T hat’s it then folks we are now in official British Summer Time so we can all look forward to those long

sunny lazy days where we can play at radio. Well it is a dream isn’t it! No doubt our sum-mer will be as normal, a couple of sunny days and the rest pouring with rain, but we can dream of the opposite can’t we. Now that we are definitely into the light nights as mentioned before it does offer a grand op-portunity for us to take down all our aerials and give them that annual MOT. I wonder what will be discovered on all our systems if we actually get round to doing it. Why not let us all know if you do carry out some maintenance. Another thought that has been rattling around in my head, amongst the sawdust I may add, is what can we do on a local front to promote the hobby amongst the masses out there. I know it is difficult as we all know the response that we have obtained when we have done ―Demonstration Events‖. The question really is are we doing it right? Could we do it better and how? What sort of things would interest Joe public? So in-stead of the normal negative thoughts let’s have a good old think about the subject, see what we can come up with and try and put it together. I honestly feel unless we try and do something we are not going to convert any of Joe public to the fun and enjoyment that this great hobby of ours provides. POSI-TIVE THOUGHTS ALL ROUND BY YOU ALL THEN! As I write this we are about to do a Special Event at the Museum of Flight so we will have had another attempt of trying to encourage the public. There are also other opportunities in the future with another event at the Museum of Flight and Port Seton Gala day, both in June plus our an-nual event at Barns Ness in August.

Back to what has gone on last month. We had a very interesting talk by Tom Wylie GM4FDM on the trip to the Falkland Islands and for those who missed it well what can I say, you missed a great talk. A group of us went to the Norbreck Rally at Blackpool, great weekend so hopefully on these events there will be write up in this month’s news-letter. Lastly as mentioned above the Mu-seum of Flight event. Other than that apart from the odd individuals taking part in con-tests there is nothing else to report. To this month—the main event is the 10 Pin Bowling Night on Saturday 27

th April at the

Megabowl. Can you let me know if you want to go as I need to get the deposit paid ASAP to confirm the booking. Remember it is a family event so bring the kids as well. Lastly, for any other future events please see Colin’s Events Column. So have a think about the above issues, come along to the 10 Pin Bowling and have a great month on the radio. See you all then. Bob GM4UYZ

Volume 10 Issue 4

April 2002

COCKENZIE & PORT SETON AMATEUR RADIO CLUB

editorial

Club newsletter

144/432 Report 2

VP8SDX Talk 3

Events Column 4

GB2MOF 5

Celtic Connections 7

Norbreck Rally 8

For Sale 9

Atlantic Crossing? 10

BARS 11

Contest Calendar 12

Inside this issue:

Special points of

interest:

GB2MOF photos

Have the Brendan Trophies been won?

A new Radio Society

GMDX Group

P A G E 2

144/432mhz contest report

V O L U M E 1 0 I S S U E 4

GM4WLL/P 2/3 March 2002

I went out /P just for a couple of hours on the Sunday morning. As this isn't a popular contest I didn't bother with 2m and took 70cm and 23cm instead. (this contest

coincides with a major UHF contest on the continent) The weather was so bad I gave up trying to get up the hill at Lauder Common and went to Mainslaughter, where the car slid off the hard-standing and dug in up to the sills (where would we be without friendly farmers with tow-ropes?) Conditions on both bands were absolutely abysmal and sev-eral stations I should have worked no bother on 23cm and even 70cm were inaudible (I'd set up a few skeds via the clus-ter and ww convers). All in all things were looking decidedly disappointing until my sked with PA0WWM on 23cm. Wim's CW signal came bounding in at 559 and we quickly com-pleted a QSO. Fantastic! My best 23cm DX to date by al-most 200km, a new country and best of all, as it's over 600km it qualifies for an RSGB Microwave distance award! In all I made only 6 QSOs : 2 on 23cm and 4 on 70cm. Best DX on 70cm was only IO93. However, the important thing was that I got an opportunity to see how the multiband UHF station works out : first time I've tried the 2 bands together in anger and several learning points came from it. Incidentally, driving home I realised I had bogged the car in the same hole and at the same phase of the same contest as Jim 'BQI did 3 years ago! Final piece of news for now concerns the big beastly HT PSU (for a UHF valve amp – CLN). Jim and I spent an evening

last week pussy-footing around it and checking it over until we both got the nerve up to hit the "ON" switch. It did OK until one of the capacitors in the rectifier stack blew up and took Jim's Digital Multimeter with it! We spotted a couple of issues in need of modification on the bias supply (surprising how many obvious things a fresh pair of eyes can spot!) so I'm spending this weekend doing them and beefing up the rectifier stack, ready for round 2 next week! If you hear a VERY loud bang from the general direc-tion of Penicuik, you'll know we've blown something else up...... 73 de David GM4WLL E-Mail : gm4wll@qsl.net (David) Website : www.qsl.net/gm4wll

Ps. I was out /P at IO85NR for the final 70MHz cumulative contest on 17 March. (I had missed the earlier ones due to poor weather) I was amazed at the level of activity - far better than the 2000 cumulatives (I missed the 2001 ones as I was working away from home). In 2 hours I made 23 QSOs, with the best DX G4RFR in Dorset at 555kms. 10 of the QSOs were over 400kms and 16 were over 300kms. I worked 11 locator squares and 3 countries (GD, GM and G) and went home well chuffed! Station was only 20W to a 6 element yagi. 73 de David GM4WLL

Web site update

I have recently changed my ISP in the process of getting an ADSL connection at home so the club web site is moving to a new address at Pipex, you need do nothing

except keep on using www.cpsarc.com as this will point to the working site. If you currently have www.btinternet.com/~john.innes/cpsarc/ bookmarked, then please update it to www.cpsarc.com to ensure that you see the most up-to-date site. At some point in the near future I will be removing the old site, and as it can only be updated over a dialup connec-tion then no more work will be done on it. I have been considering running the website from my PC at

home but I’m not sure about this yet, again wherever the site ends up, keep using www.cpsarc.com to point to the current version. I’d also like to thank Robert MM0ANT for offering to host the on-line newsletter section as I was running out of webspace, the change in location is invisible to users. John MM0JXI (webmaster)

C L U B N E W S L E T T E R

some local amateurs on the island that really went out their way to help. Eventually of they went on their trip with a target of 30,000 contacts hoping to make during the fort-night trip, with the concentration being on CW? They actu-ally broke this target which was a tremendous achievement. Tom couldn’t stress enough about the generosity and help fullness of the Island people.

It really looked fantastic and everyone involved seemed to thoroughly enjoy himself. To some-one like myself it is all a dream, maybe one day who knows. Overall it was a fantastic talk and certainly the best I have heard yet. It was enjoyed by all those who attended so for those that missed it; well what can I say. We are certainly very grateful and thankful for Tom coming across from

the other side of Glasgow to give us the talk. When is the next one Tom!! Bob GM4UYZ

T he above talk took place at our usual venue in the Port Seton Community Centre on Friday 15

th March.

It certainly was a superb talk by Tom giving us all the information on what was required to put such a DX-Pedition on. The logistics were immense but it does show what can be done with a little effort. According to Tom it cost about £2000 each to put it all together. Yes it looks ex-pensive but when you look what it costs to go on a good summer holiday then it isn’t much more. I don’t know if the XYL would let me go on something like this, I doubt it very much!!!!!!!!!! Tom is what I term a ―natural‖ speaker and certainly kept us all entertained as he narrated the story along with plenty of little amusing antidotes. This was all backed up with a video and pictures of the trip. Oh how bleak the Falklands looked. It all started when a group of them were having a few beers, as these things do, having a chat about what it would be like to do a DX-Pedition. The suggestion of going to the Falk-land Islands came up and the rest is history as they say. Each of the members of the group all did different tasks i.e. aerials, travel arrangements, QSL cards and paperwork, etc. and before you know it, it was all happening. Aerials were built and tested, sponsorship raised, travel arranged via the RAF, equipment all tested, then everything packed and trans-ported by ship to the Falklands. Tom stressed it was a ―must‖ that a contact was made ―locally‖ to help with all the local requirements. This was achieved by getting in contact with

P A G E 3

Vp8sdx talk

I have booked the MEGABOWL once again for a 10 PIN BOWLING NIGHT.

Date: SATURDAY 27th APRIL 2002 Time: 20:00 SHARP Cost for 2 Games + Shoes: ADULT £10.00 CHILDREN £7.00 (Note: Cost includes a small sum to buy some prizes) Note it is a family event so bring the kids along as well. Now the part you don't like and that is if you want to go can you let me know ASAP along with numbers if you are bring

some of the family and I need the Full Amount paid by the 5th April i.e. April Club Night. I would appreciate if you would let me know if it is a YES or NO about going, PLEASE. Bob GM4UYZ

10 Pin bowling night

28/04/2002

T he Megs Group will be operating with the call "GB4SAM" from the Stirling Club to celebrate the the birthday of Samuel Morse. The event will start about

9am and continue through to about 4pm.

The group will operate CW, mainly on 80, 40 & 20m Bands, The date for this event is Sunday 28th April 2002. All mem-bers and visitors are welcome.

Samuel morse birthday party

P A G E 4

EVENTs COLUMN

Date Time Event Contact Telephone

05-Apr-02 7pm till late Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

06-Apr-02 10am Six Metre to Microwaves Convention, Reaseheath College, Nantwich, Cheshire. 5 miles from M6 Jn16, @ 258 miles from P/Seton. Entry £5, B&B £25pppn, DX Dinner @ £21pp

www.rsgb.org

» » »

07-Apr-02 ? 45th NORTHERN MOBILE RADIO & COMPUTER FAIR - Sports Hall, Harrogate Ladies’ College, Clarence Drive, Har-rogate

Gerald, G0UFI

01765 640695

10-Apr-02 ? Lothians RS, Moonbounce by David Anderson GM4JJJ Peter GM4DTH 0131 446 0155

18-Apr-02 All Day World Amateur Radio Day IARU

» » » » »

20-Apr-02 and

21-Apr-02

All Weekend GMDX Group "Celtic Connections" (a.k.a. Scottish Activity Weekend)… to encourage activity by all radio amateurs worldwide to contact areas with Celtic origins. Also to help promote IOSA and other GMDX Award schemes. See www.gmdx.org.uk for more info.

Drew Givens GM3YOR

24-Apr-02 ? Lothians RS, Enigma Codes by Professor Alan Peacock Peter GM4DTH 0131 446 0155

27-Apr-02 8pm SHARP onwards

10 pin Bowling Night at MEGABOWL, Kinnaird Park, Edinburgh. Cost £10 Adults and £7 Children. Money to Bob by 5

th April.

Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

03-May-02 7pm till late Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

08-May-02 ? Lothians RS, Islands On The Air by Tom Wylie GM4FDM Peter GM4DTH 0131 446 0155

10-May-02 6.30pm for 7pm start

144MHz DF Hunt, meet in ―The Old Ship Inn‖ Car Park (East), Port Seton. £1 per person

Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

25-May-02 ? 2002 Lothians Challenge Peter GM4DTH 0131 446 0155

07-Jun-02 7pm till late Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

12-Jun-02 ? Lothians RS Annual General Meeting Peter GM4DTH 0131 446 0155

15-Jun-02 and

16-Jun-02

All Weekend INTERNATIONAL MUSEUMS WEEKEND http://www.ukradioamateur.org/imw/index.html

Harry M1BYT 0113 286 6897

23-Jun-02 10am to 4pm MID-LANARK ARS Scottish Convention, Summerlee Heri-tage Park, Heritage Road, Coatbridge. Entry Free! Lec-tures, Bring & Buy, Traders, Talk-In etc. etc. The organisers already have 45 tables booked for this event!

Elvin GM8BBA 01698 748 616

05-Jul-02 7pm till late Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

02-Aug-02 7pm till late Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

09-Aug-02 6.30pm to 9.30pm

―JUNK NIGHT" in the Main Hall at Port Seton Community Centre. Bring along your own ―junk‖ and sell it yourself. Tables on First Come First Served basis. Entrance fee £1 for everyone. Money Raised DONATED to BRITISH HEART FOUNDATION

Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

17-Aug-02 and

18-Aug-02

All Day LIGHTHOUSE WEEKEND BARNS NESS – GB2LBN Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

06-Sep-02 7pm till late Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

20-Sep-02 and

21-Sep-02

? LEICESTER Amateur Radio Show

Geoff G4AFJ 01455 823 344

» 27-Sep-02 6.30pm for 7pm start

144MHz DF Hunt, meet in ―The Old Ship Inn‖ Car Park (East), Port Seton. £1 per person

Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

04-Oct-02 7pm till late Club night in the Thorntree Inn, Port Seton Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

» 18-Oct-02 7.30pm to 9.30pm

Video Night, Resources Room 2, Port Seton Community Centre. Entry £1

Bob GM4UYZ 01875 811723

» 27-Oct-02 ? GALASHIELS & DARS Annual Rally Jim, GM7LUN 01896 850 245

N ot much to add this month. A last minute one if anyone fancies travelling to Harrogate THIS Sunday, de-

tails of "Celtic Connections" and also the date for this years Galashiels rally. Otherwise its pretty much the same as last month……

V O L U M E 1 0 I S S U E 4

23/24th

MARCH 2002

T his weekend came about after a visit to the museum by Cambell MM0DXC and myself to see about the use of the museum again this year for Museums on the

Air weekend on the 15th

& 16th

June. Dawn Kemp the curator certainly welcomed us with open arms regarding the above with permission duly granted to operate from the same loca-tion as we did last year, in the Prestwick Tower Exhibit. By the way she says, ―Can you do something for us for the event, ―Hands on Flight‖, we are running on the 23

rd & 24

th March?

The answer was, ―certainly we can‖. The next task was to sort out the callsign GB2MOF with the RSGB, the one we used last year. This was a bit of a panic as the stipu-lated 28 days noticed had passed, anyway a quick E-Mail to the RSGB was done with the answer ―yes all is ok so please send in the paperwork‖. This was im-mediately done and sent but by the Tuesday before the event no paperwork had arrived. This time a quick phone call to the RSGB sorted it all out and everything arrived on the Thursday. (I have also ap-plied and have received GB2MOF for the June event as well). To the event. On Friday afternoon Ricky MM3RIK, Gabriel 2M1IBH, Derek 2M1IBG, Cambell MM0DXC and myself arrived at East Fortune and proceeded to erect the W3DZZ for 40 &

Derek 2M1IBG 80M and the 3 Element Cushcraft A3S Tribander for 10, 15 & 20M. We also took the opportunity to set up the radio stations

plus the network. We used the FT1000MP + Linear on the Tribander and the FT757 on the W3DZZ. Two computers were set to run CT using the Ethernet Network for the first time. A quick test and everything seemed to ok except for whatever reason we could not get the FT1000MP to talk to the computer. Alas time run out and we abandoned investi-gating the problem.

Make your mind up Ricky—radio or phone!

On Saturday Cambell MM0DXC and Ron GM0NTL arrived first at the museum about 08:30 followed very closely by myself. The first task was to resume our investigation on the FT1000MP and the computer. Well it worked first time, weird and the only conclusion that we can make is that the com

Cambell in full flow….

puter had been rebooted. Everything was then finally set-up and off we went. We did stop around the 11:00 mark to help run tests for the Aero Modellers who were flying aircraft. Ex-tensive tests were run with no problems at all but as an extra

Gb2mof museum of flight

P A G E 5 C L U B N E W S L E T T E R

safe guard it was decided to run both stations at 100W. Sat-urday proved a popular day with the club members with a few turning up and also taking a go at operating. From the public aspect we certainly had many visitors with the promise from 4 that they will attend one of our club nights, that would be great to see. Generally though the public took a very keen interest. Finally we had to stop for the day with a total of 140 QSO’s logged and no network or computer prob-lems encountered.

Separated at birth? On the Sunday Cambell and myself turned up at 09:00 and proceeded to start operating, Cambell on the higher bands and myself comfortably seated on 40M. Paul 2M1IBE arrived about 10:00 and was persuaded by Cambell to have a go at operating. Paul did about a 30-minute slot before he had to leave. Cambell back on the radio and into a full contest type pile up. We also had a visit from Kenny GM0WHM, John Mac-Rae and Danny and Cambell and I tried to persuade Kenny to have a go, alas to no avail. (Thanks for coming though and giving us support).

Yes you will gather by now Cambell and I were still operating and this is how it stayed until we closed down at 15:00. What can I say about the level of activity on Sunday, both of us were flat out for the whole period with us taking a couple of forced breaks. Amazingly the stations stood by and we even managed to keep our frequencies. It certainly felt in a contest environment and by we certainly enjoyed it. Just before we closed Ricky MM3RIK and Liz 2M1GLD arrived and the both of them helped Cambell and I to dismantle the station. Thanks very much to you both we really appreciated your help. The end result was a total of 450 QSO’s from as far away as New Zealand to as local us just up the road. From the museums point of view they were extremely pleased on what we told them about what was achieved. I would say it certainly helped our cause about carrying out future activities from the Museum to the extent that there is a good chance we will be asked to take part in other planned activities. Overall everything performed well although I did experience a keyboard lockup and had to reboot my computer. This re-sulted in some lost QSO’s being logged on my computer. Before I started writing this I have noticed a couple of small issues which I intend to send to the writers of CT which I hope they can explain, we will see no doubt. The end result though is certainly promising and with a couple of more runs like this week end then more confidence will be gained. Bob GM4UYZ

P A G E 6 V O L U M E 1 0 I S S U E 4

gb2mof

CONTINENTS CONTACTED BY BAND

BAND MODE 40 20 15 10 ALL percent

North America SSB 0 12 5 18 35 7.8

South America SSB 0 0 0 1 1 0.2

Europe SSB 136 208 59 3 406 90.2

Asia SSB 0 1 2 2 5 1.1

Africa SSB 0 0 1 1 2 0.4

Oceania SSB 0 1 0 0 1 0.2

C L U B N E W S L E T T E R P A G E 7

Celtic connections

The GMDX Group introduces "Celtic Connections" to encourage activity by all radio amateurs worldwide to con-

tact areas with Celtic origins. This is purely m activity weekend and will enable participants to pursue the Celtic Knot Award Scheme and provide an interest in contacting Celtic areas of the world. The event is to be held on the third weekend in April each yew. It is hoped this event will also help promote participation in the other GMDX Group awards - The Islands of Scotland Award, and the Worked AD Scottish Prefix Award. The 2002 Weekend will start at 00:00z on Saturday 20 April 2002 and last until 24:00 on Sunday 21 April 2002. Activity is encouraged on all amateur HF bands by individual licencees, Novices and Club Stations or the use of a special event callsign from radio amateurs in the following areas: EA1 - Galicia and Asturias areas of Spain

EI - Republic of Ireland F - Brittany area of France G - Cornwall area of England GD - Isle of Man GI - Northern Ireland GM - Scotland GW - Wales VEI - Nova Scotia area of Canada Suggested operating frequencies

CW Phone Novice 1.8131833 1.872 1.952 3.503/013 3.772 3.572 7.0031013 7.072 10.103/013 10.133 14.0031033 14172/272 18.073/083 18.136/162 21.003/033 21.1721272 21.133 24.8931903 24.936/972

28.0031033 28.472/572 28.133 Further Details from: I&. Drew Givens, GM3YOR, 3 Murray Place, Gourock, PA19 ITS, Scotland, UK. or from GMDX Group web site www.gmdx-org.uk

like that—you can **** off!‖ Anyway—he was quite funny,

and he left the crowd of Scots alone (I wonder why?)

Beer was drunk, then more beer, at closing time, some of us

took up an invitation to go back to another hotel for more

beer, that place was expecting to be going all night, we

packed in after a couple of drinks.

Morning came and we all tucked into a full fried breakfast

before setting off for the Norbreck Castle Hotel for the Rally.

When we got there, the queue was huge, much larger than

we recalled from previous years, so we joined it and made

our way into the show. The Norbreck has two large halls

plus a couple of other rooms, it was fairly well stocked with

radio and computer bits, there were some notable missing

faces—Sandpiper for one, but the stalls were crowded about

three deep everywhere. There was just about enough room

to navigate round the place. As always, it was a good idea to

wear something light as the hall gets hot and sweaty pretty

fast.

I was on the lookout for an HF radio, I was hoping for a sec-

ond hand TS570 or something similar but there wasn’t much

in that line available. I ended up with a bag full of computer

bits. Cambell had brought down some stuff for the bring &

buy and was looking for an ATAS 100 aerial to go with his

FT100.

There was a good representation from the club from people

who had come down on the day and it was good to see

them all there (Jim, Nigel, Margaret, Gavin, Iain , Anne and

one of their sons). Even though there had been a large

queue at 11am, people were still streaming in a couple of

hours later, it really was well attended show

So despite coming away without a radio, it was a good

weekend, everyone enjoyed themselves and we’re looking

forward to next year already!

John

MM0JXI

S everal members of the club made the trip to Black-

pool for the Norbreck Rally. The trip involved driving

down on the Saturday, spending some time in Black-

pool, getting fed and watered of an evening and going to

the rally on the Sunday.

As I was the person

tasked with sorting the

accommodation, I had

booked rooms for the

people who had either

directly expressed an in-

terest or had been men-

tioned to me. I was disap-

pointed to find that sev-

eral people pulled out at

the last minute which left

me holding a bill for lost

deposits, I won’t be

caught this way again as

I’ll be asking for deposits

up front before I do any

booking on behalf of club

members.

That said, there were still eight of us making the trip—Bob

GM4UYZ and Yvonne, Cambell MM0DXC, Robert MM0ANT,

Gabriel 2M1IBH, Ricky MM3RIK and Liz 2M1GLD and myself

MM0JXI. So we set off in damp and misty weather down

through Moffat on to the M6, the journey was pretty un-

eventful, we kept in occasional contact between the two

cars, meeting up for late breakfast / early lunch at Killington

Lake. Refreshed we headed into Blackpool where we were

called by Ricky who had arrived earlier to tell us about the

parking arrangements (just dump the cars on the double

yellow lines—they’re not on yet!).

Once we had got booked in, we split up, Bob, Yvonne, Ricky

and Liz went off to the shops, the rest of us persuaded the

hotelier to open the bar and let us on the pool table. After

giving me a thrashing at pool, we set out to see the sights,

but Blackpool on a damp March day is not very exciting.

Even a shot on a rally simulator didn’t lift our spirits—so there

was nothing for it but to get some beer in (you can see the

pattern developing here!)

Later in the afternoon we met up with Bob and Yvonne

again and headed back towards the hotel where we in-

tended to get cleaned up before heading out to eat, we had

phoned Ricky who was already back at the hotel to find out

when the local pub stopped serving food and found to our

dismay that it was 7pm so we hurried back and installed

ourselves in the restaurant. The meal was uneventful apart

from Robert nearly provoking the waitress into clouting him

(he got close!)

Once we had eaten we settled down in the bar for more

beer and found there was a comedian on that night, he was

definitely on the rough side ―Ladies and Gentlemen, there

will be some bad language in my act tonight and if you don't

P A G E 8

Norbreck rally

V O L U M E 1 0 I S S U E 4

C L U B N E W S L E T T E R

If anyone is interested in these items, drop me a line at

mm0jxi@cpsarc.com.

John Innes MM0JXI

0131 665 9125

I have a number of items up for sale this month.

Due to an upgrade in my Hi-Fi, I have

Kenwood KRV 6050 Dolby Pro-logic receiver,

a pair of JPW rear speakers

Akai HX-A451W twin cassette recorder,

all in good condition and I’m open to offers to clear out my

cabinet.

I also have the following

A pair of Kef Celeste IV speakers with some cosmetic

damage (offers)

Opticpro 9630p scanner with interface port for £20

I also have a brand new Hitachi KH-WS1 Worldspace

receiver available at £150 ono (see picture)

P A G E 9

For sale

good audio DSP, ATU and full CAT control.

I was considering a second hand model but I couldn’t find

anything suitable at Blackpool so I finally decided to bite the

bullet and buy a new one from Jaycee’s and enjoy the three

year warranty.

The rig is now installed at home, connected to my recently

constructed W3DZZ (thanks Cambell and Tom) and it seems

to perform pretty well. Being the computer geek that I am, I

hooked it up to the PC pretty quickly and downloaded just

about every logging and rig control program I could find. I

have settled for now on N1MM, which has a good range of

features like rig control, cluster access etc..

So all I’ve got to do now is find some time to get operating!

(I’ve made a couple of contacts during the WPX contest at

the weekend).

The addition of the TS-570D now gives me an all Kenwood

setup at home, I have a TR-751E for 2m and a MC-85 desk

mic connected to both radios.

John

MM0JXI

A fter much delay in getting round to applying for my

A licence, I finally received the callsign MM0JXI ear-

lier this year and have been considering what HF rig

to buy, I didn’t want to spend the kind of money needed to

get a FT1000MP or an IC746 so I decided on a Kenwood TS-

570D, a fairly modern rig, small but well featured. It has

Mm0jxi gets on hf

P A G E 1 0

Atlantic crossed on 2m? me at Old Perlican, Avalon Peninsula, Newfoundland, CAN-ADA. Let's hope the rocks ionize well, tonight. Best Luck & Great DX!!! Alex, P/VO1/N2PIG -------------------- Forwarded by Bernie dk3xt/ab7iy **************************************************** .....I was sceptical (as are many others) and checked out de-tails of N2PIG and his wife Debra VA3PIG (K2PIG). They all check out on Buckmaster, QRZ etc so far as I can see. I also checked locator details to see if the locators tied in with the reported locations and they do. I make the distance 3044km using the GJV software. Alex N2PIG also appears to be the Contest & Events manager for the International Police Association Radio Club. As a follow up I received this e-mail Today Fri 22nd Mar from Bernie.... ************************************************** At 03:46 21.03.02 -0800, you wrote: >de Steady Won <steadywon@yahoo.com> >is this the only list where the 'pig trans-atlantic >qso has been announced or discussed? the details seem >a bit queer and would like to know more before >challenging it. more information please! >... Hi folks, Last night, Mar 20th, 02 at 2134UTC, N2PIG's (Alexander Dutkewych) mail arrived at my provider's server. I downloaded and read his note at around 2210UTC (that's the same note that I later forwarded to to the <Meteor-scatter>, <144mhzeu> and <HSMS> internet mailing reflec-tors, as well as to the <vhf@eu> board of the packet radio net). Frankly, I was more than sceptical, an expedition of that big a dimension, finished with an even bigger success, run by a husband-and- wife-team ? I checked Alex's call with <qrz.com> (turned out okay), then checked weather condx in Newfoundland ( turned out okay, too). Still not convinced, and considering that it was turning close to midnight on a workday in Europe, I decided not to forward Alex's mes-sage... - and then the phone rang - with an excited Alex, N2PIG on the far end. He basically confirmed the contents of his message, and, yes, he's on site in Newfoundland right now, waiting for some pings from Europe, and they've kept the preparations for and the fact of the Dxpedition "very, very secret". He said that they've shot a lot of pictures and there will be a website later. So I then hurried to forward his note to the mail reflectors and to packet radio, hoping that at least a couple of hams over here would read it and try to get into contact with him, despite of short notice and late hour. Wonder who did ? I haven't heard of Alex since, guess, he's in Newfoundland taking down his station or is on his way back to Pulteney/NY. Let's hope for a nice website with pics - and a nice wav-

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GM0CLN writes:

I 'm not sure that the following is true but I can say that the source is a well known and respected German amateur. Have the Brendan Trophies been won? See

what you think.... I received the following yesterday, Thur 21 Mar, from Bernie DK3XT........ ************************************************** Friends, this is no hoax ! Received following email a couple of min-utes ago, plus an exciting phone-call from Alex, N2PIG him-self, confirming the contents of his mail. He is on site, still checking his email for skeds ! ----------------------------------------------------- This is Alex, N2PIG. Three weeks ago,I went to eastern Newfoundland, CAN-ADA, to establish a high power 2M & 70Cm Station , with the intent of working my XYL, Debra, VA3PIG, in Europe. The next week, my XYL and I travelled to western IRELAND, where we established a similar station, mindful of the 26dBW-at-Antenna limit. Last week I returned to my Newfoundland portable, leaving my XYL, in IRELAND, at IO41vs. On Saturday night, 16 March, 2002, I "flipped the switches" on, at the Canadian Station. In the last five days, Debra & I have been communicating across the Atlantic Ocean, at an approximate Great Circle Distance of 1890 miles/ 3000 kilometres, on 2 Meters, using

WSJT!!! (A Weak Signal meteor scatter program see http://

pulsar.princeton.edu/~joe/K1JT/ Ed.) St. Patrick's Day, Sunday, we managed an exchange of Call Signs. On Tuesday, yesterday, we completed an full ex-change, in less than four hours! Today, in the early morning, we exchanged the salutations: "God Bless America", from Newfoundland, and a partial "Greetings from Ireland". Full details of the event will be available in a Web-Site, we are soon to construct...It was a few years in dreaming, plan-inng, and training for this DXPedition, and still Mr. Murphy accompanied us. However, we were well prepared for him, and he was most co-operative, in the end. Debra has now dis-assembled her station and has begun her journey back to Canada, where I shall rendezvous with her, in Toronto, late Thursday. I now invite European Amateurs, using WSJT, on 2 Meters, who think they have a reasonable chance at a QSO with me, in GN38mb, to be the next persons to "cross the Atlantic". >From 23Z this evening to 06Z in the morning, I am pre-pared to work any EU Stations who wish to try. I shall be simplex on 144.2 Mhz USB, using North American default. If you wish a SKED, pse e-mail me at dut-kewych211@msn.com I will check for mail between 2215-2230Z. Regrettably, at 06Z, I must knock-down the P/VO1 station, for transport. Therefore, this is your only "window of opportunity" to work

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fool - it ain't even April yet anyway! As for the contents of the e-mails I received, I think you have to make up your own mind and watch the news pages to see if it's true! Regards Colin GM0CLN Note that a quick search on the web turns up nothing, DK3XT’s web site has this text but no more, the WSJT people note the claim but have no supporting evidence. Ed.

file !! To all, thanks for your patience; and to Alex, thanks for your call (guess, I haven't done so last night) and once you're home, please drop us a line. 73, Bernie dk3xt/ab7iy **************************************************** I promise that all of what I say above is true and not an April

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Contesting from scotland

I am at last able to announce that the British Amateur Radio Society (BARS) is now open to membership.

Membership is free of charge and the low running expenses of this Internet/email based society, are expected to be more than amply covered by paid advertising placed on the BARS web site. Membership is only open to genuine radio amateurs and SWL's. BARS has no intentions of becoming involved with anything but issues directly affecting amateur radio and SWL's. We have two sites:- http://www26.brinkster.com/barsdata/ <<<<<< and http://www.cyberwight.co.uk/bars/ For the moment, please only use the temporary Brinkster site, although we accept the Brinkster server can be a little unreli-able. The cyberwight site is perfectly reliable, but is having some difficulty with the SQL code which processes the forms, so for the moment it is not useable. The BARS site is a secure site, with user access via password only. Guests can log into the site using the username and password provided on the first page. This will enable you to join BARS. The only section not available to none members is the Voting section and the email forums. Four email forums are in place for a variety of discussions, these will be open to BARS members only. It is anticipated that several more forums may well be opened under the wing of BARS for more specialised interests in the future, if there is call for them. Those joining BARS will automatically be subscribed to forums 1, 2 and 3. [Optional] = Membership of the forum is optional. The present four Yahoo forums are:- 1. 'BARSociety' This forum has now been handed over to dis-cussion of BARS internal issues, proposal of changes to the Constitution and other similar discussions. [Optional]

2. 'BARSissues' is where issues concerning amateur radio can be discussed, these might eventually lead to a vote being raised. [Optional] 3. 'BARSvote' A one way email system by which BARS admini-stration will announce to its members that there is an issue to be voted upon. It will form the final stage of items 1 and 2. The actual vote will take place on the web site. [membership of this email forum is a mandatory part of BARS membership]. 4. 'BARStech' This is the first of perhaps several specialised email discussion forums. It is for discussion of technical mat-ters in relation to amateur radio. [Optional] Not everyone will appreciate the large amounts of email gen-erated in forums 1,2 and 4.... These forums are therefore op-tional. Forum 3 is intended to announce a call to vote only, so the emails will be fairly sparse in this forum. Once a call to vote has been issued, members will then have seven days in which to cast their vote via the web site before the vote is closed. BARS has as yet no elected officials, only temporary officials until such time as BARS achieves a reasonable membership to permit a vote. We have simply so far, put the framework in place to allow BARS to start its operations. Members seeking eventual election to office will be especially welcome. We have taken all reasonable steps to ensure those joining are genuine... For those with concerns about your callsign possibly being used by a pirate to join BARS, we have pro-vided a facility for you to check this out on the web site. Should anyone find they have been erroneously subscribed, please advise admin without delay. Membership data on the site is also highly encrypted and none of your details will be made available to third parties. Please feel free to browse the site and make any suggestions for possible improvements. Regards, Harry (M1BYT)

British amateur radio society

I n general there is a fairly quiet month ahead. Perhaps a good time to do some antenna maintenance now that it's summer again and we have lighter nights once

more! The most popular of the events which are taking place this month, I suspect, is the Holyland Contest where the objective is to contact as many Israeli stations as possible on 10, 15, 20, 40, 80 and 160m SSB and/or CW. Multipliers are Israeli "areas", based on a 10km x 10km grid system, which will be given to you as part of the contest exchange. You should only give signal report and serial number. I'm not sure how many stations will be active this year from the 'Holyland' be-cause of the current turmoil in that region but if it is up to the usual standard then activity should be fairly high. Other HF events are the RSGB Rotating Post Codes (RoPoCo) Contest this Sunday (7

th) morning on 80m, for the CW sadists

amongst you, and also a series of 80m Slow Speed (max 12wpm) CW Cumulatives in the evenings. On VHF, as well as the monthly VHF/UHF Tuesday night activity contests there are also 50MHz and 70MHz events this month. As most of you know, these can be fun contests which are usually held in a pretty relaxed atmosphere. How-ever, don't expect to win them unless you go portable with a potent station to a site with a good southerly take-off. It is difficult to do well in these events from this area due to the lack of local stations to work. Still definitely worth a play though! Have a great month and I hope you manage to work some nice DX on the bands. Also, please remember to send in a summary to myself or someone else for inclusion in the news-letter if you are active, even if it's not in a contest! 73 Colin GM0CLN

28MHz 4 element Yagi at GM0CLN

GM0CLN’s shack during the ARRL DX CW contest

General Notes :

(1) The club or its members plan to be active in those events shown as bold above.

Full Event Rules Are Available On The Internet As Follows :

RSGB HF 2002 : http://www.rsgbhfcc.org

RSGB VHF 2002 : http://www.blacksheep.org/vhfcc/rules/02rules/frameindex.html

ARRL : http://www.arrl.org/contests/cal2002.html

WAB : http://home.freeuk.net/wab/wab-cont.htm

Links to most of the other events, or their rules, can be found on the SM3CER Contest Web Page under Calendar 2002.

Start at http://www.sk3bg.se/contest/ and use the appropriate links to find the info you require.

Contest Commentary

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Contest calendar Date

Start (UTC)

Duration (hrs)

Contest

Notes & Info

07-Apr-02 07:00 2 RSGB RoPoCo 1 80m Rotating Post Codes

09-Apr-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 432MHz Activity Contest

10-Apr-02 19:00 1.5 RSGB Slow Speed Cumulative CW 3.540MHz – 3.580MHz, Max Speed 12wpm

14-Apr-02 09:00 4 RSGB 1st 70MHz

16-Apr-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 1.3GHz/2.3GHz Activity Contest

18-Apr-02 19:00 1.5 RSGB Slow Speed Cumulative CW 3.540MHz – 3.580MHz, Max Speed 12wpm

20-Apr-02 00:00 24 Holyland DX Contest CW/SSB http://hamradio.iarc.org/contests/holy2002rules.html

21-Apr-02 09:00 4 RSGB 50MHz

23-Apr-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 50MHz Activity Contest

26-Apr-02 19:00 1.5 RSGB Slow Speed Cumulative CW 3.540MHz – 3.580MHz, Max Speed 12wpm

04-May-02 14:00 24 RSGB 432MHz – 248GHz

04-May-02 14:00 8 RSGB 10GHz Trophy

04-May-02 14:00 8 RSGB 432MHz Trophy

07-May-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 144MHz Activity Contest

12-May-02 09:00 3 RSGB 70MHz CW

12-May-02 09:00 9 WAB LF CW

14-May-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 432MHz Activity Contest

18-May-02 14:00 24 RSGB 144MHz Also 6 hour sections

19-May-02 11:00 4 RSGB 144MHz Backpackers #1

21-May-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 1.3GHz/2.3GHz Activity Contest

25-May-02 00:00 48 CQWW WPX CW Contest

28-May-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 50MHz Activity Contest

01-Jun-02 14:00 24 RSGB 50MHz Trophy/IARU Reg 1 Also 6 hour sections

01-Jun-02 15:00 24 HF National Field Day CW 10m-160m

02-Jun-02 09:00 9 WAB LF Phone

02-Jun-02 11:00 4 RSGB 50MHz Backpackers #1

04-Jun-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 144MHz Activity Contest

08-Jun-02 10:00 24 Jubilee Contest CW/SSB NEW ADDITION TO RSGB CALENDAR!

11-Jun-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 432MHz Activity Contest

16-Jun-02 09:00 7 PW 144MHz QRP Contest

16-Jun-02 09:00 4 RSGB 144MHz Backpackers #2

18-Jun-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 1.3GHz/2.3GHz Activity Contest

23-Jun-02 09:00 6 WAB 70MHz Phone

25-Jun-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 50MHz Activity Contest

30-Jun-02 09:00 6 WAB 144MHz QRP

02-Jul-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 144MHz Activity Contest

06-Jul-02 14:00 24 RSGB VHF National Field Day

07-Jul-02 09:00 6 WAB 50MHz Phone

07-Jul-02 11:00 4 RSGB 144MHz Backpackers #3

09-Jul-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 432MHz Activity Contest

14-Jul-02 11:00 4 RSGB 50MHz Backpackers #2

16-Jul-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 1.3GHz/2.3GHz Activity Contest

20-Jul-02 14:00 8 RSGB 144MHz Low Power

21-Jul-02 08:00 8 RSGB 432MHz Low Power

21-Jul-02 09:00 3 RSGB Low Power Contest - Part 1 80m

21-Jul-02 13:00 3 RSGB Low Power Contest – Part 2 40m

23-Jul-02 19:00 2.5 RSGB 50MHz Activity Contest

27-Jul-02 12:00 24 RSGB Islands On The Air Contest 10m-80m CW/SSB

28-Jul-02 11:00 4 RSGB 144MHz Backpackers #4

Information

T he Cockenzie & Port Seton Amateur Radio Club was formed in 1984 by Bob Glasgow GM4UYZ, to help the local amateurs get to know each

other. Numbers have increased steadily over the years and now average about 33. Far from being just a local club we have members coming from the Borders, Dumfries, Strathclyde and Fife. The Club meets on the first Friday of every month (Second Friday of January) in the lounge of the Thorn-tree Inn on the old Cockenzie High Street from 7pm till late. The Club is run in a very informal way, there are no fees, no real committee structure, just a group of like minded people doing something they enjoy! This does not mean that we don’t do anything, we enter (and win!) contests, train novices, run talks and video nights and hold an annual Junk Sale. The Club supports the British Heart Foundation in memory of a member who died from heart disease by do-nating the profits from events we hold, we have raised over £5,300 since 1994. The Club is affiliated to the Radio Society of Great Brit-ain and holds the callsigns MM0CPS and GM2T which are used for our contest entries. We also have our own internet domain name www.cpsarc.com and club mem-bers can get their own callsign@cpsarc.com email ad-dresses.

Bob Glasgow 7 Castle Terrace Port Seton East Lothian EH32 0EE

Phone: 01875 811723 Email: gm4uyz@cpsarc.com

COCKENZIE & PORT SETON AMATEUR RADIO CLUB

We’re on the web!

www.cpsarc.com

Contacts General Correspondence, Novice Training, Contest en-tries — Bob Glasgow gm4uyz@cpsarc.com

HF Contests, 5wpm Morse Class — Cambell Stevenson mm0dxc@cpsarc.com

VHF Contests — Colin Smith gm0cln@cpsarc.com

Newsletter, Web Site —John Innes mm0jxi@cpsarc.com

Email admin, Photo archive— Robert Veal mm0ant@cpsarc.com

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