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VK7AX > NEWS 21.03.10 03:43l 496 Lines 24383 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
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VK7 REGIONAL NEWS BROADCAST
FOR SUNDAY 21 March 2010
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VK7 EVENTS
Meet The Voice BBQ - TODAY.
As heard on the WIA National News VK7 amateurs and family are making their annual pilgrimage to Ross Caravan Park for the Sewing Circle hosted "Meet the Voice" BBQ.
Don VK7AY reminds us that when you first arrive please register, registration fee is $5.00 per amateur or amateur family. You will receive your name tag and ticket in the magnificent raffle of the day.
From this years raffle you will have the opportunity to win either a Brand New Antenna Tuner with a retail value in excess of $250.00, or a Brand new Hand Held 2 Meter Transceiver, and some one will take one of these home from the BBQ. We are indebted to David VK3JKY & Claureen VK3KMB Wilson from TTS Systems for their most generous sponsorship of our BBQ's for 4 years now.
The order of the day will be Registration from 9.30AM, Presentation and talk fest 11AM after which the BBQ will be lit.
If you have pre-loved items for sale then make contact with Ray VK7VKV and advised him of your attention to participate in the CAR BOOT SALE. Sellers please book in with Ray when you arrive at Ross, and we ask that selling not start until after the presentation of the "SEWING CIRCLE SHIELD" at about 11AM.
The "SEWING CIRCLE NET" are sponsors of the day.
I look forward to meeting you
.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#MeettheVoice
(73 Don, VK7AY)
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QSL delivery at Ross
Don't forget to collect your QSL cards from Joe VK7JG or Brian VKRR.
If you are reading this prior to the broadcast the details of the callsigns on the cards that will be at ROSS is available on the REAST website.
http://reast.asn.au/2010/Meet_The_Voice_QSL_cards.pdf
(73, VK7AC, VK7RR and VK7JG)
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VK7 Broadcast History
Justin VK7TW will be circulating at the Meet the Voice BBQ asking for and documenting the recollections of attendees about the VK7 Broadcast over the years.
Justin has been able to work backward to the 1950s with a list of broadcast assemblers and readers along with some funny stories and is looking for any recollections or memories of the VK7 Broadcast.
Justin looks forward to hearing from you at the BBQ.
(73, Justin, VK7TW)
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VK7 EVENTS CALENDAR
A summary of the events across VK7 over the coming months:
REAST March 24 & 31 ATV Experimenter's Nights Queen's Domain Clubrooms from 7:30pm
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#ATVnights
CCARC March 27 - General Meeting with Radio Mobile presentation at the Penguin Lions club rooms, 19 Ironcliff road, Penguin from 1:30pm.
http://www.my-x15.net/ccarc
WICEN (South) March 28 Equine Endurance Ride safety checkpoints - Woodstock near Huonville arrive Saturday p.m. or by 6:30 am Sunday morning.
http://tas.wicen.org.au/
REAST April 7 Tour of the ABC Radio and TV Studios starts 7:30pm.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#abcstudios
REAST April 10 WICEN Capability Display and BBQ Queen's Domain Compound from 10am.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#WICENDisplay
NWATVG April 10 General Meeting at QTH of Ross VK7WP
http://www2.vk7ax.id.au/atvgroup/
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Northern News
Northern Tasmanian Amateur Radio Club
www.ntarc.net
Those of you who are at or on the way to the Meet The Voice event at Ross, should take a moment to seek out Joe VK7JG or Brian VK7RR who may be able to reunite you with some long lost QSL cards. There's quite a large box full of these cards, so it might take a little while to find one with your callsign on it. The "Biblical method" works well in these situations seek and ye shall find hihi.
http://reast.asn.au/2010/Meet_The_Voice_QSL_cards.pdf
For those of you who need their NTARC membership receipts or cards, these can be collected from club Treasurer Ann VK7FYBG will be at Ross as well.
You've probably seen the adverts on television, or seen them going around town before. Maybe you've even thought about getting one yourself, but personalised number plates for vehicles do come at a price. John VK7XX has made a very generous offer to anyone thinking about getting your own personalised number plate. He has a $50 discount voucher available to give away, and since it must be used by the 31st of March, you will have to hurry. Its strictly first in, best dressed. Just imagine how impressive your callsign would look as a numberplate on your camper or car.
Tony VK7YBG reports that a casual BBQ and get together for those interested in WICEN activities in the North of Tasmania will be held on Sunday 28th of March at the Riverside tailrace park, starting at 11am. Like all good emergency oriented groups, Tony has figured out contingency plans if the weather doesn't co-operate. Give Tony a call if you'd like more information on what WICEN does, and how you could be a part of it.
Or you could look up the WICEN yahoo group, just search for "wicennorth" - that's wicen north, all one word, in yahoo groups dot com, and see what the latest word is.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/wicennorth
http://www.ntarc.net/
Thanks from
(Jason VK7ZJA, NTARC Secretary)
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NORTH WEST News
Cradle Coast Amateur Radio Club (CCARC)
CCARC News
http://www.my-x15.net/ccarc
Members and other amateurs are reminded that CCARC is holding a general meeting on Saturday the 27th of March at 1:30 pm.
The meeting will include a demonstration and instruction session on using The Radio Mobile propagation and coverage software application for generating vhf and uhf radio coverage maps.
So don't forget, Saturday the 27th of March at 1:30 pm at the Penguin Lions club rooms, 19 Ironcliff road, Penguin.
Kentish Endurance Riders
The Cradle Coast Amateur Radio Club provided comms coverage for the Kentish Endurance Riders on March 13 2010.
While we encountered some fog on the road near Sheffield while travelling to make the 6am meet-up time, it later on improved to a warm day with some cloud cover.
The event had 77 riders doing the 80km stages and approx 45 riders doing the 40km event. The 80km event started at 7am and the 40km started at 7.30am. There were 5 checkpoints, with one being used 3 times, no wonder Keith, VK7KW, ran out of printed writing paper
hihi.
It was an interesting day for the amateur operators that provided the competitor tracking for the days ride.
Radio coverage was over a 15km radius and was good, with base able to contact all checkpoints using a simplex 2m frequency.
The Kentish Endurance Riders were extremely pleased with the service that we provided, and like us, looking forward to next years event.
Many thanks to the comms Team for their efforts, David VK7EX, Steve VK7FXXX, Hamish VK7FHAM, Bob VK7MGW, Ursula VK7FROO, Dick VK7FORF, Keith VK7KW, Mike VK7MH and David VK7DC.
Members are also reminded that there is another 24 hour event coming up at St Helens, starting midnight Friday the 21st of May, so if you want to be involved contact David VK7DC.
What to become an Amateur?
If you are a non amateur or a short wave listener living in the North West, or West coast of Tasmania, and would like to become a licenced amateur radio operator, then come along to a meeting and find out about this interesting hobby. If you cannot make the meeting but would like to find out more about the hobby then contact the learning facilitator, Keith Winkler VK7KW, or any of the committee members.
Full contact details are available on our website which can be easily found by a "Yahoo" or "Google" search of CCARC TASMANIA
Regards from
(David, VK7DC, Secretary, CCARC)
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North West Tasmania Amateur Television Group
http://www2.vk7ax.id.au/atvgroup/
Club General Meeting
The next general meeting of the North West Tasmania Amateur Television Group is scheduled for Saturday April 10th. At the QTH of Ross VK7WP.
As the normal date would have fallen on Easter Saturday it was necessary to move the meeting to the 10th. More info on the meeting as it draws closer.
VOICEMAIL Nodes Updated
The VoiceMail Facility on IRLP Nodes 6616 & 6124 have been completely overhauled with all members of the Club logged in and assigned appropriate User ID's and Passwords.
Members will be emailed shortly a complete list of user ID's along with their individual assigned password. At this time the VoiceMail facility is usable on a LOCAL basis only, however extensive work is ongoing to have the facility usable from any other node worldwide, allowing a voice mail message to be left on the local nodes from a distant remote Node.
Access code for the facility is DTMF 900, however please be advised that registered users ONLY will be able to use the facility as user ID's and passwords are required as just mentioned.
Amateur Radio Licence Assessments and Training
Persons in the N/West Area of VK7 interested in Training and Assessments for all classes of Amateur Radio are advised that the Club can provide all these requirements and in addition provision of Facilitators via the Radio and Electronics School if candidates so desire.
For more information regarding these facilities, please contact the Club's Learning Organizer Tony VK7AX , or the Club . Contact details can be found on the Club Web Site or the WIA site under VK7 Clubs.
73's until next time
(Tony VK7AX, News Officer NWT-ATV Group)
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Southern News
WICEN Tasmania (South)
WICEN will be again providing safety checkpoints for the Southern Tasmania Endurance Riders in the Woodstock area of the Huon Valley. The ride happens next Sunday 28th March between Kaoota, Woodstock and Cygnet.
A network consisting of Base and five checkpoints will be established for the day. There will be a sausage sizzle running continuously at Woodstock.
The 80 kilometre ride is away at 0700, the 40km at 0830 and the 20km at 0900. Always a very pleasant day out providing a service for a friendly mob of people, including many family groups.
Come and join us. Just look for the tall mast amongst the horse floats at Woodstock, five kilometres from Huonville bridge towards Cygnet, at the Pelverata Road junction.
http://tas.wicen.org.au/
(Roger, VK7ARN)
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WICEN Capability Display
WICEN Tasmania (South) Inc will be holding a "show and tell" day around the REAST clubrooms on Saturday 10th April.
We expect to be set up from about 10.00 a.m. and be there until about 3.00 p.m.
A barbeque lunch will be available for a small donation.
The main purpose of the display is to provide an idea of what we do and what we're capable of. Lots of equipment will be on display and WICEN members will be there to answer your questions.
The local repeaters are very quiet these days, so there must be many thousands of dollars worth of radio equipment sat around doing next to nothing. Why? Difficult to say, but maybe chatting about nothing in particular doesn't turn you on. Why not get switched on and use your radio for some community service? WICEN provides radio communications to various community groups and events on a regular basis. Much of it well suited to having the family along. Maybe you've thought about it but weren't sure what's involved?
Why not come along, have a look, ask some questions and chew on a tasty snag. It'll be better than chewing rag.
For catering, it'd be nice to have an idea of how many we might expect. So, if you think you'll get chance to call up to the Domain for a look see, try to let us know so we're sure to have enough snags on the barby. A note to secretary(AT)tas.wicen.org.au would be great.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#WICENDisplay
(Roger, VK7ARN)
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Radio and Electronics Association of Southern Tasmania
April Presentation
Tour of ABC TV & Radio Studios
Our host will be Jim Parish who is Technical Manager at the ABC and he will be taking us through the newly refurbished TV and radio studios.
The move to digital technology has seen many changes in the studios and processes for bringing TV and radio to Tasmanians.
This should be a fascinating tour and we are privileged to have Jim showing us through prior to his retirement from the ABC in the near future. A great big thank you to Jim.
This tour will be held on the 7th April 2010 at 7:30pm please be at the front doors at 7:30pm SHARP.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#abcstudios
(Justin, VK7TW, REAST Presentations Officer)
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ATV Experimenters Night
Another great night of ATV and socialising with a great roll-up.
Our main presentation was a 30 minute video introducing and demonstrating Geocaching by David Liban. This was a great movie which featured many interviews with young and older geocachers who attended the GeoWoodStock 4 event in the US including the geocacher acknowledged as the person with the most cache finds at around 16,000 at the time this video was produced!
Whilst the video was running we put up the sound deadening curtains on each side of the studio and improved the reverb time within the studio and cut down the noise from the control desk and other parts of the studio.
Following all this Justin VK7TW took callbacks and it was found that there were four new geocachers in out midst following last week's talk by Harvey VK7TED and Justin VK7TW. Young Joey and Warren VK7FEET and Darren VK7AAR and partner are now into geocaching and enjoying the hobby.
If you would like to know more then please come and see any of these people at Ross and I'm sure they would be pleased to let you know all about this interesting hobby.
In fact, we will probably racing off during the day to find the some of the caches around Ross so, you are welcome to join us.
www.geocaching.com
www.geocaching.com.au
Next week we will be having some great amateur radio videos from K7AGE who produces some great material and we will be getting the chroma-key screen up and going.
We are also thinking of having a Focus on Foundation Licensees ATV night once a month. If you are a Foundation Licensee, we would like to hear from you to see if this is a worth while venture. We envisage the night would focus on helping and upskilling Foundation licensees and encouraging them to upgrade. We would probably focus on a particular aspect of amateur radio each month.
Justin VK7TW would also like to publically thank Jack Swart VK7TRF for lending the ATV group his DVB-S transmitter for well over 14 months! This transmitter has enabled the group to experiment with digital TV and make a decision as to which standard we will go with and undertake some propagation testing. Thanks a million Jack.
Interested? We get underway from around 7:30pm on analogue UHF TV just below SBS on 444.25MHz and very soon to be on DVB-T 446.5MHz!
Hope to see you along.
http://reast.asn.au/events.php#ATVnights
(73, Justin, VK7TW)
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DX News
ZL Stewart Island
NEW ZEALAND, ZL. Operators ZL4TY, ZL4PA and ZL4M are QRV from Stewart Island, IOTA OC-203, until March 23. QSL via operators' instructions.
(ARRL DX News Mailing List)
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Satellite News
FUNcube Pictures Released
AMSAT-UK has released images of the Command, Control & Telemetry (CCT) board being developed for the FUNcube Amateur Radio satellite.
FUNcube is the latest satellite project being developed by AMSAT-UK members. In addition to a telemetry beacon FUNcube will carry a 435 to 145 MHz linear transponder for SSB/CW operation. It will be the first time a satellite this small has carried such a transponder.
The CCT (Command, Control & Telemetry) Board is one of the circuit boards being designed and made by a number of members of the AMSAT-UK FUNcube development team.
Its function is to control what the satellite does in realtime:
Like automatically switch the satellite from 'education mode' to 'amateur mode', gather readings from more than 30 sensors on the satellite, eg: temperatures, battery voltages, currents and encode them in a Forward Error Correcting format for downlinking via the beacon transmitter.
It even collects and stores the data from the Material Science Experiment for a whole orbit to demonstrate variations in thermal performance of material having different surface finishes in a vacuum and no gravity and monitors on board systems and batteries.
The board will also contain the vital circuitry to deploy the 2 metre and 70 cms antennas after the satellite is deployed from the rocket. The board will communicate with the rest of the satellite via the I2C bus.
The pictures can be found at the web link on the email and internet editions of this broadcast:
http://www.FUNcube.org.uk/
There currently isn't a date for launching the bird but stay tuned to the website for further updates.
(Trevor, M5AKA via the AMSAT News Service(
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Technology News
Up to 250 watts harvested from your shock absorbers
All you people driving to the "Meet the Voice" BBQ could be generating enormous amounts of energy as you hit those bumps
HIHI.
In a recent study, Professor Lei Zuo, Brian Scully, Jurgen Shestani, and Yu Zhou, all mechanical engineers from the State University of New York at Stony Brook, have designed and tested a retrofit regenerative shock absorber that recovers a vehicle's vibrational energy. The researchers built a 1:2 scale prototype of the regenerative shock absorber, and demonstrated its ability to harvest 2-8 watts of power during typical driving conditions at a speed of about 45 mph. They predict that a full-scale system on a four-wheel car should be able to recover up to 256 watts under these driving conditions.
The researchers predict the ability to harvest approximately 64 watts per wheel, for a total of about 250 watts for a 4-wheel car, the value increasing considerably when the system is used on irregular roads.
The purpose of the shock absorber in a vehicle's suspension system is to reduce the vehicle's vibration by dissipating the vibrational energy. About 10 years ago, researchers began looking into recovering the vibrational energy using various magnetic devices. In general, these systems work by first absorbing the kinetic energy of suspension vibration between the wheel and a sprung mass, and then converting that energy into useful electric power.
The Stony Brook team's shock absorber consists of two tube-like components: a smaller magnetic tube slides inside a larger, hollow coil tube. The coil component is made of copper coils wound around a plastic delrin tube, while the magnetic component is made of ring-shaped magnets separated by ring-shaped magnetically permeable spacers. The magnets are aligned with like-poles facing each other to produce a radially emitted magnetic flux. The magnetic tube is also surrounded by a high magnetically permeable material in order to further "pull" the magnetic flux outward. Having a high magnetic flux is key to the design.
It was found that the power regenerated is proportional to the square of the magnetic flux across the coils. Consequently, increasing the flux by twos, quadruples the peak power output.
http://www.elektor.com/news/up-to-250-watts-harvested-from-your-shock.1293536.lynkx?utm_source=UK&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=news
http://iopscience.iop.org/0964-1726/19/4/045003/
(Sourced from Elektor E-Magazine)
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Web & Email Edition Extra Bits!!
Ever wondered what Earthshine (off the moon) was all about?
http://science.msfc.nasa.gov/headlines/y2002/12apr_earthshine.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetshine
The New Dr Who Premiere will be on I-View (Thanks Ben VK7BEN)
http://blogs.abc.net.au/abc_tv/2010/03/doctor-who-launches-in-australia-on-abc-iview.html
Amateur Satellite Communications Setup
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Th6_SffTE4&feature=player_embedded#
Tape Measure antenna for working the Birds
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBVT-3BwYI8
Frequency Divider PCB
http://www.perdrix.co.uk/FrequencyDivider/Frequency Divider 2.pdf
Clock Shaper Circuits
http://www.ko4bb.com/~bruce/CLKSHPR.html
Some Other interesting Circuit Ideas
http://www.ko4bb.com/~bruce/index.html
Surface Mount Soldering for Beginners
http://www.curiousinventor.com/guides/Surface_Mount_Soldering/101
Zumtobel LED technology lights Neuschwanstein Castle Throne Room
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/casestudies/21417?cmpid=EnlLEDsMarch172010
LED lighting Used on the Oscars Red Carpet
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/casestudies/21446?cmpid=EnlLEDsMarch172010
LED replacements for Fluro Tubes
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/products/21146?cmpid=EnlLEDsMarch172010
http://www.atgelectronics.com/education/PDF/Why_iBright.pdf
Philips Lumileds introduces ultra-compact Luxeon C
http://www.ledsmagazine.com/products/21448?cmpid=EnlLEDsMarch172010
High Performance Antennas (from AMSAT Mailing List)
Kent Britian's site with his wonderful homebrew yagi antenna designs using simple materials: http://www.wa5vjb.com/yagi-pdf/cheapyagi.pdf Look at Page 2, for the 432 Yagi.
DK7ZB 70cm-Long Yagis: http://www.qsl.net/dk7zb/70cm-longyagi/details.htm
G0KSC High Performance Antennas: http://www.g0ksc.co.uk (scroll down the side panels to 432MHz LFA Yagis)
Wayne Oberbeck, N6NB literally wrote the book, and landmark articles on Quagis: http://commfaculty.fullerton.edu/woverbeck/quagi.htm
World Moon Bounce Day 2010
http://echoesofapollo.com/2010/03/07/world-moon-bounce-2010/
Video Tours of Arecibo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vicxDnn6LEY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rFeXsVz8hE&NR=1
Do you have some interesting internet sites you have some across in the last week send them in to justingc(AT)ozemail.com.au
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VK7 Regional News Group Email Addresses
Post message: vk7regionalnews(AT)yahoogroups.com
Subscribe: vk7regionalnews-subscribe(AT)yahoogroups.com
Unsubscribe: vk7regionalnews-unsubscribe(AT)yahoogroups.com
List owner: vk7regionalnews-owner(AT)yahoogroups.com
VK7 Virtual BPL Tours
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
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Finally today, a reminder to those people rostered for next week's broadcasts:
Newsreader: VK7TW
160m: VK7DM
80m: VK7JGD
40m: VK7RO
20m: VK7IL
10m: VK7ZGK
UHF CB: VK7HGO
HF CB: VK7TED
Thanks to all people and organisations who assisted with this broadcast.
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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
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- NEWS POSTING TO PACKET -
Courtesy Tony VK7AX VK7AX(AT)VK7AX.#ULV.TAS.AUS.OC
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