal structure does not admit
such an easy flow of particles and fields.
There are many unanswered questions: Why do the portals form
every 8 minutes? How do magnetic fields inside the cylinder twist
and coil? "We're doing some heavy thinking about this at the
Workshop," says Sibeck.
Meanwhile, high above your head, a new portal is opening,
connecting your planet to the sun.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/30oct_ftes.htm?list1098418
(Dr. Tony Phillips via the Science(AT)NASA website)
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Web & Email Edition Extra Bits!!
Will it blend??
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yh0PGa3xRY0
Radio Comms 2008
http://www.radiocomms.com.au/connect/2008
Optical DX Mailing List
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Optical_DX/
Spectrum Lab Mailing List
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SpectrumLab/
Richard Garriott from the ISS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mW9DXHkKpNo
Building the Fastest Car in the World ? The Science
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081023100554.htm
World's Most Advanced Microscope
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081020120050.htm
New State Transistor Discovered
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081021185213.htm
Do you have some interesting amateur related sites you have some
across in the last week ? send them in to justingc(AT)ozemail.com.au
VK7 Virtual BPL Tours Update
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdcY0Eetvsw - Mt Nelson
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gsxpya3CnQ - North Hobart
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7DfdxjRkpU - RU ready for BPL?
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----
If you are interested in becoming an amateur radio operator or
upgrading your licence then we suggest you contact your local
club for details and/or take a look at what the Radio and
Electronics School has to offer. They have a range of courses
that can be delivered through a variety of methods.
They can be found at: www.radioelectronicschool.com
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Finally today, a reminder to those people rostered for next
week's broadcasts:
Newsreader: VK7TW
160m: VK7DM
80m: VK7EM
40m: VK7RO
20m: VK7PP
10m: VK7ZGK
UHF CB: VK7HGO
HF CB: VK7TED
Thanks to all people and organisations who assisted with this
broadcast.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
THAT CONCLUDES OUR VK7 REGIONAL NEWS BROADCAST FOR THIS WEEK.
YOU HAVE BEEN LISTENING TO OR JUST MISSED VK7WI. NEXT WEEK THE
NATIONAL WIA NEWS CAN BE HEARD AT 0900 FOLLOWED BY THE VK7
REGIONAL NEWS AT 0930 HOURS.
DETAILS TO SEND NEWS FOR THIS BROADCAST CAN BE FOUND AT
REAST.ASN.AU AND THE DEADLINE FOR ITEMS IS 21:00 ON FRIDAY PRIOR
TO THE SUNDAY OF THE BROADCAST.
VK7 Regional Broadcast & News Coordinator
Justin Giles-Clark, VK7TW
*************************************************
- NEWS POSTING TO PACKET -
Courtesy Tony VK7AX VK7AX(AT)VK7AX.#ULV.TAS.AUS.OC
*************************************************
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