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This Week's News

IRTS Radio News Bulletin Sunday 18 November 2022
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IRTS Contests

The IRTS Contest Manager published the results for the 80m Counties
Contest in October of this year. The one-hour long contest suffered
from very poor propagation conditions, reflected in the low number of
submitted logs. The New Year's Day 80m Counties Contest typically
enjoys much better mid-winter HF propagation, and attracts a lot of
activity from both shores of the Irish Sea, a chance to catch up with
friends at the conclusion of the festive seasons. The provisional
Contest Calendar for 2023 has also been updated, have a look at
www.irts.ie/contests, for next year's contesting fixtures. The first
IRTS contest of 2023 will be the IRTS 80m Counties Contest and it will
take place on Sunday the 1st of January 2023, starting at 17:00 UTC,
for the duration of one hour. This generally follows the very
successful format of the 40 meters contest, and the full rules are
available in the 'Contest' section on the IRTS website www.irts.ie .
The contest is open to all, EI and GI stations must send their county
abbreviation, as well as the report and a serial number starting with
001 for the first contact. Please note in particular the rule about the
permitted frequencies for this contest, which are for CW 3510-3560 and
for SSB 3600-3650 & 3700-3775. The very popular contest logging
software SD by EI5DI supports this contest and is available as a free
download from Ei5DI.com .
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YOTA

December YOTA month is underway and a list of participating stations
and QSOs can be found at events.ham-yota.com . The entire month of
December several youngsters will become active with YOTA as suffix in
the call-sign. The idea for this is to show the amateur radio hobby to
youth and to encourage youngsters to be active on the ham radio waves.
Ei0YOTA has been active on SSB, FT8 and are looking for volunteers to
take some time and activate the call-sign with youngsters. Email Niall
yota /at/ irts.ie to book a slot with the call-sign. The YOTA call-sign
always generates some interest and gives young-ops a great introduction
to the hobby.
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Shannon Basin Radio Club Ei2SBC

A reminder that the 2023 IRTS AGM weekend will take place over the
weekend of Saturday, April 29th, and Sunday, April 30th, 2023. The
venue is the Shearwater Hotel in Ballinasloe, Co. Galway. Tickets for
the gala dinner are available for sale for EUR35 each. A dinner ticket
is required to attend; it will not be possible to attend without one.
They must be pre-bookedfrom Anthony Ei6GGB. A limited number of hotel
rooms are still available using the special negotiated rates. Take up
has been swiftthis year so it is advisable that you contact the hotel
as soon as possible to avoid disappointment. The host club, Shannon
Basin Radio Club, is seeking submissions for short talks that will take
place on Saturday April 29th. In addition, the club would be delighted
to hear from other clubs, traders, and interested parties wishingto
reserve tables or booth space as part of the radio rally taking place
on Sunday, April 30th. Contact information and further details are
available on www.irts.ie , as well as the dedicated website for the
eventat www.sbrc.ie/agmweekend . On behalf of Shannon Basin Radio Club,
we would like to wish everyone a happy, peaceful, and QSO-filled
Christmas & New Year
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South Eastern Amateur Radio Group Ei2WRC

The final Tuesday night IRTS News bulletin by the club for 2022 will be
on Tuesday the 20th of December at the usual time of 8 p.m. The next
news bulletin after that will be on Tuesday the 10th of January 2023 at
8 p.m. Everyone in Ei2WRC would like to take this opportunity to wish
all our families and friends in Ireland and around the world a very
happy and peaceful Christmas and every good wish for the new year
ahead. For anyone that wishes to find out more about the South Eastern
Amateur Radio Group and their activities you can drop them an email to
southeasternarg /at/ gmail.com or please feel free to go along to any
of their meetings. You can check their website www.searg.ie and you can
also find them on Facebook.
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Tipperary Amateur Radio Group Ei7T

The Tipperary Amateur Radio Group, Ei7T would like to take this
opportunity to wish all radio amateur friends and short wave listeners
in Ireland and in fact all around the globe a peaceful and fabulous
Christmas 2022.A prosperous and healthy 2023 to all . May You all
remain safe, warm and continue to grow our wonderful hobby, remembering
those silent keys who are no longer with us.
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Cas-5A OSCAR-118

On December 9th, the CAS-5A satellite was launched on a launch vehicle
from the Chinese sea launch platform in the Yellow Sea. The Chinese
Amateur Satellite Group CAMSAT built an unusual satellite in that it
has transponders with a down-link in the 70cm band and up-links on the
2m VHF and the 15m HF band. CAS-5A carries two linear transponders and
an FM transponder, which are all continuously active assuming the power
budget permits. The Linear Transponder has an up-link 145.805 MHz to
145.835 MHz, and down-link on 435.525 MHz to 435.555 MHz inverting. The
FM Transponder has an up-link on 145.925 MHz, with the FM down-link on
435.600 MHz. The novel HF to UHF linear transponder listens between
21.4275 MHz and 21.4425 MHz, and that slice of HF spectrum is
retransmitted between 435.4975 MHz and 435.5125 MHz. The CW Beacon
transmits 22 wpm CW on 435.570 MHz, and the 4800 bps GMSK telemetry can
be heard on 435.650 MHz. QSOs have been reported via all three of the
transponders as of this writing. Reports indicate that the down-link is
strong and the transponders are sensitive. John, Ei7GL reports
receiving the satellite on Thursday, at a maximum elevation of 44
degrees. Using an indoor antenna, he managed to take screenshots,
showing the beacon signal and its Doppler shift. At moderate power
levels, a HF transmitter and a 21 MHz dipole, combined with an outdoor
low-gain UHF antenna should be sufficient to work OSCAR-118. Orbital
and operational information can be found on www.amsat.org
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SAQ Grimeton on VLF

On Christmas Eve morning SAQ Grimeton is scheduled to be in the air, to
send out a Christmas message to the whole world, using the nearly 100
year old 200kW Alexanderson alternator, transmitting on 17.2 kHz CW.
Live stream on YouTube begins at 07:25 UTC, at 08:30 UTC the
Alexanderson Alternator is started and tuned, followed by the
transmission of a CW message. To receive the message, one can use a
random length wire, as long as possible, connected to the microphone
socket of a laptop or PC sound-card, a choice of programs can then use
the sound-card as a receiver, allowing to listen to the transmission. A
number of ham-radio receivers can dial as low as 17.2 kHz, but are
often too deaf at the lower end. Using a simple up-converter gives much
better results when receiving VLF signals. SAQ are planning to carry
out test transmissions on Friday, approximately between 12:00 UTC and
15:00 UTC. SAQ will be on air for shorter periods of time during this
interval when they will be carrying out some tests and measurements.
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The Propagation Horoscope

The geomagnetic field was quiet on December 15, The Solar wind speed at
SOHO dropped to between 333 and 381 km/sec. GEOS-16 reports an
background x-ray flux at class C3-level. Thursday's M-class flare and
halo ejected from a Solar spot just leaving over the south-western limb
caused deep blackouts over the Mid- Atlantic, lasting until Friday
noon. Rare pink Auroras were seen above northern Norway, while raspy CW
notes were copied on topband and 80m. The critical frequency dropped to
below the 80m band during the past few evenings. Expect very changeable
HF conditions during next week, favouring the lower bands.

That is the last news bulletin for this year. Your IRTS News Team
wishes all listeners a happy new year and good health. Ei0IRTS will be
back on the air on the 8th of January with our first bulletin for 2023.
Items for inclusion can be submitted by email to newsteam /at/ irts.ie
for automatic forwarding to both the radio and printed news services.

[C]
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