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IRTS Radio News Bulletin Sunday August 18th 2002


Slide Rule and Abacus Exhibition

A Slide Rule and Abacus Exhibition will be held at the ILAC Dublin Central Library during August 2002. The exhibit includes, Slide Rules, of various ages and functions, Chinese and Japanese Abacuses, a set of Napier's Bones and various mechanical Calculators and Calculating aids. The Exhibition is by kind permission of the Open Learning Centre at ILAC in association with Dublin Corporation. The Content is provided by Liam EI9DVB. The Exhibition started on Saturday the 27th of July and ends Saturday the 7th of September.


South Dublin Radio Club

A reminder that the usual weekly meetings of South Dublin Radio Club resume on Tuesday next (20th of August) at 8.00 p.m. in the club's QTH at the Ballyroan Community Centre, Marian Road, Rathfarnham. Over the past few months, a large number of club members have obtained new licences, and in all cases except one, these are "B" licences. The emphasis over the period between now and the year end will be on Morse classes, to facilitate the new licensees (and others with the B licence) to sit the Morse exam before the year end. As usual, new members are very welcome to attend the meetings and / or to attend the classes.


Space News

Belgian Radio Amateurs are happy to announce that the country's second astronaut to go into space is an Amateur Radio Operator. Frank De Winne, ON1DWN, will join the ISS at the end of October. Radio Amateurs in the City of Sint-Truiden (RST), members of the Union of Belgian Amateurs (UBA) did some research & established that it was possible for Frank to have a QSO with students during school contacts, fitting in the ARISS program, once he obtained the correct permit.

Plans were made and suddenly needed to be accelerated as the mission, which had been planned for a few years hence was suddenly brought forward to the end of October this year. Gaston Bertels, ON4WF, Chairman of ARISS-Europe and formal chairman of the Union of Belgian Amateurs has organized a contact with the Royal Technical School of Saffraanberg. There may be other opportunities for operators to make contact with the mission and UBA/RST and ARISS invite amateurs to listen out during the ODISSEA mission. A full color QSL Card is available and is to be used only for this mission with Frank De Winne, ON1DWN. Cards from Amateur Operators or Short Wave Listeners should be sent via the bureau or direct to: Tania Petré ON7AQ, Kerkom Dorp 100, B-3800 Sint Truiden, Belgium.

Those wishing to receive a QSL card direct should enclose a self-addressed envelope, stamped or enclosing one US Dollar or one International Reply Coupon. Website details are available on the news page of the IRTS website.


International Space Station

The ISS made a number of passes south of EI during the past week. Quite a number of experimenters have RS0ISS in their logs (Phone & packet). Region 1 uplink, 145.200 Mhz FM & downlink 145.800 Mhz FM.

Website information is available on the news page of the IRTS website.


The 2 Metres Counties Contest

The 2 Metres Counties Contest will be held next Sunday, August 25th. The start time is 1400 local and the finish is 2 hours later at 1600. All the usual rules apply as per page 12 of the yearbook. There were some very close battles in the Spring event and we look forward to lots of activity once again.

Just after the Counties contest finishes at 1600 hrs, a 4 metre activity period will take place. 70.2625 MHz will be the calling frequency for the activity period. Vertical or horizontal polarization. Modes of operation will be AM, FM or SSB. Talk back on 145.225 MHz FM.

Don't forget that this year the I.R.T.S will be presenting "The John Corless, Four meter Shield" to the leading 4 meter experimenter in EI. Rules for this shield are the same as for the 6 meter shield, Unique QSO's times maidenhead grid squares times DXCC countries worked.


6 metres news

The 6-metre sporadic-E season this year has been a little disappointing compared to last year, openings seem to be rarer and shorter. Maybe we were a little spoiled with the excellent F2 season and thought a bumper sporadic-E season would follow. However there are a number of experimenters who have worked 200 plus maidenhead grid squares so far this year.


70 cm news

Could everyone who participated in the July, Sunday's 70 cm activity towards the "Slievenamon Perpetual Trophy" please send in their logs to the Contest Manager, Noel Walsh at ei2jc@hotmail.com before the 31st of August. Anyone who has had even only one 70 cm contact during the month of July should send Noel a log in support of this activity Trophy as it's the only I.R.T.S. UHF award.


EI0HQ in IARU HF Championships 2002

This year the Society used the special callsign EI0HQ in the IARU HF Championships held on the 13th and 14th of July. National Society Headquarter Stations are counted as multipliers in this contest and are allowed to operate multi-multi style with a station permissible on each band and mode.

As the decision to participate was left too late, only some of the band/modes were operated. Paul EI5DI operated on 10 metres CW while Declan EI9HQ was on 10m SSB. Jim EI8GS was on 15 Metres SSB and Thos EI2JD and Mark EI9IB were responsible for SSB on 20 Metres. Dave EI4BZ looked after 20 Metres CW and Neil EI3JE covered both 40 and 80 Metres SSB. Paul EI5DI was on 40 Metres CW while Jerry EI6BT looked after CW on 80 Metres. Over 4,000 QSO's were made and we look forward to a bigger and better effort next year.


Items for inclusion in Echo Ireland should be forwarded to Dave Moore EI4BZ at 021-4883555. Items can also be submitted to Dave by e-mail at ei4bz@eircom.net.


Items for inclusion in the Radio News should be forwarded to Mark Wall EI7IS at QTHR or via e-mail to ei7is@qsl.net or cyberis@e-merge.ie. Items can also be sent to Mark over the phone at 087-6302026.

News can also be submitted via e-mail to news@irts.ie for automatic forwarding to both news services.

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