Feedline June 2000

NEXT MEETING - JUNE 22 FIELD DAY SITE - 6:30 p.m.

CARC Field Day 2000 Update

CQ FD CQ FD N4NC N4NC

CW Ops who want to operate CARC FD2000 please contact Will Harper at [email protected] or 467-0224. All volunteers will be accepted. (K4IWW)

If you have any old study guides, operations manuals, callbooks to supplement the information booth, bring them to FD. (KM4LB)

"TO DO List" - Tables ! Operators !! Support !!! (WA4KE)

CARC Field Day 2000 Info:

Field Day Coordinator: Mike Lewis, WA4KE.

Field Day Technical Coordinator: Jack Davis, WA4OOD.

The date for ARRL Field day is June 24 and 25. We will simulate an actual emergency situation by operating from electric generators and wire antennas. It's very doubtful that during an actual emergency we would be able to put up a tower or obtain a tower on wheels as we did last year.

We will be operating as a 2A station with VHF/UHF. Operation will take place on 15M - 80M SSB, 15M - 80M CW, and the VHF/UHF will mostly operate on 6M.

Setup will be at Bond Park, with CW station being located at same spot as last year, SSB station at same location or possibly closer to the lake. Setup plans call for station setup being completed by 11:30AM (including station test QSO's).

Dayton Bucks Trend

Dayton attendance up again: Dayton Hamvention General Chairman Jim Graver, KB8PSO, reports the preliminary attendance count at the 2000 Dayton Hamvention and ARRL National Convention was 28,804. That's up from 28,127 in 1999, and Graver says the official attendance number may be a bit higher. Several vendors reported selling out of certain popular items. And, of course, a good time was had by all! (ARRL Letter)

"Hamoeba" wins QRP Design Contest at Dayton

Duncan Walters, G4DFV, was the winner of the "1 V Challenge" at the "Four Days in May" QRP gathering held in conjunction with the Dayton Hamvention. The Hamoeba is a 100 mW "single-cell" (get it?) CW transceiver. There were four entries in the "1 V Challenge"--to design and build a transceiver that runs off no more than a D cell. No voltage up converters were allowed. Duncan did not make it to Dayton. He sent his entry in with George Dobbs, G3RJV. (Jim Stafford, W4QO/QRP ARCI )

ARRL-VEC SEEING LIGHT AT END OF TUNNEL

ARRL-VEC Manager Bart Jahnke, W9JJ, says staff members and volunteers are making substantial progress processing the flood of amateur applications resulting from FCC restructuring. Jahnke says the initial surge of applications already has been processed, and fewer applications remain in the pipeline.

"We're making headway fast now, as the number of applications diminishes the further we get away from April 15," Jahnke said. He reports the ARRL-VEC sent some 6700 applications to the FCC last week and has been averaging a pace of well over 1000 per day. "Last Friday was our strongest day ever--at 1966 applications transmitted to FCC," he said. Since April 15, the ARRL-VEC has logged more than 12,000 General and more than 9500 Extra upgrades. The ARRL-VEC has logged in approximately 3800 test sessions since the beginning of the year.

Jahnke said he anticipates the time from exam session to license grant to continue to diminish from the current five weeks or longer to just over three weeks by next week. On June 8, applications were being processed from May 12 test session receipts. Typically, the FCC processes applications within 24 hours of receipt, although there were some delays last weekend.

Still remaining in the queue are applications from another 507 test sessions. Jahnke estimates these will yield 600 new Technicians, 2100 new Generals, and 1400 new Extras. By the time ARRL-VEC personnel work their way through that stack, Jahnke said, the wait should be down to less than 10 days.

Jahnke reminded applicants that the best license grant information is available from the FCC's Universal Licensing System web site (click on "License Search"). Typical Web call sign servers are at least 24 hours behind the FCC in updating license data, he said.

ARRL-VEC staff members and volunteers have been working nights and weekends--including Memorial Day weekend. Seven VEC staff members, two temporary employees, and a half-dozen or more HQ staff volunteers from other departments have been whittling down the stacks of applications. "We're just about ready to lift the moratorium on sick days," Jahnke joked.

Test session processing status is available on the ARRL-VEC web site. (ARRL Letter)

LONG DISTANCE COMMS: THE SOUTH POLE More Mission Shrink?

Ham radio is no longer the only means of recreational communications to Antarctica. For decades, scientists stationed in this frigid southern latitude have depended on Amateur Radio to talk with loved ones back home. But that could soon be a thing of the past as the South Pole telecommunications network gets an upgrade to permit high speed Internet traffic.

While the geostationary satellites above the Equator cannot see either pole, a new breed of birds using inclined orbits can. And now these satellites are being used to exchange both voice and data for hours at a time between the poles and other latitudes. And the scientists on Antarctic assignment are saying that they are able to enjoy more privacy and longer communications back home than they could using Amateur Radio. (W5YI Report via R.A.I.N)

DX

In D-X, 6 meters is getting hot as a firecracker worldwide. Now hams in the United Kingdom are enjoying all sorts of contacts . Some even with stations in the USA.

The Sporadic-E season has at last started in earnest. There was much action over the past weekend. On Saturday the 27th of May, 50MHz was wide open and many Italian stations were worked in the Italian Gargano contest. Long-haul DX was available to Africa and to North and South America. Some of the choice DX worked from the UK includes St Helena, Mayotte, Reunion, the Falkland Islands and Greenland. In the late afternoon of the 27th, 144MHz was open to Italy and Eastern Europe, mainly Hungary, Romania and Yugoslavia. 50MHz was open at times on Sunday the 28th.

On Monday the 29th of May, European signals were frequent and there was trans-Atlantic propagation to north-east American stations, notably W3CMP, at around 1400 UTC, although the signals were weak.

OY9JD, in the Faeroe Islands, was very strong on 50MHz for much of the afternoon and at 1606 UTC, G3COJ was on 70MHz and worked him cross-band. (Jeramy Boot, G4NJH)