Broadcast - 22 May 2022

Saturday the 14th May seems so long ago and so cold… but it was when NTARC, assisted WICEN (South), to provide rider tracking and safety communications for a new equine endurance event on the Glenelg property between Gretna and Hamilton in the Derwent Valley and run by the Southern Tasmania Endurance Riders. The track was spectacular, rising to high ground with outstanding views - mostly including valleys filled with fog!

From NTARC, Idris VK7ZIR, Stefan VK7ZSB, Andre’ VK7ZAB, Roger VK7ARN and from WICEN, Justin VK7TW, Lee VK7LEE, Anthony VK7AG, Garry VK7JGD and Randall VK7VWK with XYL Jodie (some of the group having dual membership).

Arrivals started 13:00 on Friday, with checkpoint exploration the order of the afternoon and the subsequent establishing reliable communications with Ride Base. The NTARC crew then left the site to the hardy WICEN campers and headed down the valley to warmer overnight quarters in New Norfolk. An early rise and 06:00 departure saw the NTARC crew heading back up the valley to collect ride paperwork and move out to the respective checkpoints.

The actual item by Roger VK7ARN, which this extract came from, including pictures can be found on the NTARC web site under “Blogs”. As Roger alluded to, some of the checkpoint vistas were indeed spectacular but one checkpoint only had sheep to see, and lots of them, HiHi. The day passed smoothly and we departed for the North after darkness and the cold set in. These events really are a good excuse to meet up, put faces to call signs and exchange latest happenings.

Last Wednesday was a club tech night, so over to Idris, VK7ZIR for a brief rundown of the happenings;

“The advance guard Peter VK7KPC had arrived and, once he had done his Duty by lighting the fire and turning the urns on, had settled himself in the radio shack to participate in the co-occurring Test Net and Tech Net being hosted by Nic VK7WW. Discord was fired up and logged into on the large monitor for all to see with the additional audio channel supplied by Phil VK7ZPD. This allowed all present to be able to go between club room and the outside real world. Peter once again brought his digital inductance and capacitance meter and was using it to check required components for an audio filter he was building up, only this time the meter was mounted in a nice clear fronted hinged case, nice job Peter.

Idris VK7ZIR brought in a mystery item, in the form of a metal case with a handle, antenna mount and front panel switch. No markings or labels were found. The item was found some time ago when Idris was still working, and had access to several large dumpsters at his place of employment. True to the amateur creed, much diving was undertaken and many useful and unusual things discovered, this being one of them particularly because of said antenna mount. After being shelved at the time, it was rediscovered recently and thought it may be of some interest to members at a Tech Night. So with much anticipation, it was given an external inspection and then the cover removed. There was much surprise when a sealed lead acid battery was revealed, explaining the heaviness, with a small circuit board with DIP switches coupled to an alarm screamer. The antenna mount was connected to the board with twisted hook-up wire. The battery was determined to be quite dead, and after much head scratching and various suggestions a conclusion was reached. It was some type of remote alarm sounder, powered by the battery in response to the correct code being received by the circuit module, via the antenna, hence the DIP switch code selector. Thus the module was most probably an actuator for a garage door or similar on the ISM band, around 400MHz. Testing was delayed for another time as the sounder would be quite loud and disturbing!

Stuart VK7FEAT brought in a Velleman hand held signal generator model HPG1 from his collection. These trusty little portable units have been around for a decade or so now, just as useful as when they came out. Stuart soon had it connected it up to a digital oscilloscope and displaying different wave forms and sweep function modes. This provided excellent visualisation of the effect of capacitance and inductance on circuits with various wave forms. Especially the leading edge effect on square waves. Definetly worth keeping in the tool box Stuart.

Andre’ VK7ZAB brought along some SDR protectors he had just received from an Australian distributor to show. These were claimed to be able to be used on an antenna next to a 1Kw transmitter and protect the front end of the receiver. Earlier in the day he had put one in the antenna feed of an Icom receiver, with a S20 signal before insertion the receiver then only displayed S0 and the loudspeaker was silent. He got the same results with the other 3 units, which were going to club members. Hooking up with an antenna analyser and dummy load showed a minimum 10:1 SWR and high R and reactive component, a bit like an open circuit! The cover quickly came off and Andre’ traced out the circuit. He looked on the web and found a photo that looked the same as our unit complete with a schematic. Their schematic showed a small 12 Volt bulb as the series element to drop the level in conjunction with a pair of back to back diodes to clamp the signal.  On our board a neon was installed instead of a bulb and the diodes where in parallel, not back to back. The neon would have been open circuit and required about 90 Volts before it conducted and the diode arrangement would have only limited one half of the signal waveform. It would never have worked, how many other clones and knock off are there out there?”

Thanks Idris for the update. The signal limiter is definitely going to be one to be followed up with the Australian supplier. Now looking to the future.

NTARC Safety Communications Team has once again been requested to provide safety communications for an upcoming Equine Endurance Event to be held at Wattlewood Park known as “Tractor on the Pole”, at Sassafras on Saturday 28th of May. The rides will be 80 km, 40km and 20 km for the one day event. We will be providing Base Communications, checkpoints and RFID tracking of rider progress. As this is one of the closer events, only a pleasant 1 hour or so drive from Launceston and if you are at a “loose end” over the weekend, why not drop in, have a chat and drink and see how the Safety Communications Team utilise voice and data skills to provide this type of safety support.

Mug Order - yes, we are talking about the white mugs for drinking out of, those that have our club logo on one side, personalised with your name and call sign on the other. We are placing another order so if you would like one then please see André at coffee mornings or at the technical night. Those members who have already requested a mug, please email secretary@ntarc.net to confirm order, and anyone else who wants one please specify what name is to be printed above the call sign. The final price will be about $12 depending on eventual quantity ordered.

UPCOMING EVENTS

TestNet and TechNet – Wednesday 25th May. TestNet/CW course on 3.580MHz from 7pm till 7.30pm….and a TechNet on 3.567MHz from 7.30pm till about 8.30pm. Your host for the evening will again be Nic VK7WW.

Club Tech night – Wednesday 1st June. Held at the NTARC Club rooms, 7.30pm until whenever.

Club General Meeting – Saturday 4th June. Held at the NTARC Club Room, Rocherlea Scout Hall, Archer Street, Rocherlea. Meeting commences at 2pm. Please note this one has been brought forward so as not to clash with the Queen’s Birthday long weekend.

Malcolm White Presentation – Wednesday 15th June about 20:00 Apart from being a licensed amateur at an early age, and a CW aficionado, the major topic is to be his association with Ray Naughton VK3ATN at the time of Ray’s pioneering Earth Moon Earth (EME) achievements in the 1960s on the 2 metre band.

Coffee Morning – held every Friday in the NTARC Club rooms. Catch up time is from 10am to noon and we look forward to seeing you all there. These coffee events represent a good opportunity to collect your QSL cards. We currently have cards awaiting collection, so why not pop in and check the QSL box and join us for a cuppa and chat.

FINALLY – A reminder to all members that if you have any items of news you would like added to our weekly roundup, no matter how trivial, then please email them to the Secretary at the following address news@ntarc.net all items to be received no later than 5pm on the Friday prior to the Broadcast.

That’s all folks,

73’s from Stefan, VK7ZSB, Secretary NTARC inc.