Posts

Mt Richmond Paint Working Bee

Here are some notes from Peter. But first a big thank you to Nick and Peter for their work on Wednesday 15/2/23

Nick and I went down to Mount Richmond and completed the following :

  • Removed the rust from the hut.
  • Applied cold galv primer to any bare metal areas.
  • Spray painted the first of 2 coats in Heritage Green.
  • Obtained details and measurements of the proposed repeater installation.
  • Gathered info to build a frame to support the solar panels.
  • Took numerous photos.

Since arriving home, I have received a phone call from Tim VK3TIM thanking SERG for today’s work. He has become very supportive of the project and is now offering more support. I have received his permission to hold the keys to the site until the project is complete.
Tim is offering to get an arborist to the site to remove some trees that may cause some shading to the panels.
The equipment rack was measured up today, and unfortunately the blue cabinet is too tall to fit into the hut. Therefore, the mini-rack that I built, (which is at the Clubrooms) will now be pressed into service, but a new solar control panel will need to be built. I have Tim’s permission to mount it on the wall above the repeater rack.
Today I spoke with Andrew VK5VKC, who will ask his boss if we can borrow a 15m cherry picker, as the mono-pole is 12m high and we may be able to do our own antenna work. This activity has been pre-approved by Tim VK3TIM.

Mt Richmond home to VK3RSW with its new face

COFFEE and CAKE SESSION

cappuccino cup with cake on the brown wooden table

It has been decided to hold a “Coffee and Cake” session in the Clubrooms once a week.

To this end we will hold a session each Thursday.

START TIME:  10.00 a.m.

FINISH: Approx. 11.30 a.m.

Bring along a plate, (and perhaps, a Project or homebrew item), and be prepared to have a chat, and possibly, operate from the shack for a while.

Weeds at Mt Graham

Things are a little overgrown at Mt Graham. Technicians take their lives in their hands when they visit, not to mention other parts while climbing over the barb wire. The sacrifices of people who work on repeaters.

Access to VK5RSE repeater and beacons

2022 Christmas BBQ

The Day was cloudy and cool but that did not deter the 20 plus hardy souls who attended our Annual Christmas BBQ.

Held at the home of Life Member Greg, VK5ZGY and wife Gabi we were pampered with an undercover paved area well sheltered from any weather. A very BIG “Thank you” Greg N Gabi.

Ample BBQ facilities made cooking easy and all present enjoyed an excellent afternoon of social interaction.

Tom, VK5TA, (VK5EE), bought along his newest power supply. (A switch mode unit which, when slightly modified can deliver 13.8 volts at 60 + Amps), and a very need foldable 60 Watt Solar Panel complete with regulator, stand and all necessary connections.

Chris, VK5MC, bought along a 1989 Edition of the Clubs Magazine which proved to be very interesting and nostalgic.

Some of the gathering.
John, VK3VAH, Ian, VK3DNQ and Nick S. having a deep and meaningful.
Master Chef’s at work
Tom, VK5TA and Chris, VK5MC – Show and Tell.
Conversation stopped time.

Gil VK5FGIL

We are sad to advise that Gil has passed on. His funeral service will be held graveside at the Millicent Cemetery on Monday 12th September 2022 at 11:00AM.

Gil was a regular for the Sunday broadcast and enjoyed listening and connecting with his SERG friends.

Rest in peace Gilbert.

Update moon rocket

It appears that the next launch window will be on Friday 2/9/22 at or about 12:45pm (All ET USA time about 13 hours behind us). There were various problems that caused the delay, the main one being that they could not cool the rocket engines enough – keep in mind they are fed hydrogen at extremely low temperatures (about -253 deg C) enough to rattle our teeth!

Will keep people posted on updated schedules as soon as they become available. This may mean that when the rocket finally reaches the moon it may or may not be in a favourable position for us to hear the orbiter and the lander. Fingers crossed.

President’s Awards 2021-2022

Each year our President presents two awards at the AGM.

The Foundation Roy Goodwin Award this year was presented to Deanna Summers VK5FDCS for her work with our Convention, her skills in managing our TV presentations for the Hill Climb and her support for car rallies.

President Peter presents the Roy Goodwin Plaque to Deanna VK5FCLS

The President’s award is presented to a person who has provided outstanding service to the Club for some time. This year it was presented to Sandy Walshaw (XYL of David VK5HDW) for her support for our Convention. Sandy has for some time been our organiser and chef for the Annual Convention. Everyone who has attended the Convention will know of the Sunday night Convention Dinner. Her apple crumble is a special highlight. The three course meal is one of the significant events for the Convention and without her the dinner may not happen. The club is deeply indebted to Sandy for her contributions. Thanks Sandy.

President Peter presents the President’s Award to Sandy Walshaw

Japanese moon orbiter and lander

I’ve been contacted by Wataru Torii of the JAXA Ham Radio Club regarding the OMOTENASHI project which plans to launch a moon orbiter and lander late August for arrival at the moon in early September. Wataru Torii works at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. The landing device is very small and the entire system orbiter and lander is only 6U CubeSat dimensions.

The issue they face is that earlier launches were planned such that their agency would be able to hear the devices when the lander was due to reach the moon’s surface. Unfortunately the launch date has been put off several times and is now due for 29/8/22. It may land on the moon on 4/9/22 at 2:45UTC to 3:30UTC at which time it will not be visible from Japan so they are hoping to enlist the support of Australian and New Zealand amateurs to record and monitor the orbiter and lander. As the landing may be quite hard they are especially interested in loss of signal and any recordings prior to this, preferably from SDRs for the frequency range 437.31 (orbiter) and 437.41 (the lander). They are using PSK31.


All the details are available on their website:
https://www.isas.jaxa.jp/home/omotenashi/JHRCweb/jhrc.html
Timings and our window is all dependent on the launch being on the 29th of August.

Reasonably good satellite systems should be able to hear the 1W signals. If you are interested in helping send me an email (john at vk5dj dot com) and I’ll send you the contact address for Wataru.

John
VK5DJ

Space station FM repeater etc

Frequencies for space station

Satellite passes / Orbitron 3.71 / www.stoff.pl

Location : Millicent (140.3750° E, 37.6042° S)
Time zone : UTC +9:30
Search period : 05-09-2022 10:33:08 – 5 days
10-09-2022 10:33:08
Conditions : Maximum sun elevation = None
Minimum sat elevation = 0 deg
Illumination NOT required

Time Satellite Azm Elv Mag Range S.Azm S.Elv

05-09-2022 11:58:12 ISS 301.7 0.0 4.1 2421 3.2 45.5
05-09-2022 12:03:47 ISS 217.3 55.9 0.3 510 1.3 45.5
05-09-2022 12:09:27 ISS 132.5 0.0 3.2 2453 359.3 45.6

05-09-2022 13:36:18 ISS 258.6 0.0 3.7 2435 330.2 41.0
05-09-2022 13:41:09 ISS 198.9 12.7 2.0 1367 328.7 40.5
05-09-2022 13:46:02 ISS 139.3 0.0 2.9 2454 327.3 40.0

05-09-2022 15:14:53 ISS 228.4 0.0 3.2 2451 305.0 27.8
05-09-2022 15:19:12 ISS 178.4 7.9 2.0 1681 304.1 27.1
05-09-2022 15:23:32 ISS 128.2 0.0 2.6 2453 303.2 26.3

05-09-2022 16:52:09 ISS 220.8 0.0 2.9 2452 287.1 10.5
05-09-2022 16:57:12 ISS 157.8 15.1 1.1 1252 286.2 9.6
05-09-2022 17:02:13 ISS 94.9 0.0 2.2 2440 285.4 8.6

05-09-2022 18:28:43 ISS 229.8 0.0 2.6 2451 272.1 -8.4
05-09-2022 18:34:24 ISS 142.2 81.7 -1.5 434 271.3 -9.5
05-09-2022 18:40:02 ISS 50.8 0.0 ecl 2427 270.4 -10.6

05-09-2022 20:06:14 ISS 254.1 0.0 2.3 2447 256.4 -27.5
05-09-2022 20:10:39 ISS 305.8 9.2 1.2 1568 255.7 -28.4
05-09-2022 20:15:01 ISS 357.7 0.0 ecl 2417 254.9 -29.2

06-09-2022 09:35:14 ISS 9.1 0.0 3.9 2408 47.1 33.5
06-09-2022 09:39:14 ISS 55.6 6.8 3.2 1730 46.1 34.1
06-09-2022 09:43:16 ISS 101.7 0.0 3.7 2440 45.1 34.6

06-09-2022 11:09:47 ISS 313.8 0.0 3.9 2416 19.9 43.9
06-09-2022 11:15:23 ISS 43.5 79.6 0.0 433 18.1 44.3
06-09-2022 11:21:03 ISS 128.7 0.0 3.3 2449 16.1 44.6

06-09-2022 12:47:24 ISS 269.0 0.0 3.8 2430 345.8 44.9
06-09-2022 12:52:30 ISS 203.8 16.7 1.9 1175 344.0 44.7
06-09-2022 12:57:38 ISS 138.9 0.0 3.0 2453 342.3 44.4

06-09-2022 14:26:05 ISS 234.2 0.0 3.4 2450 316.0 35.3
06-09-2022 14:30:26 ISS 183.6 8.0 2.2 1671 314.9 34.7
06-09-2022 14:34:47 ISS 133.3 0.0 2.7 2456 313.8 34.1

06-09-2022 16:03:44 ISS 220.8 0.0 3.0 2451 295.1 19.6
06-09-2022 16:08:31 ISS 163.0 11.7 1.5 1429 294.2 18.8
06-09-2022 16:13:18 ISS 105.0 0.0 2.4 2446 293.3 17.9

06-09-2022 17:40:20 ISS 226.3 0.0 2.8 2454 279.1 1.7
06-09-2022 17:45:58 ISS 144.6 45.2 -0.7 588 278.3 0.7
06-09-2022 17:51:32 ISS 62.7 0.0 2.1 2426 277.4 -0.9

06-09-2022 19:17:23 ISS 245.4 0.0 2.5 2448 264.2 -17.8
06-09-2022 19:22:27 ISS 309.1 17.0 0.6 1153 263.4 -18.8
06-09-2022 19:27:28 ISS 13.3 0.0 ecl 2416 262.6 -19.8

07-09-2022 08:48:36 ISS 31.5 0.0 3.7 2411 57.7 26.5
07-09-2022 08:51:07 ISS 58.8 2.0 3.6 2179 57.1 26.9
07-09-2022 08:53:38 ISS 85.8 0.0 3.8 2432 56.6 27.3

07-09-2022 10:21:33 ISS 326.4 0.0 3.7 2412 35.0 39.9
07-09-2022 10:27:02 ISS 45.5 41.0 0.8 625 33.4 40.5
07-09-2022 10:32:35 ISS 123.9 0.0 3.5 2446 31.8 41.1

07-09-2022 11:58:34 ISS 280.1 0.0 3.8 2428 2.9 46.3
07-09-2022 12:03:53 ISS 208.9 23.3 1.5 947 1.0 46.3
07-09-2022 12:09:16 ISS 137.4 0.0 3.2 2452 359.1 46.3

07-09-2022 13:37:12 ISS 241.5 0.0 3.5 2445 329.3 41.5
07-09-2022 13:41:39 ISS 189.2 8.8 2.3 1610 327.9 41.0
07-09-2022 13:46:07 ISS 136.9 0.0 2.9 2451 326.6 40.6

07-09-2022 15:15:14 ISS 222.0 0.0 3.2 2452 304.2 28.2
07-09-2022 15:19:48 ISS 168.1 9.5 1.9 1562 303.3 27.4
07-09-2022 15:24:21 ISS 114.3 0.0 2.6 2449 302.3 26.6

07-09-2022 16:51:59 ISS 223.6 0.0 2.9 2451 286.4 10.9
07-09-2022 16:57:28 ISS 148.7 28.2 0.2 829 285.5 9.9
07-09-2022 17:02:54 ISS 74.3 0.0 2.3 2435 284.6 8.8

07-09-2022 18:28:45 ISS 238.8 0.0 2.6 2447 271.4 -8.0
07-09-2022 18:34:12 ISS 313.0 30.3 -0.1 781 270.6 -9.1
07-09-2022 18:39:35 ISS 27.2 0.0 2.1 2418 269.8 -10.2

07-09-2022 20:09:12 ISS 291.3 0.0 2.3 2433 255.1 -27.7
07-09-2022 20:10:01 ISS 299.8 0.2 2.2 2406 255.0 -27.9
07-09-2022 20:10:51 ISS 308.5 0.0 2.2 2428 254.8 -28.1

08-09-2022 09:33:32 ISS 339.8 0.0 3.5 2411 47.9 33.9
08-09-2022 09:38:45 ISS 49.3 22.4 1.6 963 46.6 34.7
08-09-2022 09:44:01 ISS 118.0 0.0 3.5 2446 45.3 35.4

08-09-2022 11:09:51 ISS 291.5 0.0 3.6 2423 20.0 44.7
08-09-2022 11:15:21 ISS 213.1 35.2 0.9 702 18.1 45.1
08-09-2022 11:20:54 ISS 135.2 0.0 3.3 2449 16.2 45.4

08-09-2022 12:48:15 ISS 250.2 0.0 3.6 2443 345.0 45.6
08-09-2022 12:52:54 ISS 194.5 10.5 2.3 1500 343.4 45.4
08-09-2022 12:57:34 ISS 138.8 0.0 3.1 2451 341.8 45.1

08-09-2022 14:26:38 ISS 224.7 0.0 3.3 2451 315.2 35.8
08-09-2022 14:31:01 ISS 173.7 8.3 2.2 1647 314.1 35.2
08-09-2022 14:35:25 ISS 122.4 0.0 2.7 2451 313.0 34.5

08-09-2022 16:03:37 ISS 221.7 0.0 3.0 2452 294.4 20.0
08-09-2022 16:08:53 ISS 153.6 19.6 0.9 1067 293.4 19.1
08-09-2022 16:14:07 ISS 85.5 0.0 2.4 2439 292.5 18.1

08-09-2022 17:40:14 ISS 233.5 0.0 2.8 2448 278.4 2.0
08-09-2022 17:45:52 ISS 316.3 57.7 -1.0 501 277.6 1.0
08-09-2022 17:51:27 ISS 40.1 0.0 2.2 2423 276.7 0.0

08-09-2022 19:18:27 ISS 264.6 0.0 2.5 2443 263.3 -17.7
08-09-2022 19:21:54 ISS 302.8 4.4 1.9 1949 262.8 -18.4
08-09-2022 19:25:21 ISS 341.4 0.0 2.2 2419 262.2 -19.1

09-09-2022 08:45:48 ISS 354.5 0.0 3.3 2409 58.7 26.7
09-09-2022 08:50:31 ISS 52.8 12.5 2.2 1360 57.7 27.5
09-09-2022 08:55:16 ISS 110.4 0.0 3.5 2443 56.7 28.3

09-09-2022 10:21:16 ISS 303.3 0.0 3.4 2420 35.3 40.6
09-09-2022 10:26:52 ISS 216.9 60.6 0.0 486 33.7 41.2
09-09-2022 10:32:31 ISS 132.1 0.0 3.4 2447 32.0 41.8

09-09-2022 11:59:18 ISS 260.0 0.0 3.5 2436 2.4 47.0
09-09-2022 12:04:11 ISS 199.7 13.2 2.1 1343 0.7 47.0
09-09-2022 12:09:06 ISS 139.3 0.0 3.2 2451 358.9 47.0

09-09-2022 13:37:55 ISS 229.0 0.0 3.4 2449 328.4 42.0
09-09-2022 13:42:14 ISS 179.0 7.8 2.4 1682 327.1 41.6
09-09-2022 13:46:33 ISS 129.0 0.0 2.9 2452 325.8 41.1

09-09-2022 15:15:13 ISS 220.8 0.0 3.2 2454 303.5 28.6
09-09-2022 15:20:14 ISS 158.5 14.5 1.5 1278 302.5 27.8
09-09-2022 15:25:13 ISS 96.3 0.0 2.6 2439 301.5 26.9

09-09-2022 16:51:47 ISS 229.3 0.0 3.0 2453 285.7 11.3
09-09-2022 16:57:28 ISS 142.4 75.3 -1.1 443 284.8 10.2
09-09-2022 17:03:06 ISS 52.4 0.0 2.4 2427 283.9 9.2

09-09-2022 18:29:14 ISS 252.8 0.0 2.7 2444 270.6 -7.8
09-09-2022 18:33:45 ISS 306.3 10.1 1.4 1510 269.9 -8.7
09-09-2022 18:38:13 ISS 359.9 0.0 2.3 2414 269.3 -9.6

10-09-2022 07:58:28 ISS 11.6 0.0 3.1 2410 67.9 18.7
10-09-2022 08:02:19 ISS 55.9 6.1 2.7 1790 67.2 19.4
10-09-2022 08:06:12 ISS 100.0 0.0 3.4 2437 66.5 20.1

10-09-2022 09:32:51 ISS 315.5 0.0 3.2 2415 48.4 34.5
10-09-2022 09:38:26 ISS 41.5 73.0 -0.3 445 47.0 35.4
10-09-2022 09:44:06 ISS 128.1 0.0 3.4 2448 45.6 36.2

It doesn’t have to be complicated. Here is Tom’s VK5NFT setup for the satellite.
My portable equipment used to make contact is a magnetic base attached with a diamond antenna Model SG7500, 2m/ 70cm attached on top of the back door of the car. The radio is a  Icom 7062G, 20 watts.The icom I set up for split frequency use receive 437.800Mhz FM and Transmit on 145.990 MHz with 67.0 hz repeater tone.

Tom’s IC706