SB NEWSLIN @ ALLBBS $NLIN.913 Amateur Radio Newsline #913 11 Feb 1995 Amateur Radio Newsline is produced as an audio service by Newsline, a service of the Westlink Radio Netowrk. The transcribed version is produced by Dale Cary, WD0AKO from materials provided by Newsline. and is jointly distributed to online services and bulletin board networks by Steve Coletti and Dale Cary. Copyright owner is Newsline. Permission to reuse all or part of either this written or the audio form requires that the item be taken in it's entirety, not be subject to any further editing or commentary, and that full credit given to Newsline as the source. Editorial comment, news items and all other business should be directed to Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, Newsline's Producer and Editor-In-Chief. E-Mail - 3241437@mcimail.com, billwa6itf@aol.com or B.PASTERNAK@genie.geis.com Phone/Fax - +1 805 296-7180, fax senders wait for voice prompt. Text Version information: America Online - tstader@aol.com (Terry Stader, Sysop) or D.CARY@genie.geis.com Compuserv, Delphi, Genie - D.CARY@genie.geis.com Usenet - david@stat.com (David Dodell - Moderator rec-radio-info) FTP, (oak.oakland.edu) - wy1z@neu.edu (Scott Erlich, Boston ARC) Internet mailing list (individuals) - bigsteve@.dorsai.org Internet mailing list (re-distributors) - D.CARY@genie.geis.com BBS Networks: FidoNet - Joe Brown, 1:2526/111 RIME - RO mail to Steve Coletti, ->35 Others - Steve Coletti (within the conference) (Fido Netmail to 1:278/230) - - - - - - NEWSLINE RADIO - CBBS EDITION #913 - POSTED 02/10/95 (***************************************************************) (* *) (* * * ***** * * **** * ***** * * ***** *) (* ** * * * * * * * ** * * *) (* * * * *** * ** * *** * * * * * *** *) (* * ** * * ** * * * * * ** * *) (* * * ***** * * **** ***** ***** * * ***** *) (* *) (* **** * **** ***** *** *) (* * * * * * * * * * *) (* **** ***** * * * * * *) (* * * * * * * * * * *) (* * * * * **** ***** *** *) (* *) (***************************************************************) The following is late news about Amateur Radio for Radio Amateurs as prepared from NEWSLINE RADIO scripts by the staff of the AMATEUR RADIO NEWSLINE, INC. -- formerly the WESTLINK RADIO NETWORK. For current information updates, please call Audio Version of Newsline ========================= Los Angeles............................ (213) 462-0008 Los Angeles (Instant Update Line)...... (805) 296-2407 Seattle................................ (206) 368-3969 Seattle................................ (206) 281-8455 Tacoma................................. (206) 927-7373 Louisville............................. (502) 894-8559 Dayton................................. (513) 275-9991 Chicago................................ (708) 289-0423 New York City.......................... Out Of Service Melbourne, FL.......................... (407) 259-4479 Electronic Hardcopy Version of Newsline ======================================= GEnie (RTC Bulletin Board)............. m345;1 GEnie (File Library)................... m345;3 Dallas Remote Imaging BBS (DRIG)....... (214) 492-7573 In bulletin number 36 The Midwest Connection BBS............. (701) 239-2440 In bulletin number 6 of the ham radio conference Delphi.....................In the ham radio conference CompuServe/HamNet.................... HamNet Library 0 Internet...............In the rec.radio.info newsgroup Internet FTP: oak.oakland.edu......................... In archive: pub/hamradio/docs/newsline Local BBS's............In the Ham Radio conferences on Fidonet, RIME, Intellec, I-Link and AR-Net For questions or comments about the text version, contact me at D.CARY@GENIE.GEIS.COM on the Internet. For the latest breaking info call the Instant Update Line listed above. To provide information please call (805) 296-7180. This line answers automatically and will accept up to 30 minutes of material. Check with your local amateur radio club to see if NEWSLINE can be heard weekly on the air in your area. Articles may be reproduced if printed in their entirety and credit is given to AMATEUR RADIO NEWSLINE as being the source. For further information about the AMATEUR RADIO NEWSLINE, please write to us with an SASE at P.O. Box 463, Pasadena, CA 91102. Thank You NEWSLINE (**************************************************************** Some of the hams of NEWSLINE RADIO... WA6ITF WB6MQV WB6FDF K6DUE W6RCL N6AHU N6AWE N6TCQ K6PGX N6PNY KU8R N8DTN W9JUV KC9RP K9XI KB5KCH KC5UD KC0HF G8AUU WD0AKO DJ0QN and many others in the United States and around the globe!!! (**************************************************************** [913] (* * * * C L O S E D C I R C U I T A D V I S O R Y * * * * (* * (* Our support fund administrator, Andy Jarema, N6TCQ says * (* that we need the assistance of every listener who * (* appreciates Newsline to help to keep it on the air. The * (* Newsline Support Fund is separate from the service. It * (* exists for the single purpose of channeling donations * (* directly to the those providing services to the Newsline * (* organization. * (* The address for the Newsline Support Fund is: * (* * (* Newsline Support Fund * (* Post Office Box 660937 * (* Arcadia, California * (* 91066 * (* * (* As always, we thank you for your support. That ends * (* this weeks closed circuit advisory with Newsline Report * (* number 913 for release on Friday, February 10, 1995 to * (* follow. * (* * (* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The following is a QST Tech class hams have taken the lead position in ham radio licensing, more on the ARRL sponsored meeting of repeater coordinators and a big announcement about Newsline's Young Ham of the Year Award. It has a new home. Find out where on an extended Newsline report number 913 coming your way right now! (***** STARTLING STATISTICS Technician class hams are literally on their way to ruling the world of Amateur Radio in the United States. This according to some startling 1994 year end statistics recently released by the FCC. The commission sez that forty percent of all radio amateurs licensed by that agency hold Technician or Technician Plus licenses with the Tech Plus leading the no-code Techs by a slight margin. Put into numbers, this means that some 186,000 of the estimated 250,000 hams in the United States and its possessions are Technician class operators, with up to 5000 new Techs joining the ham radio ranks every month. Even more startling is the overall increase in the total growth in ham radio over the last ten years. We are up a bit over 62% from where we were in 1884. An increase of almost 250,000 from the half million figure the FCC's licensing computer put out a decade ago. Looked at in dollars and cents the numbers are really astounding. If each ham licensed today were to buy only five hundred dollars in equipment over the next twelve months, the net income to the ham radio support industry would be in the order of $375,000,000 -- that's million dollars. More realistically, if only 10% of that figure or 75,000 hams spend $500 on gear the net to the industry by this time next year that would be $37,500,000 or there about. (***** ELECTRONIC FILING UPDATE We have an update on the status of electronic filing of license applications. According to ARRL VEC Administrator Bart Jhanke, KB9NM tells us that Newsline #909 has an incomplete quote regarding the ARRL VEC's handling of electronic Form 610 application filing. Bart says that the complete information is that, regardless of whether a VE team enters application data and mails or Electronically mails that data to the ARRL VEC, he must still receive the actual hardcopy Form 610 applications and hardcopies of other pertinent test session documents, and must screen them, before he can forward the successful applicant data electronically to the FCC. Bart emphasizes that the ARRL cannot simply bounce data received from a VE team to the FCC without screening the exam documents first. KB1NM also says that electronic filing is now very alive and well for two of the 18 VEC's. Five more VEC's will be coming on board in the near future. (***** NEW ASTROHAMS FOR STS-67 And electronic filing of license applications has resulted in two more U.S. astronauts joining the ranks of Amateur Radio licensees. Both will fly aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour during mission STS-67. The two new astrohams are Pilot William Gregory, KC5MGA and Payload Commander Tamara Jernigan, KC5MGF. Both took examinations with ARRL volunteer examiners on January 19 and were issued call signs on January 25. The 16 day STS-67 mission is scheduled for launch in March. Six of Endeavour's seven crew members now have Amateur Radio licenses. School groups in 26 places around the world are scheduled to make voice contacts with the STS-67 crew using the Shuttle Amateur Radio Experiment radio system to communicate. (***** ARRL HELPS DISABLED Some good news for handicapped hams. Word that the new ARRL Sourcebook for the Disabled is available in electronic form from several sources. This includes Compuserve, America Online, the ARRL's own Hiram BBS, and the InfoServer via Internet at info@arrl.org. The Sourcebook describes sources for those helping the disabled both with licensing and operating needs. It's development and publication was funded by the ARRL Foundation. (***** HAMS WIN IN REALLOCATION In Los Angeles word that ham radio is the biggest winner in the FCC's reallocated 50 MHz of spectrum, including 2390 to 2400 and 2402 to 2417 MHz, from government use to unlicensed, low power devices. This is because the commission has also elevated Amateur Radio's status in those band segments from secondary to primary. This means that amateurs will no longer have to protect any other user of those bands, and amateur stations are entitled to protection against interference from other users. Looking at the specific allocations, the Commission has made 2390 to 2400 MHz available for use by the unlicensed Personal Communications Services. It has also provided for continued use of 2402 to 2417 MHz by traditional unlicensed Part 15 electronics. This includes wireless networking and data transfer devices, with everything being governed by the same rules that apply to devices operating in the 1910 to 1920 MHz band. But the important news for hams is that our service is now the primary user. In case you did not know, you can thank the American Radio Relay League for making this big win for ham radio take place. (***** ARRL REPEATER MEETING More information is now known about the ARRL's decision to hold a meeting of the nations repeater frequency coordinators. According to the minutes of the January 20th Board of Directors meeting, the stated purpose of the meeting will be to discuss several key points with coordinators. These include establishing what the ARRL calls a single point of contact between the FCC and the coordinators through which the commission would recognize and support both local and regional coordination efforts. In simpler terms, what the ARRL wants to know if whether or not the nations coordinators are willing to take their problems and complaints to the League instead of the FCC in much the same way as the ARRL's Amateur Auxiliary handles the investigation of other kinds of regulatory violations. And there is good reason for this. As Newsline learned late last year, a ham here in Alabama who was asked to vacate a repeater contacted the FCC to find out if barring him from the repeater was legal. He was basically told that the FCC is sick and tired of hearing what it considers the whining and petty complaints of repeater owners and users. The commission does not have the resources nor the interest to handle what it views as petty complaints. As a result, a fairly high ranking FCC official told this ham that if ham radio could not solve these problems with repeaters, they definitely would not like the action taken by the FCC. If we know this, the ARRL has to know it too. And if becoming a buffer between the repeater problems and the FCC is a way of avoiding some hard handed re-regulation, the ARRL appears to be ready to take on the job. A job that most repeater people will tell you that the ARRL has avoided for almost three decades. But there is a lot more on the agenda than just buffering complaints to the FCC. Also to be discussed will be setting standards for service by coordinators, how appeals of coordination decisions should be handled, establishing a method of recognition and succession of coordinators and how frequency coordinators should respond to the needs of new technologies coming to ham radio in need of spectrum. Finally, the League will also use the meeting to determine the level of support among coordinators for a return to separate repeater licensing. This is something many coordination councils have been wanting for a long time. Also, the ARRL wants to determine the extent to which coordinators should be involved in accommodating the needs of other modes and if coordinators should attempt to resolve interference between repeaters and other types of amateur operations. While no date or location for this meeting has yet been announced, it is beginning to look as if the outcome of this gathering may well impact on more than repeater owner operators and their frequency coordinators. Decisions made at this meeting will assuredly lead to regulatory changes that will affect the day to day operations of the majority of the nations radio amateurs, most of whom operate on repeaters every day. This means you! (***** W1ALT BECOMES SILENT KEY Some sad news. Word has just been received of the passing last summer of Frank Caswell, W1ALT in Beverly, Massachusetts. Caswell was first licensed in the 1920's. He spent much of his spare time collecting, recording and documenting the history of the Marconi Wireless Station on Cape Cod. He also built the replica rotary spark gap and model of the Marconi station that are on display at the headquarters of the Cape Cod National Seashore at South Wellfleet. (***** NEW PHILIPPINES PREFIX From overseas, the DX News Letter reports that the Philippines began to issue its new 4E7 prefixes as of January 1st. So far there have been no contacts reported on this new prefix, but VS6VW reports hearing SM0CNS/4E7 active on 160 meters. (***** NEW SATELLITE COORDINATOR The International Amateur Radio Union International Secretariat has announced the appointment of Bruce Lockhart, SM0TER as the new IARU Satellite Frequency Coordinator. Bruce main task will be to provide a service to enable any group to coordinate frequencies and emissions of a planned amateur satellite with existing and any other planned amateur satellites. The appointment was made after consultation with major AMSAT groups in Europe and North America. While this is a technical position, the IARU Satellite Frequency Coordinator also has an important role in assisting in the protection of bands allocated to the amateur satellite service. Bruce will work closely with the IARU Satellite Adviser, Hans van de Groenendaal, ZS6AKV. (***** DX In DX word that Frank Smith known as AH0W and OH2LVG, will be active in early March from the Northern Marianas Islands and from Saipan. His planned operation includes participation in the ARRL SSB DX Contest as a single op entry. Frank will also stop for a few days on business in Malaysia and will activate East Malaysia. Both operations will be on 20 meters and WARC bands. You may remember Frank as one of the operators of the XF4M DXpedition to Revillagigedos back in October of 1994. There is another story about the aftermath of that operation which we will have for you in a future report. (***** DX Spots now at WWW Also, Jukka Salomaa, OH2BUA reports that DX spots, DX announcements and WWV information retrieved from PacketClusters is now available at World Wide Web. The information update is not true real time. Updates take place every half hour in Europe and hourly in the United States. (***** YHOTY AT HSV Newsline in association with Yaesu U.S.A. Corporation and CQ Magazine is proud to announce an agreement with the Huntsville Hamfest Inc. for Huntsville and the Hamfest to become the permanent home of our "Young Ham of the Year Award." For those of you not aware, the Huntsville Hamfest is one of the nations largest and most popular Amateur Radio conventions. It is held at the Von Braun Civic Center in downtown Huntsville and attracts some 7000 attendees each August. And this year, it will probably be even bigger since it has been designated as the official site of the ham radio industry's national show. Besides being one of the nations friendliest places, the city of Huntsville, Alabama has many attractions of interest to young people including the nearby Marshall Spaceflight Center and NASA's Spacecamp. And the youngster selected as 1995 Young Ham of the Year will receive an expense paid trip to Huntsville and the Hamfest along with possible other gratuities courtesy of Yaesu U.S.A. Corporation. This includes transportation to Huntsville, hotel accommodations, admission to the Hamfest and banquet. And while in Huntsville, the winner will also be treated to a V.I.P. tour of the Spacecamp facility and the Marshall Spaceflight Center. This, courtesy of CQ Magazine. Then on Saturday night August 19th he or she will be presented the 1995 Young Ham of the Year Award at the Huntsville Hamfest Grand Banquet, hopefully making it an experience that some deserving young radio amateur will never forget. As we have said before, the nominating period for 1995 "Young Ham of the Year Award" is now open any continental United States radio amateur, age 18 or younger holding a valid FCC license. Nominees will be judged on the way in which they have used ham radio to significantly contribute to the benefit of the Amateur Radio service, or to the state of the communications art, to their community or the nation. All nominations must be submitted before April 30th, 1995 on an official application. These are available for a self addressed stamped envelope to the 1995 Young Ham of the Year Award, c/o Newsline, 28197 Robin Avenue, Saugus, California 91350. These nominating applications are also available electronically with an E-Mail request to: BILLWA6ITF on America Online; B.PASTERNAK on GEnie or billwa6itf@aol.com via the Internet. The Huntsville Hamfest takes place the weekend of August 19th through the 20th. Many of the members of the Newsline staff will be there. We hope you will be there too. (***** And for this week, that's all from the Amateur Radio Newsline. You can write to us at Post Office Box 660937 in Arcadia, CA 91066. (* * * Newsline Copyright 1995 all rights are reserved. * * *