Author: Guest Member

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The Stirling and District ARS & GMDX Group Awarded The Al Slater G3FXB Memorial Award

The GMDX GROUP and the STIRLING AND DISTRICT ARS are delighted to be awarded The Al Slater G3FXB Memorial award.

This award originated and administered by FOC (First Class CW Operators Club) is in memory of AL Slater G3FXB one of the UK’s top DXers and Contesters.

Inscribed on the plaque are the words DXing, Contesting, Operating Standards, Friendship and Encouraging others.

GMDX Group and the Stirling Club have been awarded these plaques particularly for encouraging others with our participation in the CW Boot Camps.

This is a very prestigious award and we are delighted and honoured to receive it.

73 Rob GM3YTS

Chairman

GMDX Group

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Slow Down To Bust A Contest Pileup

Slow down to bust a contest pileup – Observations By DAN KB6NU

In the Minnesota QSO Party last weekend, there was a big pileup trying to work a station in some remote county. The operator was working about 23 – 25 wpm, so I replied at that speed. I even sped up a little thinking that I might be able to slip my call in before the others.

Well, after several unsuccessful calls, and hearing the MN station reply to several slower stations, I decided to slow down myself. Bingo! I got a reply to my first call at the slower speed. My guess is that the slower speed made my call easier to copy and to stand out from the others. I don’t know if this tactic would work in a bigger contest, but I’m going to use this tactic again in a future QSO party.

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The New Zealand YL Scene During 2020

NEW  ZEALAND  LADY  AMATEURS 2020 – Ngaire ZL2UJT

2020 was a strange year for everyone in the world with COVID arriving .

Fortunately New Zealand has so far managed to avoid the worst of it and our lives here were not affected as badly as other countries. This was due to many factors, one being that we are a very isolated country in the Pacific ocean and the other is we closed our borders and went into complete lock down earlier than most. Thank goodness our country of 4 million complied and we were able to keep the disease at bay.

Lock down here for us personally was not a problem as we live close to a beach and part of our “Bubble” included a walk past the cliff overlooking the beach which was so relaxing. Also it gave us time to spend relaxing at home instead of going to meetings of the many clubs we belong to, and also the many lunches out with friends, which in turn saved us heaps of money.

This was a time that Amateur radio excelled and people came on the air and chatted. All our radio nets were busy and people used the airways as never before. Interesting events like the backyard Summit on the Air, the ZL2AL activity event with trying to maintain 4 contacts per day and the upper HF bands starting to open up made for interesting and fun Ham Radio days. On top of that we had fabulous weather.

Unfortunately during this time WARO our women’s amateur radio organisation went into recess, as many of our members were unable to go on the air any more due to their Om’s passing away, old age, or developing other hobbies with members being reluctant to form an active and dynamic committee.

In general we seem to have new young male recruits coming on board but hardly any females.

Our local club a few years ago had 15 active female Amateurs, now there are only two who come to the branch meetings while the male activity is growing and the enthusiasm from the new members has not diminished with time. On the bright side our female activity is high and recognized by the local branch members who proposed me for the Jumbo Godfrey award which I was honoured to receive.

We have our AGM due mid year so hoping that members will front up and join the committee and we can continue this great group. We have not capitulated and still hold a ladies net on Monday nights on our national system and also sometimes an HF 80 metre net on Thursday evenings. With propagation slowly improving on the bands above 80 metres with the upcoming sunspot cycle, we are hoping that we can do more Dxing.

There seems to be an upsurge of women doing their CW which is a new trend so hopefully this will encourage people to participate on the air more.

33 Ngaire ZL2UJT

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QSO Today Virtual Ham Expo

Whether you’re a ham that doesn’t want to travel because of Covid or just live too far from a hamvention, the QSO Today Expo offers the opportunity to learn from many great speakers, meet with exhibitors to see the latest technology, and engage with fellow hams without leaving your home ham shack………..More Info – HERE .

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Copy CW Signals More Easily With Two Tones

By –

In CQ – January 2018 – Pete, N8PR (SK) wrote that you should set up your receiver to produce two tones 65 to 80 Hz apart to make copying weak CW signals more easily. The theory behind this is that the dissonance between the two tones makes copying a CW signal more copyable than just a single tone. I like this  idea. I played around a little bit last night with this technique, and it did indeed seem to work better than using just a single tone.

Read original POST – HERE .

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WOTRA  2020 (Women On The Radio Award) Report

WOTRA  2020 (Women On The Radio Award) – Ángeles M.T (EC1YL)

A large number of radio amateurs from around the world, participated in the 2020 annual event.. More Awards for YL’s stations were delivered this year, thereby fulfilling the group mission of encouraging more YL participation.

In 2019 when the Award was launched, the event was more of a practice session, but one year on (2020) it can be considered a success thanks to the increased interest and participation of YLs.

This year, WOTRA has focused more on the work of the Special-Event-Stations  and their regular attendance on the bands, rather than on the individual making a certain number of QSO’s.

Becoming involved required commitment and the responsibility of regular participation.

Much effort and determination was needed  in an event at this level.  Not always an easy task and for this reason, several of the participants who started at the beginning of November, found themselves unable to continue through to the end.

Special thanks to the Operators that participated throughout, they displayed  great team-work and coordination amongst  everyone. In alphabetical order they are:

Ana – EI / EA7KMA
Angels – EC1YL
Carmen – DM4EAX
Cath – MW7CVT
Laila – OE3LZA
Pink- LU7IRS
Ydorca (Mariela) – YV5EVA
Zulema – CO8MGY

In particular I  would like to recognise  Zulema Gonzalez Ochoa CO8MGY  from Cuba. To reward and recognize her work, as the operator that made the most QSO’s, especially as it was her first year in this great event,  She participated with enthusiasm and dedication.

Laila OE3LZA, also had the privilege of being able to get her beautiful Award for her contact with my special station on November 25 (EH1YL), on the occasion of the ‘International Day against Gender Violence’.

Special thanks of course to all the Operators of the Wotra Award 2020  and for their effort to contact their WOTRA colleagues and in obtaining their beautiful Awards.  (2 Dec, 2020)

Women on The Radio  is a Radio Group, created by Ángeles M.T ( EC1YL), for licensed Radio Amateur YL’s Worldwide  https://web.facebook.com/groups/1913222872262810/about

[EDIT – COX: And from a UK perspective BYLARA (British Young Ladies Amateur Radio Association – also available via QUICKLINK)]

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Funding Award Keeps Fife Museum Communicating

Museum of Communication volunteers Ian Archibald (Burntisland), Dave Pack (Edinburgh) and Andrew Starling (Kirkcaldy) react to news of the award by Museums Galleries Scotland.

The Museum of Communication in Burntisland is pleased to announce an award in excess of £5,000 from the Recovery and Resilience Fund of Museums Galleries Scotland (MGS).

Museum of Communication Chairman Prof. Tom Stevenson said, “2020 has been a very lean year for us. The MGS award will help our entirely volunteer-run museum to survive through the winter as well as enabling us to upgrade our digital presence and prepare for reopening in2021. We’re eagerly looking forward to the day when we can once again offer everyone a fascinating visitor experience here in Burntisland.”

MGS has established the Recovery and Resilience Fund to secure the future of Scottish independent museums put at risk by the pandemic, thus safeguarding the vital role they play in their communities. MGS benefitted from a £4 million allocation from a £97 million package of Scottish Government funding to protect Scotland’s culture and heritage sectors from the impacts of Covid-19.

Lucy Casot, CEO of Museums Galleries Scotland said: “We are delighted to support the Museum of Communication through the Recovery and Resilience Fund. They have responded to the challenges of the pandemic, and subsequent temporary closure, with plans for increased online activities, which will continue to welcome their community and visitors from around the world to explore this fascinating museum.

The Museum of Communication’s responsive forward thinking is a credit to the volunteers who run the museum. We wish them every success as they work to deliver lectures to supporters across the world and safely reopen the museum in 2021 for their community.”

By David Brown – (e-mail dwbrown384@sky.com tel. 07886 915721)

  • The Museum of Communication is a registered museum based at 131 High Street, Burntisland KY3 9AA. It is run entirely by volunteers.
  • It was established in Bo’ness in 1992 and later moved to Burntisland, opening in 2005.
  • It has an outstanding collection of communications-related material and offers lectures and other activities, currently online.
  • For further information about the Museum of Communication see www.mocft.co.uk .
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UK Amateur Radio Exam Report Released

Colin Butler

The RSGB Examinations Standards Committee (ESC) report covering 2019 is now available to DOWNLOAD .

The report contains statistics for the both the RSGB amateur radio exams and the Air Cadets Organisation (ACO) exam which Ofcom considers to be equivalent to the RSGB Foundation.

Ofcom has been concerned about the participation of women in amateur radio and STEM disciplines. They requested the ESC to publish figures for the number of women taking the exams. Unfortunately, the results are disappointing with only 9.9% of all exams being taken by women.

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Reflections From An Old WoSARS Young-Yin!

By Hugh Cummings GM0HSC (WoSARS Past Member)

Dragging up some old memories:

Along with a number of the other younger amateurs around Glasgow, we set up a group specifically aimed at younger folks, and people new to the hobby, called YAGIS – the Young Amateurs Group In Scotland. One area of interest saw us partake in conversion of assorted PMR sets, to get cheap access to the bands, where commercial kit wasn’t available, including a batch of Pye Cambridges on 4m AM, then converting them (badly) to FM. We ended  with D3E – pretty much!

PYE Cambridge – Hybrid Mobile Tx/Rx (Valve Tx Transistor Rx)

A lesson was learned about shorting out valve grids with a screwdriver I remember, and simultaneously, that electric current flows from a person to another touching person – ouch!

I used to use aircraft scatter to make a 4m qso between David – then GM7BPA (who was a runner up in the young amateur of the year contest I think?) in Croftamie and myself in Mansewood Glasgow. 2m was fine but 4m needed an aircraft approaching the airport over Duntocher for the path to work 🙂

We also ran fox hunts, and many hill-top operations, with all sorts or mobile trips up hills in Ayrshire and the southern Highlands. I also remember a VHF field day above East Kilbride and special event station GB0BUS using a double decker bus I had at the time.

Hugh’s Current Bus – Fares Please! (COX)

I went on to become the senior novice licence instructor for Strathclyde and along with Tommy GM3VBT and Susan GM4SGB, we trained somewhere in the region of 30 mainly young people at novice level, with many going on to get Class B and Class A licences – including young folk from the High School of Glasgow and St Aloysius’ College – one of whom went on to be the lead guitarist in Indy band  MOGWAI  (Almost a callsign – COX).

Another memorable adventure was a mini dxpedition to ACHILL ISLAND in Co Mayo in Ireland IO43………..

View of Achill Island using NASA’s technology overhead

…………..where we got special permission from the Ministry to operate as EJ4VNX on 50MHz as well as on 70MHz, and the other bands. We picked a great week for it (as we had researched the likelihood) and from day 2, had almost constant day time E openings to mainland Europe.

Great times.

Best regards to all at WoSARS for your forthcoming 50th Celebrations.

Shug GM0HSC – a Old Young Yin!

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