Monthly Archives: June 2015

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WICEN Weekly News

WICEN NSW Inc News for Sunday the 7th of June 2015

WICEN is supporting a search and Rescue Exercise, or “SAREX” in southern New South Wales over the weekend of the 13th and 14th of June.

WICEN will be providing communications support for the True Grit event at Dargyl Farm in Lower Portland, near Windsor over this weekend.

WICEN Northern Rivers Region will be holding a meeting and training on Sunday June 14, at the clubrooms of the Summerland ARC in Richmond Hill, at 1000 hrs for 1030 start. The training will be on theory and setting up of antennas for short-distance HF communications, using high-incidence skywave (‘NVIS’), and all interested people are welcome.

The Bushwalkers Wilderness Rescue Squad is holding the 27th NavShield over the weekend of 4th and 5th July, with WICEN teams deploying on the evening of Friday 3rd July.

The WICEN New South Wales’ website at nsw.wicen.org.au includes contact details, including a contact form, useful links, and a printable membership form.

WICEN has a twitter account: @wicennsw
It can be viewed at: twitter.com/wicennsw

Facebook users will find the official WICEN New South Wales page, and an informal national WICEN group.

WICEN ACT is part of the Canberra Region Amateur Radio Club, and supports events in the ACT and the surrounding region. The club’s website at www.crarc.ampr.org includes details of both WICEN and general events.

WICEN Victoria is supporting the Mallee Rally, an off-road vehicle event at Sea Lake, about 50 km south of Euston, from the 6th to the 9th of June.

Coming events include:

True Grit othis weeked
Southern NSW SAREX on the 13th and 14th of June
Northern Rivers Meeting and Training on Sunday 14th of June
NavShield 4th and 5th of July

Prepared by Julian Sortland VK2YJS on behalf of the WICEN State Management Committee.

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Space Weather Users Workshop

Space Weather Services, Australian Bureau of Meteorology (formerly IPS Radio and Space Services) is holding its inaugural Space Weather Users Workshop.

When
3 December 2015, 8:45am – 5:00pm
Where
300 Elizabeth St Sydney, Level 15 (Bureau’s NSW Offices)
Cost
Free (lunch and refreshments provided)
Registration closes
31 August 2015

Summary

This one-day workshop will provide an opportunity to hear from expert speakers, owners and operators of susceptible technological systems, and other users of space weather services.

The workshop will also provide the opportunity to tour the Australian Space Forecast Centre, learn more about the Bureau’s space weather services, and to provide feedback on existing and future services.

Enquiries

Enquiries can made at +61 2 9213 8000 or sws_workshop@bom.gov.au.

Some subsidised accommodation will be available for those travelling from outside the Sydney area. Further information on accommodation and travel will be provided in the near future.

http://swworkshop.ips.gov.au/

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Port to Port Mountain Bike Race – Newcastle

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Ros & Raffy supported this WICEN event for several days whilst I only participated in the final Sunday since this was identified as the day with the greatest need. I was allocated the checkpoint downwind of the Belmont Sewer works located in some serious mud! (?newbie)

As this was my first WICEN event and my first serious portable excursion I spent some time gearing up and was quite pleased with the eventual result. It was great fun to test the equipment in the field. All of the equipment worked as planned. Given the inclement weather on the Sunday the necessity of some form of shelter was reinforced. Unfortunately the location was quite tight and as the photograph reveals the supporting poles for my shelter were situated in one of the mud puddles. Despite this all equipment was protected from excessive rain as was the operator!

PortToPortEcho

A mobile radio with a gain antenna on the top of a 5 metre squid pole powered by a couple of 18Ah batteries that had spent the last year powering some medical equipment meant that I had unfettered access to the Newcastle WICEN repeater. Simplex operation to base was also possible.

The riders showed an unusual sense of enthusiasm for the ride despite their universal brown and bedraggled appearance. I hope that they all were able to bask in the glow of achievement at the end of the day.

I have the sense that Newcastle will be calling again next year……..

Rob
VK2HRJ

 

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Ros VK2FROS & Raffy VK2RF at the Newcastle Port to Port Bike Race

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Ros & I participated in the Wicen supported Mountain Bike Race in Newcastle.

Weather was overcast and drizzly and raining at times.  Riders were amazingly fit, I think over 300 started and most finished the 4 days race. At the end they were thoroughly mud covered! We didn’t record any medical casualties although a couple of  mechanical failures were repaired with the aid of my trusty hex key set!

Port to Port Mountain Bike Race Website

 

 

p2p2015-RosVK2FROS-Ros at the Newcastle Port to Port Bike Race P2P2015-VK2RF-Raffy at the Newcastle Port to Port Bike Race P2P015-VKFROS- Ros at the Newcastle Port to Port Bike Race

project

New(ish) PCB Milling Machine

I’ve sold my old heavy duty CNC and acquired an old non working Roland MDX-20 Modela that needed some love.  These little engraver/modelling machines sold for many thousands of $$$ in the past and were widely used in various industries.  Sadly this unit hasn’t had the best life and needed some work to get it going as the original controller board had been (destructively) removed and some seriously hacky working on the wiring left it in a real mess.

With few hours hacking on the weekend I now have all three axis moving they they should using an open source ‘TinyG’ controller board which mates with web based control software.  All that is left to do is build a new spindle as I’m not happy with the runout on the standard setup, I’ll need a little lathe time to make that once the parts (and tools) have arrived (and tidy up the wiring).   Fortunately the local hacker space has a metal lathe that should be up to the task.

This unit is small enough that I can bring it on project day to show off 😉 and maybe even mill some PCB’s.

This CNC will be used to make circuit boards for assorted radio projects, first up will (probably) be a series of RF filters.

http://www.vk2vjb.net/2015/05/30/good-bye-to-one-cnc-hello-to-a-newish-one/