FRANKSTON AND MORNINGTON PENINSULA RADIO CLUB

EDITION #4 July August 2017

Famparc News

Inside this Edition

Cover Page 1

Club Info 2

Presidents Report 3

Meetings 4

Members List 5

Editor 6

Antennas 7

Antennas Cont 8

Radio Signals 9

VK3YE Article 10

Birthdays / Events 11

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 1

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — Committee and Club Info

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 2

Regular Club Activities

Follow the road into Cornish College OBSERVING the SPEED LIMIT and take a left turn at the

roundabout, go left around to the carpark and turn left at the tennis courts, then follow

SLOWLY to the club. In winter time please do not park on the grass and please angle park on

Saturdays. We would be happy to see members, guests and anyone interested in coming along.

- Club Regular Frequencies: 2mtr 146.425 Simplex and 70cm 439.900 Duplex

- D-Star Repeater 2mtr Port C 146.7625Mhz Output and 70cm Port B 438.125Mhz Output

Committee and Office Bearers 2017

Farmparc Amateur Radio

Club Correspondence to:

PO Box 65

Patterson Lakes

Victoria 3197

Site Located at:

Cornish College Grounds

Riverend Rd

Bangholme Vic.

Melways Ref 93 J11

- Weekly Net: Tuesdays at 8pm club members and friends meet on

146.425Mhz

controlled by VK3MMM Billy

- Weekly Wednesdays 9am till 2pm at the club rooms to catch up or

meet club members

who are no longer in the workforce. Work may be done on various

projects, at your leisure.

- Weekly Saturdays 9am till 2pm at the clubrooms.

A get together to sit around, relax and chat about whatever!

There's plenty of coffee, tea and biscuits, and friends and new members

are all welcome to come along.

President Roy Seabridge VK3GB 5971 6804

Vice President John Cheeseman VK3XM TBA

Secretary Peter Collins VK3IJ 9551 4591

Treasurer Murray Little VK3FADX

Committee Member Michael Lammer VK3UUU 0428 880 500

Committee Member Andy Walton VK3CAH 9783 6859

Committee Member Bill Grypstra VK3MMM 9781 2886

Committee Member Bruce Bathols VK3UV 97858003

Committee Member David Swallow VK3AWX 0409133318

Committee Member Collin Reynolds VK3CR 9772 6885

Other Positions

QSL Manager Bill Grypstra VK3MMM 9781 2886

Website & Newsletter Shaun Stoddart VK3VH 0431 564 451

IMPORTANT NOTE:

Our monthly general business meeting is no longer the last Saturday of the month

and will move to the FIRST Saturday of the month.

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — Presidents Report

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 3

I do hope everyone is keeping warm as winter this year appears to be colder than previous

years. I opened the curtains the other morning and the grass was white! It was a reminder of an

average winters day in England.

The new 40 metre quarter wave vertical mounted on the clubs roof is proving to be a winner. To

test it out I entered the Shires contest for six hours (contest was for 24hrs) and submitted a score

of 9000 plus points. I had many complementary comments about our signal, it will be interesting

to compare our score with others who worked the contest for the full 24 hours. Last week I was

talking with g0nxa Giles an old pome friend of mine on 40 metres (cw of course) whilst listening I

switched from the vertical to the clubs dipole and lost his signal completely until switching back

to the vertical.

The club was donated four fibre glass vertical antennas some time ago. They were commercially

built for vhf. John vk3xm suggested we strip out two of them and make a helically wound rotary

dipole for 40 metres as a club project. Several members put their hands up to help John and by

good fortune one of the volunteers was Brian vk3vbj! It should be an interesting project. It will be

interesting to see if it will out perform the new 40 metre quarter wave vertical. Any bets? If its fit-

ted at the highest point on the clubs tower 62 feet......ok for you newbies 8.6 metres. I think it

should.

I know its a little early in the year but I think members should be aware, the current club Secretary

Peter vk3ij will be standing down at the next AGM to a well earnt retirement. I have also been

advised the club Treasurer will not seek re-election at the next AGM due to family commitments.

We there for have two vacancies. The Secretary of any club is the engine and the power to drive

the club into a successful future, if you feel you have the skills required and would enjoy leading

the Famparc club, please step forward. The treasurers position is for someone who is good with

figures and has the skills required to extract money out of members pockets with a smile. I under-

stand the computerised financial system is easy to use and understand.

Several months ago at a monthly meeting there was a discussion regarding the Mobile Tower

the club purchased a year of two ago. The tower has never been used by the club or member-

ship. Peter vk3ij the club secretary proposed we should sell the tower. By a unanimous show of

hands the motion was passed. Before advertising to the amateur radio community in general, do

we have any member of Famparc considering purchasing a tower or know of anyone consider-

ing doings so. To clear the cost of purchase and renovations we are asking for the sum of

$3000.00. The tower at full hight is 15 metres and that's before any pole is fitted. The tower now

complies with current regulations regarding mobile towers. As far as we are aware there is no

planning approval required to use this tower as its not fixed, however, members are advised to

check with their local council. If you know of anyone who has applied to erect a tower and had

their application refused by the local council, this could be a very attractive option.

Roy. Famparc President.

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — Meetings

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 4

FAMPARC Business Meeting Sat 1st July 2017 at Cornish College Club Rooms

The June business meeting started at 10:35 Committee members present

Roy GB, John XM, Peter IJ, Colin CR, Bruce UV, David AWX, Bill WWW, Murray FADX, Michael UUU

Apologies Andy CAH, Shaun VH, Graham FGKE

Visitors No visitors Minutes of the last meeting

The minutes of the last meeting were read, moved Terry BMX, seconded Brian VBJ

Correspondence in: News Letters from various clubs

Correspondence out: Nil GENERAL BUSINESS

Peter IJ has had en email from a guy wanting to purchase a Famparc whip and has agreed

to purchase one of the antennas for $250

He then discussed a visit with Roy GB to the Dingley Mens Shed and also suggesting the club

purchase a copy of Wireless Men and Women at War as listed in AR. Colin suggested the

club spend up to $100 on new books and that was agreed on a show of hands.

John XM suggested

Roy GB offered his 6 band-pass filters for sale to the club at $350 and after some discussion it

was agreed to go ahead and purchase them.

Roy raised the issue of selling the trailer and suggested we need to sell it for $3000 to cover

the purchase price and cost of repairs.

David ADM asked if any members had any experience with somebody knocking on the door

offering to change the light globes to LED which evolved into a discussion on LEDS and

interference.

The meeting closed at 11.1S

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — Members Listing 2017

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 5

Alan VK3FARW

Albrecht VK3FKH/ZL1ABI

Alex VK3VAB

Alex ZS1L/vk3

Allycia VK3FVWS

Andrew VK3AEJ/VK3MUD

Andrew VK3CAH*

Andy VK3XKA

Anthony VK3JIA

Barry VK3THE

Bob VK3BAY

Bob VK3XP

Brenda VK3KT

Brian VK3VBJ

Bruce VK3UV*

Chris VK3AML

Claureen VK3KMB

Colin VK3CR*

Craig VK3JCH

Craig VK3NCR

Dana VK3HHL

David VK3EW

David VK3ADM

David VK3AWX*

David VK3JKY

Earl VK3BER

Edwin VK3GD

Elly VK3FLEW

Eric VK3EPD

Gerald VK3FGMO

Gerard VK3GEE

Gerard VK3GER

Graham VK3GA

Graham --nil---

Grant VK3GDC

Greg VK3KV

Henry VK3FHWH

Howard VK3QA

Ian VK3IMB

Ian VK3ZHM

Jeff VK3BZ

Jeff VK3VJS

Jessie VK3VAN

John VK3XM*

John VK3CVF

John VK3JJO

John VK3JPA

John VK3EGG

John VK3MJL

Ken VK3ZER

Kennett VK3MJF

Kevin VK3IR

Leigh VK3LVA

Malcolm VK3DMG

Mani VK3SRS

Martin VK3JAZ

Michael VK3UUU*

Murray VK3FADX*

Noel VK3BMU

Paul VK3ERA

Peter VK3SC

Peter VK3TE/VK3SPB

Peter VK3IJ*

Peter VK3YG

Ray VK3KFJ

Richard VK3IDX

Richard VK3RR

Roderick VK3YC

Roger VK3HRS

Ron VK3BRA

Ron VK3FROM

Ross VK3LTD

Roy VK3GB*

Ruben VK3PRA

Shaun VK3VH

Simon VK3ZSJ

Stefan call sign pending

Stephan VK3GTR

Stephen VK3MPR

Stjepan VK3WF

Terry VK3BMX

Timothy VK3MIT

Warren VK3LX

Wayne VK3TWM

William VK3MMM*

Asterisk Denotes Committee

Member

If any callsigns are incorrect,

please notify myself VK3VH

or Peter VK3IJ

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — A word from VK3VH

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 6

Until next time

73 DX

VK3VH Shaun

Hi all, nothing much to report on the radio front. Some of you may have seen the VK Shires contest results come in,,,,

yep, second again for 4 years straight to John VK5PO,, well done, I got well flogged this year in the appalling condi-

tions!

Anyway, I have finally got all my tanks running, now, 7 tanks with a total capacity of 1950 litres between them all.

George, my oscarfish has moved from upstairs to the downstairs room into a GIANT 6x2x2 tank with a 160 litre under

tank sump filter. This system alone is almost 800 litres.

Her old tank upstairs has been pulled down and re scaped and set up for a new species of fish I’m going to stock it

with.

Its not to be revealed as yet so stay tuned. It will be an awesome display tank and fully planted too.

On another note, just putting out the feelers to ask if anybody may be interested in giving the newsletter a run for a

while??

I am extremely busy with so many projects on the go I just simply struggle to find the time, if not so be it but we will look

at just putting one out every quarter instead of every 2 months.

I’m open to offers.

Left

George the Oscar

New 6x2x2 tank

10mm thick glass walls

with 12mm thick bot-

tom

Capacity 660 litres

Sump filter 150 Litres

Bottom right

Breeding tanks all up

and running

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — Antennas

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 7

Hi Members of Famparc.

Some years ago a came across and old book which I found very interesting to read. I noticed who ever

had once owned this book had highlighted various paragraphs and thought maybe members of Famparc

would find them interesting too. Unfortunately when I scanned them the highlighted section did not show

up. I have therefore lined the specific sections. I plan to add a couple of pages to future newsletters. If you

do find them interesting please let me know.

Roy. Famparc President.

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — Antennas

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 8

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — Radio Signals

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 9

Strange Signals from the Nearby Red Dwarf Star Ross 128 posted Jul 12, 2017, 1:31 PM by Abel Mendez [ updated Jul 13, 2017, 11:32 PM ]

We are conducting a scientific campaign from the Arecibo Observatory to observe red dwarf star with planets. These observations might provide information about the radiation and magnetic environment around these stars or even hint the presence of new sub-stellar objects including planets. So far, we observed Gliese 436, Ross 128, Wolf 359, HD 95735, BD +202465, V* RY Sex, and K2-18. Only Gliese 436 and K2-18 are known to have planets.

Observations were done between April and May 2017 in the C-band (4 to 5 GHz).

Two weeks after these observations, we realized that there were some very peculiar signals in the 10-minute dy-namic spectrum that we obtained from Ross 128 (GJ 447), observed May 12 at 8:53 PM AST (2017/05/13 00:53:55 UTC). The signals consisted of broadband quasi-periodic non-polarized pulses with very strong dispersion-like fea-tures. We believe that the signals are not local radio frequency interferences (RFI) since they are unique to Ross

128 and observations of other stars immediately before and after did not show anything similar.

We do not know the origin of these signals but there are three main possible explanations: they could be (1) emis-sions from Ross 128 similar to Type II solar flares, (2) emissions from another object in the field of view of Ross 128, or just (3) burst from a high orbit satellite since low orbit satellites are quick to move out of the field of view. The signals are probably too dim for other radio telescopes in the world and FAST is currently under calibra-

tion.

Each of the possible explanations has their own problems. For example, Type II solar flares occur at much lower frequencies and the dispersion suggests a much farther source or a dense electron field (e.g. the stellar atmos-phere?). Also, there are no many nearby objects in the field of view of Ross 128 and we have never seen satellites emit bursts like that, which were common in our other star observations. In case you are wondering, the recurrent

aliens hypothesis is at the bottom of many other better explanations.

Therefore, we have a mystery here and the three main explanations are as good as any at this moment. Fortu-nately, we obtained more time to observe Ross 128 next Sunday, July 16, and we might clarify soon the nature of its radio emissions, but there are no guarantees. We will also observe Barnard’s star that day to collaborate with the Red Dots project. Results from our observations will be presented later that week. I have a Piña Colada ready

to celebrate if the signals result to be astronomical in nature.

More updates via @ProfAbelMendez, @PlanetaryHabLab, and @NAICObservatory

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — Article by Peter VK3YE

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 10

Item 5: Online information about amateur radio

Geographically remote or can’t get to a club meeting? Consider asking questions on an online forum or

group. Those on qrz.com and eham.net are the biggest but there are also country-based and specialist

forums. They carry some great answers and informative discussions worth saving or bookmarking. Face-

book groups are even more popular and exist for most aspects of amateur radio.

Social media has its dark side, though. Like the village market, participants comprise a cross-section of hu-

manity, including know-it-alls, bigots, inarticulates, the short-fused, the backward and the socially chal-

lenged. Post count does not equal technical expertise. And technical expertise does not equal social

maturity.

It’s amazing how some who behave acceptably on the air or in person become abrasive trolls online.

Nasty comments reflect more on the writer than their target. Ignore them and don’t let them affect either

you personally or your interest in radio.

At the same time, there are things that returnees (or newcomers) with questions can do to make the forum

experience more pleasant for everyone, including those trying to help. These include:

Use the forum’s search function to find past discussions on a topic you wish to know more about. Your

exact question may have already been answered.

Search Google for the answer before asking. Again, there is a high chance others have had similar

questions answered.

Mention the prior steps you took to find an answer when you do ask a question. Replies will be better if

respondents can see you’ve made an effort first.

Specific questions get the best answers. A broad question like ‘what is the best HF antenna’ requires a

book-length answer that no one will write. Whereas stating preferred bands and distances, available

space and cost requirements should elicit useful answers.

Respect readers’ and respondents’ time. This means writing clearly, spelling well and rereading before

posting. Results will be better this way.

Without formal vetting of forum posts, answers received will vary in suitability and accuracy. A lot of non-

sense is sprouted on antennas, for instance. Someone may claim something ‘works’ but their definition of

this might be signals substantially weaker than those achieved with a common dipole. Other replies may

be from perfectionists with professional or engineering backgrounds. Their responses may be technically

correct but could prove discouraging if their recommendations exceed available space and budget.

Consequently forums should supplement your reading rather than be your sole source of information.

Enjoyed the read? There’s more in ‘Getting back into Amateur Radio’ by Peter Parker VK3YE. It’s available

as an ebook through Amazon for $6.99. Search the title on Amazon, like ‘VK3YE Radio Books’ on Facebook

or visit vk3ye.com for more details.

Frankston and Mornington Peninsula Radio Club — B’days, Events

www.vk3frc.org.au Page 11

The Editor is always looking for articles of

interest.

Please forward article contributions to:

shaunvk3vh@optusnet.com.au

Closing date for next edition 20th August

2017

July

Peter Bargholz VK3ABR

Stephen Clark VK3FSPG

Edwin Parsons VK3GD

Shaun Stoddart VK3VH

David Swallow VK3AWX

Andrew Walton VK3CAH

August

Dana Hunt VK3HHL

Murray Little VK3FADX

Martin Luby VK3JAZ

Stjepan Nikolic VK3WF

Claureen Wilson VK3KMB

The Gippsland Gate Radio & Electronics Club will

be hosting another hamfest in 2017,

The hamfest will be held on July 22nd at

The Cranbourne Public Hall at the Corner

of Clarendon and High St in Cranbourne

NEWS FLASH FROM THE PRES

Further to my comments regarding the new clubs vertical antenna

for 40 metres and the Shires Contest. The results of this contest

have been announced and Famparc came 7th overall and 4th as

a single operator. Bearing in mind the contest ran for a 24 hours

and Famparc operated for only 6 hours and the entire contest was

run using the new vertical. It would be true to say it is working rea-

sonable well.