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llecernber EditorialWelcome to the December and Christmas issue of thenewsletter. I just can't believe that this is the last editorialof 1999, also more so, it is the last editorial of this millen-nium, where has this year disappeared to?. Next clubnight takes us into the new millennium so what future isthere for the club? well one wonders. To think it allstarted away back in 1984, 15 years ago with a smallgroup to now being a very well known and establishedclub.

What has happened over the last year? First of all a rundown on the attendance for the vear^ note I run from De-cember to November for this information. Attendance this Other events that we have done is a batch of demonstra-year has averaged out at 28 which is a drop of 2 on 1998. tion stations at Carberry Tower and Loanhead HighThe slight drop has resulted due to a few ofthe regulars School for the scouts, Gala Days at both Port Seton andhaving a change of "commitments" resulting in that they Macmerry and lastly our now annual visit to Barns Nesshave been unable to attend club nights. The grand total of Lighthouse (GB2LBN). We also managed a couple of so-60 people actually came to the club through the year, cial events as well, the 10 pin bowling and our Christmaswhich is I down on the 1998 figures. Basically the num- Night Out both excellent nights.bers are much the same, overall this is still indicating thatwe are still a very strong and healthy club. As I have saidmany times before it really is down to you all making itthat way.

Unfortunately over the year there has been some "sadtimes". Firstly Alex GM6VIUIGM0WSN mother died be-tween Christmas and New Year. Peter GMIRCP lost hisfather and lastly Colin GM0CLN's mum and BobGM0BWU's wife was a sad loss. As always at thesetimes our deepest sympathies to all concerned. On a hap-pier note David GM4WLL and his wife Wendy gave birthto their son.

No callsign changes this year but glad to say that my lastyear Novice Pupils all passed and obtained their Novicecallsigns. Ewan 2MIHCI and Iain 2MIHCJ.

Over the year we took part in our usual batch of contestsboth HF and VHF i.e. PW QRP, VHF Field Day, IOTAagain from Tiree, CQWW SSB, RSGB 10/15M, etc. Toomany to list, some we have improved on others we have-n't done as well i.e. not winning the PW QRP (well donethough to David GM4WLL on winning, a well deservedwinner) loosing the Restricted Section on \{HF FieldDay. There is always another year! Well done to everyonethough who has taken part in whatever contest as no mat-ter where you end up it is the fun of competing. If youhave never taken part in a contest why not give it a go, itreally is a test of skills and believe you me it really is funas well. Lastly on the contesting front we had our ownlOM contest in June and it was a sreat fun nieht with

some great contacts been made. It is designed to encour-age all the "B" and "Novice" licensees to have a go onIIF in a relaxed atmosphere, so why not take part in thenext one in June 2000.

The organised events that happened were once againJohn GMTOLQ doing a Radio Check Night, (manythanks John it is really a worthwhile night). Talks by JackHood GM4COX on "25 years of Raynet" and still to hap-pen as I write this Tom Wylie GM4FDM on"Contesting". Our video night and DF nights as well.

The last main event of the year was our now annual JunkNight which was once again a very resounding success,many thanks again to all those who were irwolved. Thisyear we managed to raise a grand total of $986 for ouradopted Charity the British Heart Foundation. Tremen-dous amounts once again so let's hope we can continueto achieve this.

Lastly on the general club front we now have our ownclub callsign MM0CPS which we car use for all ourevents and finally our "wee" newsletter managed to comesecond in the PW Club Spotlight competition, well doneRon GM4IKU for all your effofts.

That's it then a general suflrmary from which you can seecovered many aspects and I hope there was something inthere for everyone. For next year the events calendar iswell on its way of being finalised but I am still short ofsome events and although I keep asking what you wantno replies are forthcoming so come on get those ideascoming. IT IS YOLIRRADIO CLUB!

All that is left to say is that I hope you have written yourChristmas list and have "posted" it up the lum for SantaClaus. To you and all of your family have a VERYMERRY CHRISTMAS and A HAPPY. IIEALTHY andPROSPEROUS NEW YEAR when it comes and I'll seeyou at the next club night, l+ft January 2000, in the newMillennium.

Bob GM4UYZ

Cockenzie & Port Seton A.R.C. Page

Annrral Tables Update lls Of,t lth Novernber 1999

Yet again we had an early closing date for table entries thismonth. Primarily due to various other commitments whichmembers of the newsletter team had. This has unfortunatelyresulted in only 50Yo of the table entrants submitting scores.However, thanks to the CQWW SSB Contest I still receivedhealthy updates from some of the regulars....

First of all I will deal with Bob G}|.f.4I.JYZ who, at long last,had a chance to play a bit while a contest, CQWW SSB, wason. His scores have improved well as a result. His new addi-tions were.... l4lvfrIz : Eire@I), England(G), LiechtensteinGmO), Finland(Ot{), Netherlands(PA), Lithuania(LY), Slove-nia(S5), U. S.A.(W); I SMlIz : Portugal(CT), Spain(EA). Be-larus(EW); ?llvfllz : Morocco(CN), Germany(Dl), Moldova(ER), Liechtenstein(F{B0), Italy(I), Finland(OH), Sweden(SM), Poland(SP), Ukraine(UT), Antigua & Barbuda(V2),Indonesia(YB). A good improvement of 22 anllF this month.

David GM4WLL is next and has been active, with 3 QSOs on23cnr, this month as well as an aurora and the Marconi Me-morial 144MHz CW Contest. Scoring QSOs were...l44MIIz: IOTI(GW), JO3l(DL), 1o,46(02), JO57 JO58JO65 & JO79(SM), JO59 & JPSO(LA) Awell earned 9 moreon VHF.

After last months complaints John M0BEX says "What was itI was saying about condilions? I take it back after an abso-lutely fantastic October". The CQWW SSB Contest and gen-eral good conditions have given him 8 completely new DXCCcountries amongst the following non-European additions...7Nfr12 : Barbados(8P), Netherland Antilles(PJ), Asiatic RussiaOA9), Antigua & Barbuda(V2), Canada(\{E), USA(W);I4MIIa: Israel(4X), Morocco(CN), Catary Is(EA8)" St Lucia(J6), Japan(JA), Alaska(Kl), Lebanon(OD), Australia(VK);I SMHz : Dominican Republic(Hl); 24WIz : Pakistan(APi,Morocco(CN), Turkmenistan(Ez), US Virgin Is(KP2), Aruba(P4), Kazaldtstan(tlN), Antigua & Barbuda(V2), Monserat(VpzM); Z8i$lftlz : Uganda(SX), Algeria(7X), Barbados(8P),Kuwait(9K), United Arab Emirates(A6), Ceuta & Melilla(EAq), Dominican Republic(til), St Lucia(J6), Japan(JA),Mongolia(JT), Lebanon(OD), Netherland Antilles(PJ), Fer-nado de Norohna(PY0), Antigua & Barbuda(V2), St Kitts(V4), Anguilla(VP2E), Monserrat(VP2M), UK Bases CyprusQC4\ These additions see John top the 241\fr12 and2SlvIIlztable scores with an exffa 88 overall on IIF.

Jim MM0BQI put in a single operator entry for CQWW SSBand has again reaped the benefits in the tables. Jim comments"Too many highlights but top fiour must be Zimbabwae on 28,Antarctica an7/14121, Faroes on 6m Aurora and strings ofWVE on 80i40 m with a bit of damp string and 80watts.More people should try it, it's wnazing what is out there to beworkedl" His recent new FIF points from outside Europe, in-cluding the last minute update from last month, and any \lHFadditions were as a result of the followins... l.SMlIz : Tunisia

(3V), Morocco(CN); 3.5MHz : Azerbaijan(4l), Ceuta &Melilla@A9i, Asiatic Russia(UA9), Canada(VE); TMHz : Ku-wait(9K), Ceuta & Me1i11a@A9), Antarctica(various), BritishVirgin Is(VP2V), LIK Bases Cyprus(ZC); l0MHz : CapeVerde(D4)" Martinique(FM); laMHz : Kuwait(9K), Trinidad& Tobago(9Y), Morocco(CN), Madeira Is(CT3), Philippines(DLI), Canary Is(EA8), Armenia(EK), Guadeloupe(FG), Gre-nada(J3), Kure Is(KH7K), Netherlands Antilles(PJ), Fernandode Norohna(PY0), Antigua & Barbuda{V2), Namibia(V5), In-donesia(YB); 18MHz : Liberia@L)" Canada(VE), British Vir-gin Is(VP2V) ; 21lvt1z : Zambia(9l), Canary Is(EA8), Antarc-tica(various), Tadjikistan(EY)" St Pierre & Miquelon(FP), StLucia(J6), Netherlands Antilles(PJ), Fernando de Norohna(PY0), Seychelles(S7), Australia(VK), Montserrat(VP2M);24Mllz: Turkmenistan@Z)" Chagos Is(VQ9), UK Bases Cy-prus(ZC); 29MIIz : Cyprus(5B), Uganda(5X), Senegal(6W),Ghana(9G), Zanbia(9l), Kuwait(9K)" East Malaysia(9M),United Arab Emirates(A6), Madeira Is(CT3), Kyrghyzstan(EX), F,cuador(f{C), Dominican Republic(}il), Japan(JA),Mongolia(JT), Jordar(fY), US Virgin Is(KP2), Brazil@Y),Fernando de Norohna(PY0), Kazakhstan(Ul{), Canada(VB),Anguilla(VP2E), Indcnesia(YB), Zimbabwe(22), Cayman Is(ZF); sOMHz : IO65(GI), IO76(GM), JO5T(LA), JP73, JPB l,IP62(OY); 144Mfr{z: IO68(GM). In total Jim gained 87 extraon llF and 5 extra on VHF for his considerable efforts.

At last, at GMOCLN, I have a shack I can operate from again!The bigger shack, a new radio and a bigger garden for anten-nas will no doubt pay dividends in the coming months. In themean time I managed a few more new ones, mainly duringCQWW SSB with my trusty HX-240 transverter and the nor-mal dipole arrangement. This months additions arc...7lvfrlz:Oman(A4), Sweden(SM); lOMlIz : Georgia(4l), Canary Is(EA8), 2lNftlz: United Nations Geneva(4U), Libya(5A), Es-tonia(ES), France(F), Montserrat(VP2M), Chagos Is(VQ9);28}'/JIz : Israel(4X), Morocco(CN), Portugal(CT), Ceuta &Melilla@A9), Japan(JA), Jordan(JY), US Virgin Is(KP2),Lithuania(LY), Bosnia(T9), Kazakhstan(UN), Anguilla(VP2E), Latvia(Yl), Macedonia(23), Albania(ZA);r44\&Iz: IO68(GM),IO92 & JO02(G), JO57(SM), Sweden(SM), JO59 & JP50(LA), Norway(LA). A long overdue 24 onF{F and 8 on VHF.

Please make sure that I receive your next updates by FridaylTth December at the latest. Also. final submissions for the1999 tables should reach me by l4th January 2000. That willgive you all a couple ofweeks to sort out your logs. The final1999 tables will be published in the February Newsletter(baning natural disaster, the end of the world, the milleniumbug etc etc)

Finally, I would like to confirm that I will run the tables againin 2000 so remember to start collecting new ones on Januarylst. I hope to publish the rules again in the January Newslet-ter and, as ever, newcomers will be very much appreciated.

Good DX and73 until next month.

Colin GMOCLN

Tables overleaf

VHF/UHF $cores are tha totEl number of DXGC countrias end Maidenhead locator equares workod on each band.

$qckende,&.Pgrt $eJoq ARQ Annu.q! Hr T, ahlp Ag,Of l'lth NpYeqber t9g9

Cockenzie & Port Seton A.R.C. Page 3

Qochenrie&Fgrt$ston ARC AnnualVHF/UHF Ta[h As Ot 1lth Norenber 1999

HF $cores are ths toial number of DXCC countfies lttolkad on each band.

W|'Bend Leading $core ForEach Bencl

I}IORSE TIIPESFor your information I have sent away to George AllanGM4}IYF l0 blank 90-minute audiotapes so that he can createCW Tapes. The offer of this service was advertised in RAD-COM plus I personally spoke with George at the Scottish Con-vention to find out all about it. George has run the RSGB CWtraining nights on the air so he is well equipped to provide thisservice.What is coming (hopefully they will be with us by the time youread this) is:

5 Tapes at 5WPM and 5 Tapes at I2WPMThese 5 tapes break down to:I x Plain LanguageI x NumbersI x Letters In-Groups of 5I x Mixed Letters and NumbersI x CW Test QSO's

The idea is that these will be Club Master Tapes and if anyonewants a copy of them then all they have to do is provide me withthe required amount of blank tapes and I will do the necessarycopyrng. I am sure there will be enough CW on them to help youpass the respective CW test.HappyCW'ing.

AalFlsnLrst

Update50MHz 70MHr l4rtilHz 43?[rHt ;ountrysquen ('fiano

TotalCtry $qr Gtry Sor ebv $qr Ctry $qr TEEI TsblUMOBQI 1 14 49 3 4 54 172 2&SMOELV0$Jul-S9 30 93 0 0 4 1 0 0 34 100 1S10id4wLl 0&No*9t 0 0 ?5 96 121MM0CCC?7"Ausg! 7 t2 4 12 5 ?1 1 2 t7 50 67Sil|ocLN11-Nov-99 I 2 0 0 6 e0 0 0 7 22 29sM4LfYZ 108-Nov-9! 0 0 1 o 2 t0 I 2 4 18 223MONTL 110-Seo-gg 0 0 0 0 I 1 1 2 2 3 5

CellrianLs$t

tlEdebBend lMHzl grand

TohlIOINI

DXCCt.8 3.il T 10 t l 1E tt 2{ 28Mir0Bal 0&Nov-st s2 31 7g 556 161BMO$,|TL1&Sep9! 21 21 34 0 79 93 33 74 4't0 154MOBEX 07-Nov-9t 0 11 43 rt TI 52 66 s78 127SMOELV 0$Jul-99 0 g 43 0 76 3 01 4 35 a8 116BMOCLN11.Nov-9[ 0 2 2A 4 52 20 42 2 36 178 80Mft0cce 27-Auo9$ t f f i 21 0 35 3 ffi 0 14 1m s1MiimAitv0$setrg! 0 0 0 0 50 1? 13 s 5 85 573M4UYZ 0&Nov-9t 0 5 5 0 23 14 22 1 t3 83 44OM4WLL0$Nov-9{ 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 19 19 193MlGVJ 2&Jan99 0 2 0 0 3 0 0 t 2 I I

ltlllrocPs Qsr, GnRrDAs you know I asked you all to desigrr a QSL Card as partof a small competition for our new club callsign and eventhough the closing date was two months back as yet I havenot received any entries, why I ask?Are you not interested? So making the assumption that youall forgot all about it I am once again making the final clos-ing date the first club night ofthe year (14fr January).Come on get your design skills out and let see what you canproduce.

I am looking forward to being flooded with de-signs! | ! ! | ! | Ml | ! ! ! ! l! ! ! l! ! | ! ! | ! l l ! ! ! ! ! ! | !

Bob GM4UYZ

Bob GM4UYZ

Cockenzie & Port Seton A.R.C, Page

IIUDIIIN NI}IATEUR$ PROVIDE POST -GYGLOITE IIII'

Hams in India were able to play a critical role in providing emergency communication from the eastern state of Orissa, struckby a destructive "zuper cyclone" in late October. The storm resulted in tens of thousands of deaths, left many more homeless, andcreated food and water shortages. Troops have been sent into the affection regions, and the US has pledged $2.1 million in emer-gency food and shelter aid.

Calcutta VHF Amateur Radio Society Secretary Indranil Majumdar, W2KFR" an ARRL member, reports teams of amateursfrom all over India responded to the disaster. The Caicutta club set up an Amateur Radio Control Room at the shack he shareswith his brother, Horey, VU2I{F& running a Drake TR4 transceiver into a three-element beam on 20 and 40 meters. At onepoint, a dozen Calcutta hams were staffing the facility around the clock. "This is the first time the whole of India has to come toknow and appreciate ham radio," W2KFR said. He said ham radio provided the initial communication link between the strickenstate and the rest of the country.

On November 7, a group of five Calcutta hams took off for the Jajpur District in Orissa in a Land Rover-type vehicleequipped with HF mobile equipment. "The communication was done from the mobile with a dipole fi1ted like an inverted Vee onthe car roof," Majumdar said. The transceiver in the car was a l5-W homebrew SSB rig that the club had put together.

"The entire communication in the state is being maintained by hams--except for some satellite phones that are operating nowand then and facing battery problems," Majumdar said. The disaster comdiunications team has since returned fiom Orissa as tele-phone and satellite phone service became available. Majumdar said the teams handled message traffic relating to emergencyfood, clothing" and medical needs, road conditions, and health-and-welfare. Similar fixed facilities were set up in other Indiancities--including New Delhi and Hyderabad-and linked via lIF.

Majumdar says a group of hams from the National Institute of Amateur Radio in Hyderabad also went to Orissa and set upemergency control rooms in Bhubhaneswar, Jajpur and Paradip. Other stations subsequently were set up in other affected citieswith'yHF and FIF capabilities. VU2KFR says VHF links were being used to handle regional traffic within and between states.There are no repeaters. The hams are using what he called "human relay."

M{umdar estimated that 50 hams in all were participating in the disaster communication effort using their own or borowedequipment. One Jajpur official praised the Amateur Radio efforts. In a letter to Calcutta VHF ARS President Dipak Mitra,l'U2DPM District Magistrate R. Balakrishnan said the radio links were helpful in monitoring the spread of disease and in dam*age assessment eficrts. "I am ofthe view that the concept ofham radio should be popularized and more and more such groupsneed to be encouraged," he wrote.

faken frorn the 8RRL l{ewsletterNovernber 26th and acknoruledged wittr

thanks

At the controls of the VU2KFR/VU2HFR Amateur Ra-dio Control Room in Calcutta is Indranil Majumdar, VU2KFR.Left is Sanjeev, VU2TIL.

[photo courtesy of Indranil Majumdar, VU2KFR]

The Amateur Radio control center in the JajpurDistrict of Orissa: (l-0 W2NKI operates on 2 meterswhile VU3BIS works the IIF link.

[photo courtesy of Indranil Majumdar, VU2KFR]

Cockenzie & PortSeton A,R.C. Page

rAI.K ON IOTtr GOTUTESTIIUG ET

We had the honour of Tom giving us a talk in the CommunityCentre on Friday 19ft November on what is needed to put to-gether a "winning' station in the IOTA Contest.

Tom is part of the West of Scotland Contest Group GM5VG/Pas well as being one of the adjudicators of the RSGB IOTAContest. The group over the years during IOTA have operatedfrom various islands around Scotland, now basing themselveson the island of Ggha situated to the west of the Mull of Kin-tyre, to taking part from the island of Antigua in the Caribbeanduring the 1998 contest. Overall they are a very, very experi-enced contesting group.

Toms talk covered various aspects like planning, equipment,strategJ, software, and even down to post mortems after theevent. Planning is always a very important issue when organis-ing or doing anything but with going to an island there is noroom for error so it must be very meticulous, as you can't af-ford to forget the simplest of items. Equipment is also very,very important and they use identical equipment tluoughout. Agood section of the talk was down to this area saying what theyused (FTI0OOMP's, Band Pass Filters, aerial switching, com-puter logging and control, aerials of different types [verticals,wire, Yagi's]), why they used it and how they operated it.Software run on the computers was Nd as this has the abilityto network computers together. An important issue here is that

trltITlTEUN ltNTTGRAtr[SThe final Amatzur Anagrams of the millenium await youl So" why don't you try this month and see ifyou can solve them for achangel Anagrams of words with an Amateur Radio link are given below. When you figure out what the words are,they should be entered horizontally in the grid provided. Any black squares represent spaces between words. When the grid iscompleted correctly you should have another word in the highlighted vertical box. Good luck...

This months clues are...1. GIN TRIFLE, 2. OIIR A.M. EAT RArD, 3. A MORSE TrLTE& 4. RAT BYTE, 5. HID ANCHOR TRIM, 6. INCA MIG,7, CREPT SUM

NOVEMBER 1999 ANSWERS1. SOLARFLIIX,2. SPLATTE& 3. TETRODE,4. PREAMPLIFru& 5. CALLSIGN,6. STATION,7. NEI_TTRAL

The vertical word last month was *OPERATE". Hope you managed to get it right and that you enjoy the forthcoming milleniumcelebrations wherever you are!See you in 2000, if my computer is still workingl

TOItt WYLIE GItI4FDItt

before the contest everyone who is operating has to be fluent inhow the software operates which falls back into the good plan-ning area. The other area that Tom stressed is really importantis strategy. How you operate? When you operate on whatbands? All about achieving maximum points at any one time.No point working a pile up of W's for 3 points when you couldbe working G's for 15 points! Do not waste time idle chatting,time costs points. Lastly the post mortem. In any contest afterthe event look at where you went wrong. Can it be improved?Look at all other aspects, did we need this equipment, etc, etc?Lastly Jim GMONAI showed a various selection of slides ondifferent antennas that the group have used. Many ofthem be-ing home built.

The talk was definitely very informative" both serious andfunny with Tom saying he really didn't know if he should betelling us all these things seeing that we are now becoming"stronger" competition.

My thanks from everyone who attended goes out to Tom forthe talk and Jim for the slides as you both gave us all a very,very enjoyable evening. For those of you who didn't attendagain you have missed an excellent evening which was sadlyvour miss.

Bob GM4UYZ

73 Colin (GM0CL1.0

Cockenzie & Port Seton A.R.C. Page 6

Torne One frorn l[alcokn fSBVU/G!}I3UIN

October 30th around 1300 Kermit Standard Time sifting outside in glorious sunshine digestinglunch and quaichs of "Chateau Kamikaze" when the mail arrived. Yes anything between 13A0 and 15A0 KT isnormal for snail mail delivery here. The house before we occupied it was the local Customs Office so wonder justexactly what they achieved in a normal days work.

Bob, Thanks for the regular on-pass of fhe newslefter especially the present issue with Cambell"srundown on Tiree, thanks again for a cracking weekend John/MMlCCC et aland bonne chance with the resu/fs.Just to prove that my AWOL syndrome is only temporary l thought it time to put quill to papyrus....

The subject of wftich is dear to my heart, because if was my bread and bufter for the best years ofmy warking life.

I t rOR SE

Let us have no illusions on the subject, as a professionally taught (and I hate the inference radiooperator) Merchant Navy Radio Officer (Leith Nautical College circa 1955156), Morse at any speed is a very dif-ficult thing to achieve especially without some form of assistance. I am not sure how good or bad commercialMorse tutors are but I doubt they can live up to Morse being hand keyed by someone there and then who cancross check the reception accuracy.

Whatever, the Morse exam even at 5 wpm is still mandatory to get a fullA Licence and I doubt ifthat barrier will drop for a few years to come. During the Tiree trip one of the subjects bandied across the ferrysaloon table was Morse Jamborees and judging by the November Radcom they have achieved a very high suc-cess rate of passes. However before you venture forth on such you have to have the Morse Code well and trulytucked under your belt. . I have taught Morse myself to amateurs and the method I used was that which wastaught to me by our Morse Instructor at College. A superb CW operator called Boetcher who was one time ChiefRadio Officer on the RMS (Royal Mail Ship) Andes/GQCV a passenger liner that run between the UK and SouthAmerica in the days before air travel was commonplace.

Boetcher used a method I can only describe as opposites and if it is something new to readerswho are learning Morse perhaps it will help them to memorise the code easier than just ploughing through the al-phabet ABCs etc.

First of all we did not use dot and dash but DIT and DAH

E.g.A ditdah (spoken as one word) C dah-dit-dah-dit etc

We started off with the letters of the alphabet beginning with dits and then took their opposites beginning withdahs line by line as shown below.

E ISH

AU

R

W

L

P

c

zPlease note I have said that this method is best learned under the watchful eye of an in-

structor but if it helps anyone to learn the code easier all well and well. I am sorry I am not closer to "La BelleEcosse" to give personal assistance but good luck anyway....

V

TMO

NDB

K

G

0

MaIcoIm FSVBU/GM3UIN

Cockenzie & Port Seton A.R.C. Page

EVEilTS GOLUIIIIVYet again I have a few new additions for the Events Columnso please try to keep your diaries and calendars up-to-date.I'm sure you all know how infuriating it is to forget all aboutan event you wanted to atlend....

DECtrMBER3rd Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton, 7pm till late

8th Lothians RS : A talk by Danny Begg GM3YXJ entitled"Lorentz Beam System". Contact Tommy Main GM4DCL forinfo on Tel 0131 663 8501

ll/llth ARRL 10m SSB/CW Contest 00UTC Saturday until24UTC Sunday but with a maximum of 35hrs operating.** See Note **

26-29 RSGB VHF Christmas Cumulative Contests 14-I6UTCeach day. 50,70,144 and432Wz activity for those fed upwith the hype of Christmasl ** See Note **

JANUARY 2OOO2nd RSGB 144\/ftIz CW Contest from 10-16UTC.** See Note *x

12th Lothians RS : Double Bill 2000 bv Lawrence CalderGMlBKF,

14th Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton, 7pm till late

16th RSGB lst 7OMlIz Cumulative Contest l0-l2.30UTC** See Note **

23rd Lancastrian Rally, Lancaster University, nr M6 In33 /3 4.Opens 11am (10.30 for disabled). For further detailsTeLAfi7Z 621954

26th Lothians RS : A talk entitled "Forensic Electronics" byBurt Whittington

30th RSGB 2ndTATvtrIz Cumulative Contest 10-12.30UTC** See Note **

FtrBRUARY4th Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton, 7pm till late

9th Lothians RS : IIF Antennas bv Dave Stocklon GM4ZNTX

L2l13th RSGB 1st 1.8MHz CW Contest, 21-01UTC, Single-Op only. ** SeeNote '<*

f3th RSGB 3rd7}NtrIz Cumulative Contest 10-I2.30UTC** See Note **

f Sth C&PS ARC Equipment Check Night hosted as usual byJohn GMTOLQ. The venue is Resources Room 2 at Port Se-ton Community Centre and the evening runs from 7.30pm un-til 9.30pm. The usual entry fee of I pound to cov€r roomhire costs applies.

l9l20th ARRL International DX CW Contest. 00UTC Satur-day ta 24VTC Sunday.** See NOte **

23rd Lothians RS : Emergency Communications by Jim BurkeGM4TNP

26/27thRSGB TMHz DX CW Contest, 15UTC Saturday to09UTC Sunday. ** See Note x*

27th RSGB 4th7}Nfrlz Cumulative Contest 10-12.30UTC** See Note **

MARCH3rd Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton, 7pm till late

4/5th RSGB 144/432MIII Contest 14-l4WC. This contestalso has'6 hour sections for multi and single operator stations.x* See Note **

4/5th ARRL International DX SSB Contest, 00UTC Saturdayta 24UTC Sunday.** See NOte **

llllzth RSGB Commonwealth Contest (CW), I2-12UTC on10-80m. ** SeeNote **

17th C&PS ARC Talk by David Anderson GM4JJJ on thesubject of "Moonbounc€" from 7.30pm onwards in the meet-ing room (upstairs) at Cockenzie & Port Seton CommunityCentre. Entry fee I pound per person.

19th NORBRECK Rally, Blackpool. Details from Tel.0l516305790

28th RSGB lst l44MI{z Cumulatives Contest (all mode). **

See Note **

** NOTE *** TI{F CONTESTS ABO\'E WHICH REFERTO THIS NOTE ARE THOSE WHICH TI{E CLUB UMAYU

TAKE PART IN. T}IOSE WITHNO REFERENCE TOTHIS NOTE ARE ALREADY DEFIMTES.

Have a great Christmas and may I wish you all a healthy andprosperous New Year.

73 de Colin (GM0CLN)

Cockenzie & Port Seton A,R,C. Page

Torne 2

F5K3 T

I wonder how many of you havewanted to try datacomms but shied off because it wastoo complicated or more to the point demanded expen-sive modems.

This is definitely true if you want to godown the modem road but over the years programshave been developed using computer sound only. Myfirst venture into RTTY was a Commodore VlC20 andcassette program that on 'Tire up.", brought in an Eng-lish news broadcast from Peking on 13 MH2..... Ham-comm via Shareware have an excellent RTTY programrequiring only a small interface between PC and Trans-ceiver.

Now there is an opportunity to try outthe latest in Datacom mode. PSK31 requiring as in mycase a minimum 486 PC running Windows 3.11 and 16Bit (minimum) soundcard Plus of course the requisitesoftware.

lwill not venture into the theory of PSK(Phase Shift Keying) 31 suffice it to say it was originallydeveloped by SP9VRC.... Changing the Morse codeinto digitalform revamped by Peter Martinez/G3PLX ofAmtor fame.

The 31 in the G3PLX version stand for 31baud or bit rate with a bandwidth of 31 Hz. Thethroughput is 50 words per min only 10 wpm less thanstandard RTTY. But with the narrow bandwidth it outclasses RTTY by miles on outputs of 50W and less.Further reading Radcom Dec 98/Jan 99.

I have only been using PSK31 for un-der a month and am astonished at a) the throughputwithout any form of error correction and b) the amountof activity in this mode which has been going now foralmost two years. Finding PSK3f ites is very easy allyou have to do is listen .15 kHz above the beginning ofeach IARU datacomms section of each band 14070.15 Seasonal best wishes and all the very best for the newUSB seems to be where the main activity lies. I have Millennium.also worked into Argentine on 28120J5 running 50WAs mentioned previously the bandwidth of the signal is

only 31 Hz so there is no need for a lot of dial swinging.You may think that at this bandwidth you need a super-duper stability Transceiver. lf you have one all goodand well but I have been able to resolve and workPSK31 without much difficulty using a Ten Tec Corsairwhich increments in 100 Hz steps and compared with"oriental black boxes" is not renowned for its stability ..The PSK3ISBW Version 1.08 software incorporatesAFC, which helps if you are inclined to drift.

. For those of you interested and whomight find it confusing looking at the various denomina-tions such as baud or bit-rate and wpm (words per min-ute). Quoting WPM is by far the simplest to understandin terms of throughput and at least you know what youare getting for your money, but how does it comeabout?

The word in WPM is an accepted average offive characters and a space i.e. six characters in all. (lnMorse.it is "Paris")

In Baudot for those of you who may have readmy intro to datacomms you will remember that eachBaudot or lTA2 character consists of 7-112 bits. Ama-teur RTTY speed is 45 bauds per second or 6 charac-ters per seconds (45 divide 7-112). Or one word persecond i.e. 60 Words per minute. At 75 baud it willtherefore be 100 wpm.

In PSK31 since we do not know the bit rate percharacter we can work back quoting 50 WPM or 300characters per min i.e. 5 per second then the bit rateper character will be 31.5 divide 5 i.e. 6.3 bits per char-acter. Because of the variance in character rate ofMorse, PSK31 characters are also variable in lengthwith the most used in our alphabet the shortest and theleast the longest. At 10 WPM less than standard RTTYwhich I can assure you is hardly noticeable on thescreen and less than a tenth of the RTTY bandwidth,PSK31 is definitely the new data mode for the Millen-nium.Give it a try!

Malcolm FSVBU/GM3UlN

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DEEPEST SYMPATHYOn behalf of everyone at the club I would like to offer our deepest sympathy to Kenny GM0WHM and his family on the re-cent death of his mother. It is said many times before but our thoughts and sympathy are with you all.

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