1

Est. 1938 Club Call G4HRS

Sponsored by: Affiliated to:

The Journal of

Horsham Amateur Radio Club

July 2017

2

Contents

In this issue

3. Notes from the Editor Summertime broadcasting

4. Widescreen eyes Amateur Internet transmission and a collection of music

6. Listen to this Broadcast reports and the AM / FM saga

8. Diary of events Full listings for the month

9. Contact details For the committee and website and club nets information

Member Score The latest results in the Club Championships

Cover picture: Chairman sat outside the National field day tent (CW)

Published by Horsham Amateur Radio ClubHARCNEWS is produced at home by G4JHI

3

You may have noticed that festival season has arrived. Thinking back to a handful of talks that we have had at the club about outside broadcasting (OB) it makes one think about the technical challenges that it takes to put a festival together. One thing that is known is that radio will frequently play a part.

Editorial

As I write this the yearly local fete is being set up on the green opposite my QTH and they often use radio equipment for the radio mic and possibly music on the wireless exempt frequency range of 863 MHz which I have mentioned in previous years. I’ll find out later! I was looking at the website for this year’s Glastonbury Festival and the lists for artists that are performing just goes on and on!

I wonder how much professional radio equipment is used there? The festival site appears to be very large! By the time that you read this the Glastonbury Festival will have come and gone but you will be able to watch a selection of many performers via the BBC iPlayer.

David G4JHI

Copy deadline for emailed items for August edition 20th July - For written items the deadline is 17th July.

For items sent by email please send to this address:

harc.news@g4jhi.co.uk

4

TV Addict

by David G4JHI

TX Factor

Episode 16 of TX Factor is now available to watch. Topics covered in this edition include a look at the Kenwood TH-D74E a dual-band hand held with D-STAR and a chat with Bob Inderbitzen from the ARRL about the League’s worldwide presence. Also featured are two clever devices from SOTABeams and a section on YOTA (Youngsters On the Air 2017).

In the latter there is a very familiar face interviewed along with another member of the family. So as not to spoil the programme in advance we’ll let you find out for yourselves!

www.txfilms.co.uk/txfactor

Bob Inderbitzen NQ1R from the ARRL

5

IOW Festival

During 8th – 11th June the Isle of Wight Festival took place at Seaclose Park, Newport and was screened for 12 hours over the weekend on the Sky Arts channel. Edith Bowman, Maya Jama and Ricky Wilson presented live for three evenings from the festival with interviews and highlights of the weekend. Artists included Kaiser Chiefs, The Pretenders, Run DMC (particularly good), David Guetta, Clean Bandit and Rod Stewart.

There were interviews with many of the performers and a few words from the party goers. This particular festival has a wide appeal to all ages of attendees. For the very first time those viewers who have the new Sky Q Receiver had the chance to watch in Ultra HD on one of the two dedicated channels to this new transmission format and this was mentioned frequently. It should at this point be mentioned that to enjoy Ultra HD one must also have a compatible TV!

Zara Larsson on stage

6

Monthly Roundup

by David Ansell 2E0NKC

All times BST

A shorter report this month due to recent ill health.

Medium-wave

BBC Radio 5 can be heard at my QTH on 693 kHz via Shoreham and 909 kHz via Brookmans Park. [The lower frequency suffers from QSB and phase distrotion in Horsham and best reception is on 909 kHz. Ed] However the town of Tywyn on the west coast of Wales has its own low power relay for this service and was heard via grey line propagation on 990 kHz at 20:33. BBC Radio Norfolk heard also via grey line propagation at 20:55 on 873 kHz via Kings Lynn transmitter.

Short-wave

An unidentified station with Chinese music and no announcements heard at 17:00 on 15720 kHz. This may be a Chinese jammer. Bangladesh Betar heard at 19:00 on 11580 kHz with English news and ‘Voice of Islam’ programme. BBC World Service heard on 15490 kHz at 15:00 with “Focus on Africa”. Radio Oman heard in English at 17:00 with a show called “Ramadan Bananze”. Normally Arabic is scheduled at this time.

Radio Kuwait English from 19:30 on 15540 kHz continues to give very good evening reception. A number of Chinese transmitters have been off air for maintenance. These are mostly Lhasa and Urumqi sites. Voice of Korea Pyongyang heard in English at 19:30 on 15245 kHz with usual “News Now” programme. Madagascar World Voice heard in Russian at 20:00 on 9820 kHz from Mahajanga in North-West Madagascar. Voice of Hope heard at 20:30 on 6065 kHz from Lusaka Zambia with a talk on forgiveness. Heard through static crashes.

Broadcast Listener

Vintage classics

Radio Caroline awarded AM licence

Fans of Radio Caroline need not wait much longer as the radio station has now been awarded by Ofcom a licence to transmit on the Medium-wave frequency of 648 kHz which was used for many years by BBC World Service. The transmitter will operate with 1Kw of power to an audience in Essex, Suffolk and beyond. The transmitter has been imported to the UK and is currently being modified to work on the aforementioned frequency.

It appears that some well-known voices to listeners will be heard playing tunes from the Radio Caroline original era. The station is also available online and in the past was available on satellite. However the latter was dropped some years ago. One of the issues they had with satellite broadcasting was that they didn’t appear on the Sky EPG so listeners had to tune in manually and they ended up with a limited amount of listeners and dropped the output on this platform.

www.radiocaroline.co.uk

Svensk radio

Analogue transmission expansion

In a strange move where some countries are expanding digital radio, Sweden’s communications authority, the Post and Telecom Agency, have announced that 80 available frequencies in the VHF band have been found to establish three new national broadcasting networks across the country, with 75 to 80% coverage using the existing analogue FM platform and could be on air by next year. It has been known for a while however that interest in the DAB platform has been low amongst consumers.

Well at least they won’t (for now) be complaining about poor audio quality due to low bit rates that are common on DAB! As mention previously in this magazine Norway is already in the process of closing public service broadcast networks on FM in favour of DAB+. Neighbouring Denmark has also expanded its network of digital radio. DAB+ is also making itself a name in Germany. With reference to some of the above from Radio User magazine.

7

Diary

8

July 3rd, 80m CW Championship 20:00 - 21:30

July 6th, Club Night: Pirate Radio - Mick Senior G4EFO

July 12th, 80m SSB Club Championship 20:00 - 21:30

July 14-16th, Ham Radio Friedrichshafen

www.hamradio-friedrichshafen.de/ham-en

July 16th, McMichael Rally and Boot Sale - Reading Rugby Club 09:30

www.mcmichaelrally.org.uk

July 20th, Social Evening: The Sportsman - Amberley

https://whatpub.com/pubs/AAA/2/sportsman-amberley

July 27th, 80m Data Club Championship 20:00 - 21:30

July 29th-30th, IOTA Contest 13:00 - 13:00

August 3rd, Club Night: FPGAs

August 10th, Committee Meeting

For details on the above contests use this link and follow to the appropriate section

http://rsgb.org/main/radio-sport

All above times are BST

Committee/Club Meetings and Socials start at 20:00

9

Committee Members

Chairman - Adrian Boyd, G4LRP 5 Walmer Close, Southwater (01403 733087)

Secretary - Alister Watt, G3ZBU 5 Brambling Road, Horsham (01403 253432)

Treasurer - Paul Barnett, G4TMC 8 Parsonage Road, Horsham (01403 261218)

Mick Senior, G4EFO (07855 268666)

Mike Tooley, G8CKT (01403 783127)

Robin Powell, G3OGP (01403 822275)

Web MasterJonathan Nethercott, M0TWM (01932 866412)

HARCNEWS EDITORDavid Miller, G4JHI 10 Fairview, Horsham, West Sussex, RH12 2PY (01403 252202)

E-Mail: harc.news@g4jhi.co.uk

BADNET: Sun 10.00 on 3.722 MHzClub net: Tue 21.30 on 144.725 MHz

HARC meets the first Thursday of the month at - The Guide Hall, Denne Road, Horsham, West Sussex

H A R C W E B S I T E : w w w . h a r c . o r g . u k

Comments, ideas, and questions very welcome. Please send to HARCNEWS or contact a committee member about it.

All input to this magazine is subject to available space and should not contain copyright material unless permission has been granted from the owner.

Photos, QSL cards etc must be clearly marked as to what they are or represent.

FACEBOOK GROUP - Horsham Amateur Radio Club

HORSHAM AMATEUR RADIO CLUB

10

RSGB Club Champs 2017 - Horsham Club Scores Issue: 29th June 2017 Rev A

TOTAL

SSB Data CW SSB Data CW SSB Data CW SSB Data CW SSB Data CW SSB Data CW POINTS SSB DATA CW

G3LET/M5O Pete 947 328 1275 3.6 328 0 947

G3OGP Robin 659 748 744 2151 6.1 0 0 2151

G3SWC Bryn 1000 805 850 818 854 741 919 888 683 769 808 9135 25.8 3550 3047 2538

G3VQO Les 0 0.0 0 0 0

G3WZT John 0 0.0 0 0 0

G3ZBU Alister 444 325 897 130 683 494 528 576 585 675 567 821 737 7462 21.1 3167 2225 2070

G4EFO Mick 0 0.0 0 0 0

G4LRP Adrian 481 342 823 2.3 823 0 0

G4TPO Steve 435 388 584 114 604 276 668 756 162 614 705 246 5552 15.7 2709 2045 798

G7DFV Gavin 85 85 0.2 85 0 0

G8CKT Mike 306 545 293 468 585 410 2607 7.4 306 2008 293

M0GJH Andrew 0 0.0 0 0 0

M0GUZ Dominic 0 0.0 0 0 0

M0TWM Jon 259 519 128 325 532 358 852 106 344 659 68 433 872 184 5639 15.9 1719 3434 486

2E0WEK Keith 324 393 717 2.0 717 0 0

2E0XRT Richard 0 0.0 0 0 0

Mode totals 3249 2194 2218 2430 2402 903 2499 2087 2577 2804 3268 2418 2422 2808 1167 0 0 0 13404 12759 9283

Month totals to date 7661 5735 7163 8490 6397 0 38% 36% 26%

Contest dates/times 6th 15th 23rd 23rd 6th 15th 12th 27th 3rd 1st 10th 25th 22nd 5th 14th 12th 27th 3rd - Start times are all 2000 clock time, ending 2130 local

2/27 3/28 2/31 3/37 2/32 3/32 3/37 3/37 3/37 3/37 3/37 3/37 3/38 3/37 3/38

Latest robot entries may be viewed at:-

Contest rules may be viewed at:-

Pos Total SSB DATA CW

1 Cambridge & DARC 40,998 16,466 14,474 10,058

2 Torbay ARS 40,648 20,047 12,416 8,185

3 Horsham ARC 35,446 13,404 12,759 9,283

4 Sheffield & DWS 31,180 15,934 7,253 7,993

5 RAF Waddington ARC 27,839 9,902 8,886 9,051

6 Scunthorpe Steel ARC 23,499 5,710 9,688 8,101

7 Colchester RA 17,361 8438 5,052 3,871

8 Stevenage & DARS 17,018 7629 2,819 6,570

(all results data courtesy of RSGB website) prep by: Bryn Tinton G3SWC

http://www.rsgbcc.org/hf/rules/2017/r80mcc.shtml

THE TOP EIGHT CLUBS - LOCAL CLUB SECTION

out of approx 38 participating in this section

(82 total all club participation)

HARC POSITION

Maintaining 3rd place

MODE TOTALS%

www.rsgbcc.org/cgi-bin/hfposted.plwww.rsgbcc.org/cgi-bin/hfenter.pl

APRIL JUNEMAYFEBRUARY

35446

http://www.rsgbcc.org/hf/

This update: - added: May DATA & CW results + ALL results for June.

Cambridge has now taken the lead over Torbay.

Well done Steve/G4TPO for the high May data score and to Jon/M0TWM for the high June data score.

Only one more month to go. SIX HARC members who participated in 2016 have not yet participated this year, so how

about an appearance in July chaps?

PARTICIPANTSMARCH

All entries to be uploaded

with the

Contest Robot at:-

JULY

Club Name

HARC overall position after above

results announced

Contest results may be

viewed at:-