SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE
SARL NEWS SUNDAY DECEMBER 31 2000

This is Amateur Radio Station ZS6SRL transmitting Amateur Radio News, a
service by the South African Radio League, the National Society for Amateur Radio in South Africa, for the interest of all Radio Amateurs, Short-wave Listeners and Electronic Enthusiasts. For a complete list of broadcast times and frequencies please send a SASE to Amateur Radio News, SARL, P O Box 1721, Strubensvallei 1735.

This bulletin is also available on the SARL's web pages hosted by Intekom at www.sarl.org.za, as well as the packet radio bulletin board system. You may also request sarlnuus@mweb.co.za to e-mail it to you in either text or MSWord 6.0 format.

SILENT KEY

From a close ex-colleague it has been learnt that Tom Harvey, ZS6AUN, passed away on October 25. Tom leaves no family behind.

Our sincere sympathy to his friends.

PAUSE.

Here are the headlines of today's news:

SARL COUNCIL INVITES PROPOSALS FOR AGM VENUE

NOMINATIONS FOR COUNCIL

MOTIONS FOR THE ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

AO 40 SITUATION LOOKS GOOD

NOMINATIONS FOR SARL AWARDS

NOMINATIONS FOR AWARDS CALLED FOR

ENTRIES FOR THE TINUS LANGE AWARDS INVITED

PROPAGATION FORECAST

You are listening to ZS6SRL. The news follows in detail.

SARL COUNCIL INVITES PROPOSALS FOR AGM VENUE

Council is now inviting clubs to submit proposals for hosting the AGM and the annual prize giving function. The date for the AGM is Saturday 28 April 2001 which is over a long weekend with Friday 27 April being Freedom day. The proposal should be in great detail and include a full programme and costing. The core time for the meeting itself is from 08:00 to 13:00. The club organising the AGM will be responsible for all costs except the travel costs
of Councillors the SARL has budgeted for.

Proposals should be sent by Email to: sarl@intekom.co.za before 15 January 2000. Council at its meeting on 20 January will review all the proposals and inform the club whose proposal is accepted on the same day.

NOMINATIONS FOR COUNCIL

There are currently 5 vacancies on Council and nominations are invited from members of the SARL to fill these vacancies. Should more than 5 nominations
be received a ballot will be held.

Full requirements were published in previous bulletins. If it is required, request Sarlnews to forward it by e-mail to you.

The nominations must reach the National Amateur Radio Centre by no later than 31 January 2001.

MOTIONS FOR THE ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

Motions for submission and consideration at the Annual General Meeting of the SARL which is to take place on the 28 April 2001 are invited from members.

Each motion must contain the following:

1. A concise description of the motion.
2. A motivation in support of the motion.
3. Each motion must have a proposer and a seconder.

The motions must reach the National Amateur Radio Centre by not later than 31 January 2001.

AMSAT OSCAR-40 SITUATION LOOKS GOOD

Good news is that the spacecraft is now fully under control.

AMSAT-DL Vice President Peter Guelzow, DB2OS, has provided a summary of
recent command team actions regarding AO-40:

On December 25, 2000 at 21:45 UTC command station ZL1AOX transmitted a L-band reset command which included an initialization block to switch 'on' one of
the two S-band transmitters on board AO-40.

Just after the first attempt, AO-40's S-2 beacon was received by Ian, ZL1AOX, on 2401,305 MHz. The signal strength was S-5 to S-6, which compares to S-2 when the beacon was last heard during testing in early December.

At the time of reception, AO-40's approximate distance from ZL1AOX was 61,470 kilometers.

AMSAT-NA President Robin Haighton, VE3FRH, said that the excellent news of contact with AO-40 through the L-band uplink and S-band downlink has been received with joy and relief by AMSAT members around the world. AMSAT-DL issued a bulletin giving the news that everyone had hoped for on Christmas
day, a fantastic gift to the Amateur Radio community.

The recovery procedures are a true team effort between Project Leader Karl Meinzer, DJ4ZC, the command stations and the other members of the P3D/AO-40 team.

AMSAT-DL President (and P3D Project leader) Dr. Karl Meinzer, DJ4ZC,
provided ANS with additional information regarding AO-40's recent S-band transmissions on 2401.305 MHz:

Ian, ZL1AOX, has succeeded in loading IPS software and a minimal operational package into AO-40. As a consequence, AO-40 sent telemetry (A blocks) that enabled an analysis of the status of the spacecraft.

A quick look at received telemetry instrumentation shows Helium pressure at essentially where it was following the first 400-N motor burn. Also, it appears that a few temperature and current sensors either failed and/or are showing incorrect values. The onboard sun sensors appear to be fine and are showing a solar angle that is near predictions.

During the next several days additional software will be loaded and the
various uplinks will be verified before a command is sent to turn on the 2-meter again.

NOMINATIONS FOR SARL AWARDS

Nominations are now being awaited from clubs or individuals for the following annual awards by the SARL:

Arthur Hemsley 2-meter Trophy;
Barney Joel Trophy;
Icom Excellence award;
Joseph White Plaque;
Bert Buckley Six Meter Trophy;
Radio ZS Two Meter Floating Trophy;
Gary Immelman Radio Amateur Heritage Award Floating Trophy;
Radio ZS Shield;
J J Pienaar Trophy.

ENTRIES FOR THE TINUS LANGE AWARDS INVITED

Entries are also invited for the Tinus Lange 7066 Technical awards for the design and/or construction of amateur radio apparatus or accessories or any software for use in amateur radio.

For the complete requirements visit the SARL Webpage or look in the bulletin
of 17 December or request Sarlnews to e-mail an extract from that bulletin to you.

GERMANY - DL MORSE TESTING

According to Thomas Maisl, DL3SBB, as of Thursday, December 21st, only a 5
word per minute Morse code is required to pass the CW-exam and get a CEPT
Call 1 License in Germany. A government notice containing this information
was released on Wednesday, December 20th. (DL3SBB via ARNewsline)

NEEDLE IN A HAYSTACK? - BLACKJACK KNOWS WHERE.

While an ordinary global positioning system (GPS) receiver uses information carried by radio signals from a constellation of satellites to calculate its position, NASA's BlackJack GPS receiver looks at the radio waves themselves.

By making precise measurements of how the signals are distorted or delayed along their way, the BlackJack provides a new way to study Earth's gravity field and atmosphere.

While typical GPS can determine to about 20 meters, BlackJack pinpoints with
an accuracy of 2 to 3 centimetres!

Still in space we learn the Russian Controllers have again lost radio contact with the Mir space station.

Mir, some 14-years in space "turned off" for more than a day just after Christmas. Officials however said this posed no danger, and Mir will be
still brought back to Mother Earth March 15. (packet bulletin)

GREET THE WORLD AT THE TURN OF THE REAL MILLENNIUM

At five minutes past midnight tonight the SARL will be holding a Millennium
net on 3718 kHz. Join Laurie Devereux ZS5DL and many other new year
revellers on the air to welcome the new year and to share good wishes across the length and breadth of South Africa and beyond our borders.

PROPAGATION CONDITIONS

Ean Retief, ZS1PR, reports as follows:

During the past week conditions were as expected and forecast in last week's bulletins. From Wednesday the geomagnetic field became quiet and propagation was reasonably good.

The good news was that the solar flux stayed about 10% higher than expected.
It is now expected that the solar flux will reach it's low point on Friday
and then start to climb again. It should peak around the 21st of January,
but the value is expected to be less than 200.

Due to the relatively low sunspot count you will find signals fairly poor on the 10 and 12 metre bands. The 15 metre band should however provide good DX signals in the late afternoon.

On the 40 metre band you should find good signals from early morning till
after dark, but it is not expected that the signal strengths will be very
high.

It is expected that the geomagnetic field will be relatively quiet tonight,
so it does seem that the New Years net to be run by Laurie ZS5DL will be very successful.

The bad news is that Ean ZS1PR is of the opinion that the peak of the 11-year cycle has occurred early in September and that the solar flux and sunspot
count will tend lower and lower in the coming year.

EVENTS AND DATES TO REMEMBER

Milennium greetings get together 5 minutes past midnight tonight on 3718 kHz with Laurie Devereux, ZS5DL;

Submission of proposals for AGM venue by 15 January;

Re-opening of SARL Head Office 17 January;

Nominations for Councillors 31 January;

Motions for AGM 31 January;

Tinus Lange awards 15 February;

SARL awards 20 February.

The SARL News Service invites Clubs and individuals to contribute information regarding Amateur Radio to sarlnuus@mweb.co.za with a copy to gth@mweb.co.za. Please submit in Afrikaans and English wherever possible.

Also join us in the following activities:

The President's Net on Sundays 12:00 on 7082 kHz. Amateur Radio Mirror International Sundays at 10:00 on 9750 and 21560 kHz which is repeated
Mondays at 20:00 on 3215 kHz. Relays on various 2M repeaters can also be heard.

Correspondence for Amateur Radio Mirror International is via armi@intekom.co.za. Include your telephone number to allow the producers to call you for a possible interview. Send written reports to PO Box 90438 Garsfontein 0042 and include a self-addressed envelope and sufficient postage so that you may receive a QSL card.

These transmissions are sponsored by Sentech, the common carrier for broadcasting signals in South Africa and Telkom who provides the transmission lines. Various local repeater frequencies on 2 metres and 70 cm are also
used in your area.

We thank all contributors, especially AMSAT News and Q-News, to this bulletin and all stations who so reliably relay these bulletins. This bulletin was compiled by George, ZS6NE, and read by ZS.... in.......

You have been listening to ZS6SRL.

This bulletin now ends and Sarlnews wish you a prosperous new year.

/ex
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Internet feed from ZS6NE moved by Richard de ZR6CK

Regards,
Richard.

--- Msged/Q 1.60
* Origin: QTHR KG44DG, Novell User Group, Pretoria, RSA (5:7106/22)