[Ham-News] Amateur Radio Newsline Report 1607 - May 30, 2008

Tue Jun 3 18:05:49 EDT 2008

Amateur Radio Newsline Report 1607 - May 30, 2008

The following is a Q-S-T.   

Russia launches its RS-30 ham radio satellite.  The FCC says it will 
soon clarify what a repeater really is, no new subbands on 2 meters for 
digital voice operations, a quick look at what was new at Dayton and 
the Anchorage Hamfest says to "come on up!!"  Find out more on Amateur 
Radio Newsline report number 1607 coming your way right now.

**

HAM RADIO IN SPACE:  RUSSIA LAUNCHES RS-30

Ham radio has a new bird in the sky.  Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, has the 
details:

--

Russia has successfully orbited a new ham radio satellite called 
Yubileiny.  Also designated as RS-30 the bird's CW beacon is 
operational on 435.315 MHz with reports of other signals also on 
435.215 MHz as well.

At the time of writing it is still not clear if RS-30 is carrying a 
linear or FM  transponder. It does appear to be in a 1500 km orbit 
which would give a pass time of up to 20 minutes and enable stations 
over 7000 km away to be worked.

Work on the satellite started in December 2004 with the intention of 
launching it in 2007 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the first 
satellite Sputnik-1. 

We will have more ham radio space related news later on in this weeks 
Amateur Radio Newsline report.

>From the studio in Los Angeles, I'm Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, for the 
Amateur Radio Newsline.  

--

A full report on the satellite with pictures can be seen at 
www.npopm.com/?cid=242
(ANS)

**

RESCUE RADIO:  HONG KONG HAMS SUPPORT CHINA EARTHQUAKE RELIEF

Ham radio post quake rescue operations are continuing in China.  Jim 
Linton, VK3PC, of the WIA News is in Forrest Hill, Australia, with the 
latest update:

--

Situation report on China earthquake 

The Chinese Radio Sports Association is quietly very pleased that radio 
amateurs in its country have been a key part of the rapid government-
led response to the big Sichuan earthquake.

The death toll climbs daily with many thousands still missing and five 
million left homeless following the 12th of May quake. The extensive 
disaster recovery work that includes disease prevention measures, 
providing food and shelter will continue for some considerable time 
yet.

What is now emerging are more details of how radio amateurs swung into 
immediate action to provide emergency communications.

Clearly, when the IARU national radio society CRSA asked in the early 
days for three designated HF frequencies to be kept clear, those 
frequencies were being used for urgent traffic. 

Fan Bin, BA1RB, on behalf of CRSA, said the society expresses sincere 
thanks for the cooperation around the world to free up those 
frequencies, and acknowledges having received inquiries and `warm 
concerns' of amateur radio societies worldwide.
. 
As the disaster response begins to lessen in intensity, government 
officials and the news media such as the China Central Television have 
given recognition that amateur radio amateurs stepped in to provide 
vital links.

The TV service in a news report said that when all other communication 
means failed, amateur radio operators came out to provide valuable 
first hand information from the centre of the earthquake disaster.

This included an HF link for the Red Cross from the disaster area back 
to the nation's capital city of Beijing, enabling that aid agency to do 
its essential humanitarian work.

In other action, Luo BY8AA continuously coordinated VHF/UHF 
communications for a 100 km radius from Chengdu, the capital of 
southwest China's province of Sichuan.

More repeaters were set up in two other cities that are among the worst 
hit areas outside the epicentre, to form an effective amateur radio 
communication network.

In another report two ham radio operators drove to the centre of the 
earthquake area and had a repeater set up by the morning of 13 May just 
hours after the disaster hit. 

Their repeater enabled the transmission of rescue instructions, status 
reports and was a main communication channel for public use when 
telephone services were down.

Among the traffic that repeater carried were communications for the 
Mayor of a city, who gave his orders to those on the front line rescue 
and recovery activity, and to receive up to date situation reports.

A fuller story on the  role amateur radio played in China's worst 
earthquake disaster in 58 years is expected later this month - but 
there's no doubt the individuals involved did their very best under 
extreme conditions - that included hundreds of after-shocks. 

Now closing this report with an acknowledgement of information provided 
by Fan Bin BA1RB, this is Jim Linton VK3PC, Chairman of the IARU Region 
3 Disaster Communications Committee, for the Amateur Radio Newsline.

--

Meantime the Southgate news reports that radio amateurs in Hong Kong 
have been sending much needed supplies to assist victims of the 
Sichaun, China earthquake that occurred almost three weeks ago.  The 
Chinese Radio Sports Association website said that on May 18th members 
of the Hong Kong Amateur Radio Communications Association - VR2HAM - 
donated a second batch of food, medicine, communications equipment and 
other materials to the ongoing disaster relief efforts.  (VK3PC, WIA 
News, Southgate News)

**

RADIO LAW:  IS IT A REPEATER OR IS A DUCK A DUCK

Back in the United States, the FCC says it will soon answer the 
question of when is a repeater and when might it be is it something 
else?  That's what the Northern California Packet Association wants to 
know and it has filed a request for clarification that asks the FCC 
define what it means by the term simultaneously as it is used when 
defining what a repeater is.   According to the FCC's Bill Cross, 
speaking at the recent Dayton Hamvention FCC forum, this question is 
the result of some folks who claim D-Star repeaters are not repeaters 
by virtue of their inherent analog to digital and digital to analog 
lime lag:

--

Cross: "The Northern California Packet Association has filed a request 
for clarification that the FCC define what is meant by the term 
simultaneously as it is used when defining a repeater. 

"The issue here is that in California, D-STAR repeaters have been 
coordinated on channels that are set aside for auxiliary stations, on 
the basis that, because there is a delay in retransmission of the 
signal, the retransmission is not simultaneous, and therefore the 
repeating station is not a repeater.

"Others have advanced what he calls "the duck argument:  If the station 
looks like a repeater, if it functions like a repeater, and it sounds 
like a repeater, it should be treated as a repeater -- and confined to 
the repeater subbands. 

"A decision on this will be coming shortly."

--

The applicable rule that Bill Cross seems to be referring to is section 
97.3, subpart 36.  It defines a repeater as an amateur station that 
instantaneously retransmits on a different channel the angle-modulated 
phone or image emission transmission of another amateur station. 

But this rule was written before the advent of digital audio systems 
that by their very nature have some inherent delay.  Whether or not the 
FCC will strictly adhere to this definition or modify it to meet 
current technology could well determine the future of digital audio 
repeaters.  Bill Cross says that a decision on this issue will be 
coming from the Commission in the not to distant future.  (ARNewsline)

**

RADIO LAW:  DON'T ASK THE FCC TO RE-REGULATE HAM RADIO

If there was one lesson that came out of the FCC Forum at the recent 
Dayton Hamvention it is not ask the FCC to re-regulate any aspect of 
the service because its just not going to happen.  Case in point, the 
recently denied petition filed with the agency by Mark Miller, N5RFX.  
The FCC's Bill Cross  says that the rules now in place are more than 
adequate to minimize interference from digital operations to other 
existing modes:

--

Cross:  "The request that we limit the subbands for automatically 
controlled digital stations are permitted to transmit on to only those 
specified in (Part) 97 is curious because the rules as they are today 
limit transmissions from these stations to a bandwidth of no more than 
500 cycles or Hz. on frequencies authorized for RTTY and data emissions 
outside of the automatically control subbands, when a locally or remote 
controlled station is interrogating that automatic station.  If the 
idea behind this request was to limit these stations to the subbands to 
minimize interference, we were not persuaded that limiting stations 
that were transmitting in response to interrogation by a station where 
there was a control operator present would cause increased interference 
because these stations are already limited to a 500 Hz. bandwidth." 

--

In other words, the technology of tomorrow is about here and its up to 
all of us in the ham community to learn how to introduce it and how use 
it without the help of the FCC.  (ARNewsline)

**

RADIO LAW: NO NEW SUBBANDS FOR DIGITAL VOICE

At the same time, the FCC made it clear that its not going to make 
specific spectrum available for digital voice relay operations.  This 
after the agency recently turned away a petition from two California 
hams who wanted the creation of an additional 300 kHz wide subband for 
D-Star and other digital voice operations on the two meter band.  Again 
Bill Cross, W3TN:

--

Cross:  "The third item that came out had to do with 2 meters.  We 
received a request from two hams out in California.  What they wanted 
was for us to (allow) a little more spectrum -- 300 KHz  -- to be 
authorized for repeater stations.  Currently, repeater can use 3 of the 
4 Mhz in the 2 meter band.  They claim that additional spectrum is 
needed for repeater stations because some amateur repeater stations 
have begun (using) certain digital communications protocols and digital 
voice operations that are incompatible with the existing analog 
operations because digital voice users are unable to determine if the 
desired frequency is in use by An analog station.  Inadvertently, they 
say, digital systems can cause harmful interference to analog systems.  
They also claim that coordinating groups have been unable to separate 
analog and digital voice repeater operations because the available 
repeater spectrum on the 2 meter band is fully occupied by existing 
analog systems.  

Now, as I mentioned, repeaters are prohibited from using two 500 Khz 
segments of the 2 meter band in order to minimize harmful interference 
to other amateur service stations.  Believe it or not, some licensed 
users use 2 meters for things other than repeater operation.  The 
petition was turned down because their request would likely result in 
increased interference to other operations such as Packet, moonbounce, 
and simplex type operations. .  

--

So how do you make room for digital voice repeaters where no channel 
pairs are available?  Cross says that's up to the ham community and the 
nations frequency coordinators to work out and not the job of the FCC. 

Cross also came down on those hams who hold a coordination but have no 
system on the air.  He stopped short of directing that coordinators act 
to free up channels where a coordination exists but their is no 
repeater using it.  None the less his message to the coordination 
community and to those who have repeaters only on paper came through 
loud and clear.   (ARNewsline)

**

RADIO LAW:  UN-NEEDED PETITION LAUNCHED OVER INDUSTRY CANADA MISTAKE

A strange story out of Canada where mis-information on the part of one 
of that nations telecommunications regulators lead to an un-needed 
petition from the ham radio community.  One asking that nations 
political leaders to force Industry Canada to resume regulating the 
nations ham radio operators, even though it had never stopped doing so.  
Here's what happened.

Back in early May, Eddie Pereira, VA3EDP, sent a letter to Industry 
Canada regarding interference complaints in the Canadian amateur radio 
service.  The reply he received on May 13th from the Spectrum Management 
department in Toronto likely caught him off guard.  It read, and we 
quote:

"The Amateur Band is self policing now because it has been de-licensed 
for the past few years.  Industry Canada is no longer the regulatory 
body overseeing the Amateur Band operation."

This response did not sit well with VA3EDP, and he decided to do 
something about it.  His action came in the form of that on-line 
petition to Canadian Parliamentary leaders that urged them to force 
Industry Canada to resume regulating the Canadian amateur radio 
service.  The petition garnered close to 300 signatures in its short 
life.  Some from real heavyweights in Canadian ham radio politics.

Well, you guessed it.  The Industry Canada bureaucrat who had responded 
to Pereira's original information request was totally wrong.  Industry 
Canada had not abandoned the nations hams and has no plans to do so.  
But it took intervention from Radio Amateurs of Canada to straighten it 
all out.

On May 20th Radio Amateurs of Canada contacted Industry Canada which 
confirmed that the information sent to VA3EDP was incorrect.  In fact, 
the agency affirmed it is the regulatory authority for Amateur Radio in 
Canada. 

VA3EDP has since received a message from the acting Director of 
Industry Canada's Toronto office confirming that the original unsigned 
e-mail was sent in error. He says that he will be meeting an official 
of the Industry Canada in the near future to discuss a spectrum 
management issue that was the cause of his initial inquiry with.  (RAC, 
others)

**

RESCUE RADIO:  GAREC -2008 TO BE HELD IN GERMANY IN JUNE

The fourth Global Amateur Radio Emergency Communications Conference, 
GAREC-2008, will take place on June 26th and 27th  in Germany.  This, in 
concert with the German HamRadio 2008 convention that begins on the 27th 
of June at the Conference Center of the Friedrichshafen.  

GAREC-2008 will focus on the co-operation among IARU member societies 
and with specialized groups working on emergency communications in the 
Amateur Radio Service.  The event is being organized by the IARU Region 
1 Emergency Coordinator, Seppo Sisatto, OH1VR.  Working with him ias 
the same team that has already put on the highly successful GAREC 
Conferences in Tampere, Finland, in 2005 and 2006.  (Southgate)

**

RESCUE RADIO: DELAWARE ARES GROUP RESPONDS TO MAJOR STORM

Back in the USA, Sussex County Delaware ARES sprang into action on 
Monday May 12th,  This as a major late season storm strained resources 
in the states coastal region. 

As wind gusts were clocked in excess of 60 mph and inches of driving 
rain blanketed the area, Sussex County ARES activated its' Emergency 
Radio Network.  

Beginning at 09:50 hours the group began  providing eyewitness reports 
of weather, flood and traffic conditions throughout the county.  Some 
32 members worked for hours reporting power outages and road closures 
due to flooding and debris.  (eHam)

**

ON THE AIR:  USPS AND ARRL SPECIAL EVENT

To help kick off the 2008 North American Safe Boating Campaign, the 
United States Power Squadrons will hold a special event June 7 and 8 at 
the Hiram Percy Maxim Memorial Station.  That's W1AW at American Radio 
Relay League headquarters in Newington, June Connecticut.  

The United States Power Squadrons and the ARRL have been working 
together for the past several years on these campaigns.  The ARRL 
shares in the Power Squadrons' commitment to education, safety and 
public service.  It has been promoting boating and marine electronic 
education and seminars.

The W1AW special event station will broadcast from 1200 to 2400 GMT on 
frequencies 3.99, 7.29, 14.29 and 21.39 MHz for single side band phone.  
The station will also use digital modes PSK31 and RTTY. (USPS - ARC)

**

DAYTON WRAP-UP:  THE LITTLE BIT OF NEW GEAR

If those attending the recent Dayton Hamvention were hoping that a 
bunch of new gear would be introduced this year, they would have been 
very disappointed.  Burt Hicks, WB6MQV, in the newsroom with more:

--

While 2007 had a load of new product introductions, 2008 can best be 
described as a year of tweaking and improving what was shown 12 months 
ago. That's not to say that there were no new products -- just not very 
many and nothing really upscale. And unfortunately, nothing that could 
be classified as earth shattering. 

On the high frequency transceiver front Icom did show its soon to be 
available IC-7200. This unit is being billed as a robustly built 
transceiver providing coverage of H-F amateur bands plus 6 meters and 
housed in a box that should be of interest to those who are involved in 
on-the-go emergency communications. 

While Icom does not say that the IC-7200 is waterproof, it notes that 
extra design steps have been applied to the front panel buttons and 
knobs. This provides a measure of protection against water intrusion. 

Power out is the customary 100 watts. Features include D-P filtering, 
digital twin pass band tuning, manual notch filter, keypad entry, dual 
VFOs, voice synthesizer, 200 memories, attenuator, RIT, scanning, 1 Hz 
tuning and even a USB port on the rear panel. Taken together these 
features are perfect for those first responders needing the ability to 
do electronic messaging via an HF network from a USB connected laptop.

For the crowd on 6 meters and above, the only new item was a quad-band 
H-T from the folks at Vertex Standard. The latest in its Yaesu brand V-
X line, the new VX-8 can transmit and receive in the 50 to 54, 144 to 
148, 222 to 225 and 440 to 450 MHz bands. Its submersible design makes 
it practically an air tight unit that includes a built-in dual speed 
packet modem with APRS support along with Bluetooth and GPS options. 
Included are all the other bells and whistles that the very popular V-X 
line has become famous for. 

And from a major supplier hardware standpoint, that was it. 

If there were any big losers it was those who are waiting for a second 
source for D-Star transceivers and HTs -- in the hope that would bring 
competition and possibly drive prices down. 

But no other company showed up at this year's Dayton with a D-Star 
compatible radio. And so far, it doesn't seem that there is any 
interest on the part of any of any other company to enter the D-Star 
field. 

So for now it seems that only Icom plans to support D-Star in North 
America. Because of this, one could assume that prices will likely 
remain unchanged or even go up. And if that happens it will not be 
Icom's fault either. With the weakening US dollar vs. the strengthening 
Japan Yen, the actual cost for electronic goods made in the western 
half of the Pacific Rim may very likely see a significant price hike in 
the months to come -- as will much of everything else made outside of 
the U.S.A.

For the Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm Burt Hicks, WB6MQV, at the studio 
in Los Angeles.

--

Oh yes, if you want to get a good visual idea of what this years Dayton 
Hamvention was like may we recommend that you view two free videos.  
Both were produced by our friend Joe Eisenberg, K0NEB, and are up on 
the YouTube dot com website.  One is titled All Night Long and the 
other Joe calls Lean on Me.  Just search on YouTube Hamvention 2008 and 
K0NEB to find them.  (ARNewsline)

**

THE SOCIAL SCENE:  HALL OF SCIENCE HAMFEST IN NYC JUNE 8

The Hall of Science Amateur Radio Club Hamfest will be hold June 8th in 
the New York Hall of Science parking lot.  That's in Flushing Meadow 
Corona Park in Queens, New York. Admission is by donation.  Vendor set-
up begins at 7:30 a,m. with the doors opening to the public 9 a.m. 
local Ewastern time.  Amenities include ample free parking,, QSL card 
checking and more.  Talk-in is on the 145.270 MHz repeater and requires 
a 136.5 sub-audible access tone.  For more information e-mail Stephen 
Greenbaum to wb2kdg at arr1.net or visit  www.hosarc.org on the world wide 
web. (Via e-mail)

**

HAM RADIO IN SPACE:  CHINA TO LAUNCH NEW HAMSAT IN 2009

AMSAT says that China will likely launch a new ham radio satellite in 
2009.  The ham radio space agency says that it has received a report 
from Michael Chen, BD5RV, that indicates the CAS-1 amateur radio bird  
has completed its IARU frequency coordination and the hardware has been 
finished.

The payload of CAS-1 will likely include a CW telemetry beacon, a 
linear transponder, an FM repeater and a digital store and forward 
transponder.  These operations will use 2 meters for uplinks and 70 
centimeters  for downlinks at 500mW output power.

The satellite is expected to be launched from China into a sun 
synchronous orbit with a 670 km apogee.  According to Chen the  CAS-1 
team is waiting for another payload to be finished before launch  date 
is officially set.  (ANS)

**

HAM RADIO IN SPACE:  CALL IT DO-64

AMSAT's Bill Tynan, W3XO has announced that the Delfi C-3 amateur aadio 
satellite has been issued an OSCAR number.  From this point on Delfi-C3 
OSCAR-64 or Dutch OSCAR-64 will be known simply as  DO-64.

This newest amateur satellite was developed by a team of some 60 
students and facility members from various polytechnic schools in The 
Netherlands. It was successfully launched April, 28th  from India aboard 
a Polar launch vehicle and was successfully commissioned.

Currently DO-64 is transmitting telemetry on the 2 meter amateur band. 
In addition to its 2 meter downlink, the new bid has an uplink on the 
70 cm band.  (ANS)

**

HAM RADIO IN SPACE:  AN INTERMITTANT AO-16

AO-16 Command Station Mark Hammond, N8MH, says that over the last 
several days you are likely to have found the AO-16 ham satellite 
silent.  According to Hammond, there appears to be something in the 
spacecraft shutting down the transmitter after a short, random period 
of time.  

Hammond says that it does not appear to be a battery related issue.  
Rather current speculation on the problem includes a temperature issue 
that has reared its ugly head now that the eclipse periods are 
increasing and the spacecraft internal temperatures are decreasing. 

For the moment, ground control stations will  manually turn the 
satellite on and then configure it for voice operations.  This is a 
manual process and command stations are limited to the East coast of 
the US.  Hammond says that only time will tell if the current situation 
will stay the same, improve, or get worse.  (ANS)

**

DX

In DX, word that DL6ZFG will be active portable I-S-Zero from the 
island of Sardinia until around June 10th.  He plans to work all 
popular modes concentrating on PSK, RTTY, CW and also SSB.  Listen out 
for him mostly on 20, 30 and 40 meters and QSL As directed on the air.

And DL2AAZ, will show up portable V4 using the call 9H3TI from Nevis.  
He plans on using CW and SSB on 80 through 10 meters through June 15th.  
QSL via DL2AAZ, either direct or via the bureau.

Also, WA3FPK will be in Rwanda until the 5th of June.  He has been 
issued the callsign 9X0A and  plans to be active in his spare time, 
mainly on 20 meters SSB.  QSL via KA1CRP.

Members of the South Flanders DX Activity Group will be active from 
June 5th to the 9th ON6JUN slash P from the Pegasus Bridge memorial 
museum. This, as a DX-pedition commemorating World War 2 D-Day 
landings.  Operation will be on all HF bands using CW, SSB, RTTY and 
PSK.  QSL direct or to the bureau via ON5SD 

AA8YH, says via the Ohio Penn DX Newsletter that ne will be returning 
to Tunisia in mid-November for a 5 week stay. He plans to concentrate 
on the lower frequency bands is willing to accept skeds from QRP 
stations,
Either on CW or SSB. You can contact him via his \e-mail address listed
on QRZ.com.

Lastly, SP9PLK, the club station of the 2nd Mechanized Corps of the 
Polish
Land Forces, will be active as HF9GA from the 2nd to 30th of June. QSL 
this one via SP9PLK. 

(Above from various DX news sources)

**

THAT FINAL ITEM:  COME NORTH TO ALASKA IN AUGUST

Finally this week, we all know that there are a lot of good hamfests 
out there, but very few that put out radio spots designed to invite the 
public to come on down.  Or in this case its come on up.  Up to Alaska 
for the Anchorage Hamfest. Take a listen:

--

Audio only - hear it in the audio version of this newscast downloadable 
in mp3 form at www.arnewsline.org

--

That's Pete Summers, KL2GY, who is the voice of the Anchorage Hamfests 
radio spot.  And in addition to Pete's contribution, the Anchorage 
Hamfest will have loads of other activities to make the trek to 
America's last frontier a memorable outing.  

Again the dates are August 1st to the 4th at the Anchorage Sheraton 
Hotel.  And as Pete says, to learn more just take your web browser to 
www dot akhamfest dot com and be ready for a lot of ham radio fun in 
America's 49th state. (KL7SP)

**

NEWSCAST CLOSE

With thanks to Alan Labs, AMSAT, the ARRL, the CGC Communicator, CQ 
Magazine, the FCC, the Ohio Penn DX Bulletin, Radio Netherlands, Rain, 
the RSGB, the Southgate News and Australia's W-I-A News, that's all 
from the Amateur Radio Newsline.  Our e-mail address is 
newsline at arnewsline.org.  More information is available at Amateur 
Radio Newsline'sT only official website located at www.arnewsline.org.  
You can also write to us or support us at Amateur Radio Newsline, P.O. 
Box 660937, Arcadia, California 91066. 

Before we go, please note that by the time most of you hear this 
newscast, the nominating period for the 2008 Newsline Young Ham of the 
Year Award will have closed.  The cutoff was Friday, May 30th at 
midnight.  All nominations are now in the hands of the judges.  We 
should have the name of this years recipient in just a few short weeks.  

For now, with Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, at the editors desk, I'm Jim 
Meachen, ZL2BHF, saying 73 from down-under, and we thank you for 
listening.  