SOUTH AFRICAN RADIO LEAGUE
SARL NEWS SUNDAY 17 SEPTEMBER 2000

This is Amateur Radio Station ZS6SRL transmitting Amateur Radio News , a service by the South African Radio League 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

Midlands Amateur Radio Club regrets to announce the death of Dick Andrews (ZS5FB) who died unexpectedly on Sunday 10th September 2000. Dick was a
member of long standing with the Club having served on the committee holding various offices such as Chairman, Vice Chairman and Secretary over the
years. Dick joined the SARL in 1957 and also served on Council for a period
of six years looking after the portfolio of Contest Manager. He is a
Honorary life member of the SARL is one of only a few members who held all
the SARL awards. OM Dick will be sorely missed by all. Our heartfelt condolences to Marie and family at this time.

Here are the headlines of today's news:

COMMUNICATION RECEIVED FROM INDEPENDENT COMMUNICATION AUTHORITY OF SOUTH
AFRICA

SARL ELECTRONIC CALLBOOK NOW AVAILABLE

NEXT RAE TAKES PLACE ON 9 NOVEMBER

NEW COMMITTEES

VHF CONTEST LOGS

QSL CARDS

PROPAGATION REPORT

In a communication received this week, ICASA has informed SARL HQ that a
number of repeater licence applications have been mislaid in the system. It
is possible that they may resurface in the near future, but in the event
that this does not occur clubs are urged to re-submit copies of their applications as soon as possible to SARL HQ for processing. Proposed
deadline is 24 September 2000.

The councillor responsible for repeaters and bandplanning, John Fielding
ZS5JF, promises to process the applications with as much speed as possible
so they can be hand carried to ICASA for attention at the earliest
opportunity.

This mysterious disappearance of licence applications is the second time
this has occurred at SATRA/ICASA this year.

The SARL apologises to members for the frustration this has caused but the matter is entirely in the hands of the licensing authority. Clubs are urged
to advise SARL HQ as soon as the licence is received so we can track the situation.

The SARL President, Hans Potgieter ZS6ALJ, had urgent talks with ICASA in
the past week to find out what the cause of the internal problem is and how
the SARL can assist with the processing of applications in future.

After talks with ICASA official's , the assurance was given that all applications will be dealt with in two week after it was received by ICASA.

SARL ELECTRONIC CALLBOOK NOW AVAILABLE

The SARL Electronic Callbook is now available as a benefit to SARL members. Members may install this program and database on their own PC's to allow callsign lookups at any time. The callbook is being distributed to all
members with the current issue of Radio ZS which will be mailed this coming week. It is also available for download in the member's-only section of the SARL web site at www.sarl.org.za. The following are a few of the major improvements in this all-new electronic callbook: - The database can be
updated at any time from the SARL web site.

- The program maintains two databases, the SARL Database and the Personal Database. This will allow you to add your own entries for hams anywhere in
the world, and update existing entries for ZS hams.

- The new Browse / Search function is extremely powerful. This function searches for a given string on callsign, surname, name and town at one pass.
As an example, if you know that a callsign contains 'HZ', you can search for all callsigns which contain those letters. The program then presents a list from which you can usually determine the required entry.

The SARL Database is an extract from the SARL HQ data base. Information for SARL members is obtained from members as they advise the SARL, mainly
updated each year when memberships are renewed. Information for non-members
is the best available, but the SARL is not able to obtain licence
information from ICASA so information may be missing or out of date.

NEXT RAE TAKES PLACE ON 9 NOVEMBER

Registration forms for the November RAE examination can be offloaded from
the SARL website. After the form has been fully filled in post it to the
SARL at the NARC at P.O. Box 1721, Strubensvallei, 1735. A photostat of
the first page of your ID book must be included. In the case of minors, a photostat of the parental guardian's ID book is required. The cost to
register for the examination is R95-00. Payment can be made by creditcard: provide the SARL Administrator, Wally Sime, with name, creditcard number and expiry date, you may also attach these details to the registration form. Payment can also be made into the SARL bank account at Standard Bank,
Killarney Branch, account number 001682059 . The deposit slip, application form and ID copy must be faxed to the SARL at 011 675-2793. The closing
date for registration is 9 October and the examination will be conducted on
9 November 2000. Dont delay, act now and get everything done.

NEW COMMITTEES

The Alberton Amateur Radio Club had their Annual General Meeting on the 9th
of September 2000 and the following committee members were elected:

Chairmain and Webmaster Michiel de Kock ZS6MDK
Vice Chairman and Qsl Manager Koos van der Merwe ZS6JPY
Secretary and News Bulletins Micheal Stewart ZS6MSD
Treasurer Rowan Baumgarten ZS6BIB
Technical, Repeaters and competitions Emil Bhome ZS6EGB,
Gavin Werner ZR6GE and Malcolm de Beer ZR6MAL
Social Hannes du Preez ZS6HLJ

The Council of the SARL wishes to congratulate the committee members on
their election and thanks them for their services to the SARL, their clubs
and amateurs country wide.

SUBMISSION OF LOGS FOR VHF CONTEST

The SARL Councillor responsible for contests wishes to advise members
intending to submit logs for this weekends VHF Contest that the correct
address is as follows:

The VHF Contest Committee
PO Box 256
Inchanga
3670

Logs sent to any other address will most likely disappear into a black hole. Please do not FAX logs as the contest coordinator no longer has a fax
number. Also please note that members should NOT send logs by registered
mail. In the past some logs have been sent via registered mail and as the
main post office is some distance from the PO Box this has meant that they
have had to wait until the box holder was able to get to the main post
office.

Logs may also be sent by email to: johnf@futurenet.co.za in PLAIN TEXT
format, or MSWord, please no fancy spreadsheets!!!!!

(PLEASE NOTE THE CORRECT ADDRESS johnf and NOT john)

It will speed up the adjudication of the logs by ensuring that ALL the
relevant information is filled in on the official SARL summary sheet and
that the logs are double checked for duplicate contacts, correct callsigns, times of each contact and total score claimed. Also don't forget to sign
the declaration that you have operated within the terms of your licence and
the contest rules. If submitted electronically your full name and callsign must be printed in this space and a return postal or email address included
for any queries.

If you are in any doubt about the validity of a contact, it is safer to
claim zero points for that contact than risk loosing points of ten times the claimed score due to the error. Stations exceeding a total of 20% of the claimed score due to errors will be excluded under General Rule 11.

In the March contest several entrants suffered deductions of points due to errors and one stations log was excluded under General Rule 11. Contestants should read the general and VHF contest rules carefully to alleviate
problems with scoring.

QSL CARDS

The QSL Bureau informed SARLNUUS that in order to conform with the International Agreement the dimensions of QSL cards should be 140 x 90 mm.
This agreement has been in operation for a number of years. The QSL bureau will not handle oversize cards as from the end of October 2000.

PROPAGATION REPORT

Ean Retief ZS1PR reports that the past week was noted for the expected declining Solar Flux that reached a low of 133 during the week. From 13:30
to 15:30 SAST on Tuesday a large Hyder-flare formed on the Sun. A
Hyder-flare is a loop-type, where the flare curves back into the sun to form
a loop. This flare caused a large steam of protons to be emitted from 16:00 SAST, a so called "proton event". Friday morning at 08:27 SAST things were helped along by an M1 flare. The major effects was felt from Friday when signals was weaker than usual.

The prognosis for the coming week is fair. The Solar Flux that has been
rising since Friday should reach 170 by today. The bad news however is that
it is not expected to rise much above this value. There is a small sign however that it may possibly just rise higher.

At the moment quiet to unsettled magnetic conditions are expected for the coming week, and thus mostly fairly good conditions. Keep in mind however
that an energetic flare or two can quickly upset the apple cart.

The 15 metre band should be one of the best, especially in the late
afternoons.

DIARY OF COMING EVENTS

The Pretoria Radio Amateur Club will be holding a flea market and boot sale
on 23 September starting 8 am. The venue is near the Clubhouse on the South Campus of the University of Pretoria. This will again be a memorable day as usual and please reserve the morning of the 23rd for a great get-together
and bargain hunt. Contact Hans ZS6KR at 012 333 2612 for details and to reserve tables.

The Secunda Amateur Radio Club will be running a special event station from
25 September to 6 October to celebrate Sasol Coal's 50 th birthday, A
special QSL card will be sent to all stations worked during this period.
The Callsign will be ZS50SAS indicating SASOL STEENKOOL. For more
information please contact Sid Tyler by e-mail srtyler@mweb.co.za or cell
082 461 3279.


The West rand Amateur Radio club will hold a bootsale on 30 September 2000
at the club house in Kroton Ave, Weltevredenark, Roodepoort. The gate will open at 09:00. Plenty to eat and drink will be available. For more details contact Bill van Zyl ZR6REV at 011 726-6807 (w) or 011 726-6892 (h).

The Voortrekkers are holding their annual CQ Hou Koers gathering on the air
on 14 October and request that radio amateurs who are willing to assist the commando in their town or city to contact one of the following persons

Louis Kruger ZR6ABC Cell: 082-336-2597
Willy Wilson ZR6CY Tel: (012) 343 7176
Gustav Snyman ZS6BWN Cell: 083 254 1150

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 clubs, to this bulletin and all
stations who so reliably relay these bulletins. This bulletin was compiled
by Marten ZS6ZY, and read by ZS.... in ....... You have been listening to ZS6SRL. This transmission now ends and we wish you a pleasant week.

/ex
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Internet feed from ZS6ZY moved by Richard de ZR6CK

Regards,
Richard.

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