CTARC Summits On The Air - 20 Sept '21

Chris ZS1CDG and Pino ZU1KAT hope to activate Maclear's Beacon on Table Mountain, weather permitting. Listen out for them on 145.500 MHz Simplex and give them SOTA points. It will also be the opportunity to wish Chris a Happy Birthday too!

They will be going up by cableway in the morning (Chris gets a free birthday ticket!) and should be active by mid-morning.

Chris and Pino have been active this past week on that frequency with SOTA activity on mountains and hills in the Cape Metropole area. For those who have to be at work, take your handie along to the salt mine!

STOP PRESS! The Monday 20th September Maclear's Beacon SOTA event has been cancelled due to weather. HOWEVER, Chris ZS1CDG and Pino ZS1KAT are determined to still do it this week, weather permitting. So, please keep your rigs tuned to 145.500 MHz.

CTARC Field Day Station Report - 12 Sept '21

On Saturday 12th September, Chris ZS1CDG set up a field station outside the CTARC club house. Unfortunately, a furious South-Easter sprang up and started blowing tables and chairs across the field! So Chris and others repaired to the interior and kept the club house open to enable visiting hams to see and use the equipment. People doing Chris's RAE course were present there as well at periods throughout the day.

Thanks to Chris for his efforts and to all those who attended!

CTARC Field Day - 11 Sept '21

In line with the SARL National Field Day on the weekend of 11/12 September 2021, the CTARC has decided to run a field station at the CTARC clubhouse in Rondebosch. Chris ZS1CDG will set up a field station on the lawn outside the clubhouse from around midday on Saturday, 11 September.

Radio amateurs are invited to come and set up their field stations and antennae there as well. As it is a Field Day event, no mains electric power will be used (unless provided by your portable generator, of course!).

The usual Covid precautions will be in place. Let's keep this event virus-free.

We look forward to seeing you there!

_________________________________________________

This event has now taken place. A brief report [here].

CTARC International Lighthouse/Lightship Weekend - 22 Aug '20

The Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre will once again take part in the International Lighthouse Lightship Weekend, on the weekend of Saturday/Sunday 22/23 August  at Green Point Lighthouse in Mouille Point, Cape Town - but with a difference. Owing to the Coronavirus lockdown requirements, the Lighthouse's premises are unavailable this year. However, we may nevertheless do the following...

Going Ahead With Social Distancing...

Members are welcome to set up their own stations and operate parked from their cars near the Green Point Lighthouse and are free to use the ZS1CT/L call sign provided they fill out a Google form and ask Rob ZS1SA our chairman for formal permission.

What is the ILLW? Is it a Contest?

The event is NOT a contest. There are no prizes, certificates or other enticements to participate and therefore, participation is free. Each station's operators decide how they will operate their station regards modes and bands. Participants are not committed to being on the air during the entire period - only as much as they can. There are no restrictions on aerials or power. We wish operators to enjoy themselves and have fun whilst making contact with as many amateur radio stations as possible. We request that stations take time to work other lighthouses or lightships as well as the slow operator, or the newly-licensed or QRP stations.

How close to the Lighthouse do I have to be?

As most available space in many lighthouses is usually filled to capacity, our activity does not have to take place inside the tower itself. Field day type set-up at the light or other building next to the light is OK. Our guidelines require that the station must be AT or ADJACENT TO the lighthouse. Adjacent means next to or as close as possible. The intention behind this requirement is that the station should have a visible presence to the passing public who may be visiting the lighthouse over the weekend.

Please note that the exchange is CALLSIGN (ZS1CT/L), Report, and lighthouse reference ZA0006. Kindly send your call logs to Chris ZS1CDG.

To register your intention to setup a station kindly fill in the Google logging form here: shorturl.at/fhkmo

Note: There is no access to mains electrical power at the lighthouse this year, so operators must provide their own power sources / batteries.

Chris ZS1CDG

CTARC International Lighthouse/Lightship Weekend - 22 / 23 Aug '20

Every year our club has activated the Green Point Lighthouse on Cape Town's western seaboard for the International Lighthouse/Lightship Weekend (ILLW).

While the Coronavirus lock-down has imposed restrictions on access to the lighthouse premises and buildings, the CTARC Committee hopes to still take part in the event this year.

The ILLW takes place on the weekend of Saturday/Sunday 22/23 August 2020.

An announcement on the format of this forthcoming event, in compliance with the lock-down regulations, will be made shortly.

CTARC Field Day Report - 8 Feb '20

This February’s SARL Field Day was a chance to experiment with members’ radios, antennas and power systems, to see what works and to learn from each other.

Field stations were setup by Lem, ZS1LEM and Matt, ZS1MTF and Chris, ZS1CDG setup a demo of QO-100 as well, although this was not classed as a field station as some elements required AC from the clubhouse.

Lem’s setup was a vertical dipole for 40m HF and he began working a number of stations. Matt brought along ex-miltary B25 and setup a Dipole on 20m.

The bands seemed quiet but Chris, ZS1CDG worked ZS6J after a few calls of CQ on the B25. Both Matt and Lem had good DC power systems, with a number of solar panels providing auxiliary power to the main batteries.

James ZS1RBT, Paul ZS1S, Celso ZS1MYG, Barry ZS1FJ, Elsabe and John ZS1AGH, all popped in to have a look at how we were doing. After we had had our fill of playing radio the braai was lit and we shared a meal and some fun stories around the table.

Chris ZS1CDG

Here below are photos of the Field Day station.

This report and some more photos of the event appears in Ragchew of February 2020.
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CTARC Forthcoming Field Day - 8 Feb '20

 

The next meeting at the CTARC will be an activation of a Field Station on the lawn outside the clubhouse for the SARL Field Day competition, starting at 10h00 on Saturday, 8 February 2020.

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Note: This event has taken place; read the report-back [here].

CTARC Summits On The Air - 27 Oct '19

Please listen out for students from Reddam House, Durbanville, on Sunday, 27 October 2019. They plan to hike to the summit at Meerendal Wine Estate and activate a SOTA entity there.

The school has a growing Amateur Radio club that can often be heard working satellites and HF stations. The students have a number of hand-held transceivers and AMSAT antennas so they will be active on 2m and 70 cm.

Additionally, they will take along an HF transceiver so to those not in the Cape Town area, listen out for them on 20m and 40m. They are aiming to be set up and operating by 09h00 SAST (07h00 UTC), so after the CTARC Sunday morning bulletin check-in, listen out for them calling CQ SOTA.

Kindly please log any contacts made with them on the SOTA website database as you will be awarded with chaser points.

The summit reference is Dorstberg (ZS/WC-940). Perhaps you might also consider doing some SOTA activations on that day?.
How about a summit-to-summit QSO?

For more information, please contact Chris ZS1CDG ON Mobile: 079-787-1426.

CTARC Field Day - Sat. 14 Sept. '19

Danny ZS1BL and Lem ZS1LEM
operating one of our previous Field Day stations

SARL field day at the Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre - Saturday 14th September 2019.

Why not come join us for some family field day fun on Saturday 14th September?

From 10h00 onwards, come and set up a station outside the CTARC clubhouse. Bring that unusual antenna or transceiver, and lets try to make as many HF contacts as possible - anything goes! Our aim is to work as many stations on the HF bands (excluding the 60, 30, 17 and 12 m bands).

Please note - All contacts must be made with transmitters and receivers operating independent of commercial mains power, so bring along batteries or solar panels to power your equipment as needed [it is a Field Day exercise, after all!].

We will light the braai fires from 13h30 onwards, for all to use.

Lets make this a great fun day!

For more information, contact Chris, ZS1CDG via the club's e-mail address.

CTARC Field Day 14 Sep '19

CTARC Lighthouse Weekend - 17/18 Aug '19

Hi Everyone

It’s that time of year again when CTARC prepares for the International Lightship and Lighthouse Weekend. This year it seem a bit later in the month but actually it’s not. It is always the third FULL weekend in August. For us down in the Southern Hemisphere, it’s a time of cold weather and storms which makes it even more challenging!

Once again we have arranged to man the Green Point lighthouse from the Saturday morning of 17 August until mid-day Sunday of 18 August. We have repeated this so often now that our Lighthouse Team manages to do the set-up and take-down with military precision, but we still need manpower from our members, especially around 10:00 on Saturday morning in order to get our beam antenna raised.

Even if you are not taking part in the Lighthouse weekend, it would be appreciated if club members could come and assist with the set up at Green Point on Saturday morning 17 August 10h00 and for take down on Sunday, 18th at 12h00. (Committee members will meet at the clubhouse at 08h30 on Saturday morning to load antennas and equipment).

We will be having our very popular and always well attended Sunset Bring & Braai on the Saturday evening so even if you are not planning to operate, please join us and bring the XYL along for this social event. Bring your meat, rolls and salads etc; along. We will provide the fire.

We need operators for the event so please pop in and grab a mike or key and make a few contacts with us, it’s always great fun.

If you are planning on staying over (the more the merrier, ) then please do let me know soonest and I can arrange enough room for us all. We already have several staying over this year, which is great news.

See you there!

Regards

John, ZS1EQ
(CTARC ILLW Coordinator)
073-740-0543

PS: We will be working over the next two weeks on getting the equipment up to shape for the event so if you have some spare time available, please drop us a WhatsApp on +27-73-740-0543 so that we can organise suitable times.

Regards,

Anne Bareham
(CTARC Sec:/ Treasurer / Editor)
072-268-1207

 

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NB: This event has now taken place. A report is in the September 2019 Ragchew.

CTARC National Field Day - 9/10 Feb '19

Members of the Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre set up a solar- and battery-powered field day radio station outside the clubhouse for the SARL National Field Day Event, which took place on Saturday 9th and Sunday 10th February 2019.

The Field Day's traditional purpose is to give radio amateurs the opportunity to rehearse their emergency preparedness for comms operation in the face of a disaster or weather emergency, where adequate mains power and conventional fixed antennas would potentially be unavailable.

Danny, ZS1BL, Lem ZS1LEM, James (no call sign) and Chris ZS1CDG had a very windy day out in the field. Several different antennas were tried out but the gods of propagation where not on our side. We did make several contacts however and it was a lot of fun.

Thanks to Chris ZS1CDG for the photos below:

CTARC JOTA Event 19 - 21 Oct '18

We still require a few members to assists us with Jamboree on the Air 2018.

This year it will be held on Friday 19th to Sunday 21st October 2018.
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This year we will be setting up a station at the Sea Scout base in Muizenberg.

We need persons to help us set up the station on Friday 19th in the afternoon from 12h00 ish. (Please confirm time with Noel, ZS1FW  or John ZS1AGH. John’s e-mail: zs1agh at telkomsa.net )

In previous years, we used the Girl Guide Hall in Bergvliet, but the Sea Scout base may be more suited to our purpose.

JOTA-JOTI is the largest Scouting event in the world with over 1.3 million Scouts participating across 150+ countries.

Scouts and Guides across the world connect with each other during JOTA-JOTI using the airwaves and the internet.

The event has traditionally been held the third weekend of October since 1957.

Report-back on ILLW of 18/19 Aug '18

Once again the CTARC run a field station at the International Lighthouse/Lightship Weekend on Saturday the 18th and Sunday the 19th of August 2018. Here is a report-back on the event, by John ZS1EQ, extracted from the September edition of Ragchew.

Photos here.

CTARC ILLW Latest - 19 Aug '17

Things are humming at the Green Point Lighthouse right now. At 08h30 this morning (Saturday 19 August 2017) the CTARC members met at the clubhouse in Rondebosch and loaded up the radios, rotatable mast, beam antenna and other gear. Paul / ZS1S brought his trailer along, which enables transportation of the heavy gear with relative ease.

At about 09h45 we were at the lighthouse, and Noel / ZS1FW and Paul / ZS1PXK started assembling the beam antenna, which process goes quite smoothy these days. At the same time, Danny / ZS1BL and Rob / ZS1SA started setting up equipment in the Ops Room. Danny discovered a problem with the power cables and last-minute emergency repairs were effected. The 40 / 80 metre dipole was strung up by Matt / ZS1MTF and Rob. An intermittent fault was discovered and fixed on the dipole. Nick / ZS1ZD set up the 2m antenna and wandered around taking photos. Others were on hand to help as well, in the form of Barry / ZS1FJ, Keverne / ZS1ABU, John / ZS1AGH & Elsabe, Pieter / ZS1PGC, Lem / ZS1LEM, Chris / ZS1CDG (who is busy compiling a video of proceedings), Tony / ZS1TK and others. The beam antenna went up without a problem and the banners advertising our club have been mounted on the antenna stays and also on the top railing of the lighthouse.

From the start, there have been a number of interested enquiries from dogwalkers, passers-by and interested parties who are visiting in response to adverts they have seen or heard of this annual event.

The weather was spectacular in the morning to midday -  a maximum of 25 degrees and sunny. We hope that continues into the late afternoon as we will hold a braai at the lighthouse at about 18h00, which is always a great event.


The radio weather is also not oo bad, considering where we are in the solar cycle. Today's sunspot numbers (courtesy of Paul Herrman / N0NBH) are as indicated. The Planetary A-Index is a bit active at 21, and the K-index similarly active at 4, but the sunspot count has increased from its measly 12 of the last few days up to 41.

The ZS1CT /L station is active right now, on 20, 40 and 80 metres, with contacts being made this midday and afternoon with local stations in Divisions 1, 2 3, 4 and 6. Rob / ZS1SA made contact with a station in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and DX from Europe is coming in, too. We will see how well we fare this afternoon and evening, as we will be operating through the night.

Tomorrow (Sunday 20 August) we will dismantle the station and antennas at around midday, and would appreciate the assistance of CTARC members to help us take down the main antenna then.

The view from the top of the lighthouse (looking south) is always spectacular!

Looking north towards Bloubergstrand across Table Bay

The mast and gin pole are assembled on the turf

The HF directional beam antenna is attached to the top of the mast

Raising the antenna using the gin pole

In the radio room, Rob / ZS1SA makes a final tweak on the SWR meter

Seated (left to right) Chris / ZS1CDG, Matt / ZS1MTF and Paul / ZS1PXK

Paul / ZS1PXK gets going on 40 metres

Lem / ZS1LEM and Noel / ZS1FW

CTARC Report-Back on JOTA Event - 17 Oct '16

In response to very positive feedback from last year's event, the CTARC put up a field station again for the JOTA weekend on Saturday 15th October 2016, at the Meadowridge Scout Hall, off Ladies Mile.

Noel /ZS1FW reports that the event was well-attended by Boy Scouts and Girl Guides, who responded with enthusiasm at the chance to make supervised contact on with others on HF and VHF. An HF wire antenna was erected and some contacts were made despite the rather disappointing solar figures.

A morse code key and oscillator were also set up at the station, which also generated great interest.

Thanks to all who assisted with the setup, running and take-down of the station afterwards.

Photos will be added here presently

CTARC Forthcoming JOTA Event - 14/16 Oct '16

This year the Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre will again run a field station for JOTA (Jamboree On The Air).

The JOTA event involves many thousands of members of the Scouts and Girl Guides association being given the opportunity to make supervised radio contacts with other Scouts and Girl Guides internationally, via radio amateur stations.

This year the CTARC will, as with last year, set up a field station at the Meadowridge Scout Hall. Noel /ZS1FW, who is managing this event for CTARC, envisages setting up the station on Friday afternoon, and operating on Saturday, taking the station down either on Saturday afternoon or Sunday.

Interested hams who would like to take part in this worthwhile and rewarding activity are please to contact Noel via the CTARC email address

CTARC Lighthouse Weekend - 20/21 Aug '16

It’s that time of year again when CTARC prepares for the International Lightship and Lighthouse weekend. This year it seem a bit later in the month but actually it’s not. It is always the third FULL weekend in August. For us down in the Southern Hemisphere it’s a time of cold weather and storms which makes it even more challenging.

Once again we have arranged to man the Green Point lighthouse from the Saturday morning of 20 August until mid-day Sunday of 21 August. We have repeated this so often now that our Lighthouse team manages to do the set-up and take-down with military precision but we still need manpower from our members, especially around 10:00 on Saturday morning in order to get our beam antenna raised.

Even if you are not taking part in the Lighthouse weekend, it would be appreciated if club members could come and assist with the set up at Green Point on Saturday morning 20 August 10h00 and for take down on Sunday at 11h00. (Committee members will meet at the clubhouse at 08h30 on Saturday morning to load antennas and equipment).

We will be having our very popular and always well attended Sunset Bring n Braai on the Saturday evening so even if you are not planning to operate, please join us and bring the XYL along for this social event.

We need operators for the event so please pop in and grab a mike or key and make a few contacts with us, it’s always great fun.

See you there.

Rob ZS1SA

(CTARC Chairman)

CTARC Forthcoming Lighthouse / Lightship Weekend - 20/21 Aug '16

A pic from 2015 - Paul /ZS1S and
Hylton /ZR1HPC start setting up the
beam antenna's mast

The next meeting of the Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre is the International Lighthouse/Lightship Weekend, which is scheduled to take place on Saturday 20 August and Sunday 21 August 2016. Our club will set up a radio station at the Green Point Lighthouse as it traditionally has done for a number of years.

It is a great opportunity to work local and DX lighthouse / lightship stations and radio amateurs. In the evening we usually have a braai as well, which is a great social occasion.

A heads-up to members that we will need a number of hands to help erect the antennas and set up the station on the Saturday morning, and again to dismantle it again on Sunday afternoon.

Committee members are reminded that we will have a meeting on Monday 15 August at 19h00 at the CTARC clubhouse.

Further details will be published and announced on the CTARC bulletins closer to the time.

CTARC JOTA Station at Bergvliet - 17 / 18 Oct '15

Members of the Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre set up a JOTA field station for the Bergvliet Scout and Girl Guides on the weekend of 17 / 18 October 2015. The location was the Scout- & Girl Guide Hall in Glen Alpine Way, Bergvliet in the Cape Town southern suburbs.

The antennas used were the club's WD3ZZ dipole for 40 & 80 metres, as well as a TA33 beam antenna on a lightweight rotator.

Present during various parts of the weekend were: ZS1FW /Noel, ZS1AGH /John, ZS1BL /Danny, ZS1S /Paul and ZR1HPC /Hylton. Thank you to those who assisted with setting up the station on Friday, , operating it during the weekend and dismantling the station after 10h30 on Sunday.

In spite of relatively poor propagation- and solar figures, (on 18 October the Sunspot Number was 51, the Solar Flux was 89, the A Index was at 22 and the K index at 2) contact was made with several other JOTA stations during the course of the weekend.

Grateful thanks to Noel / ZS1FW, for providing the initiative behind the event, and to Paul / ZS1S and John / ZS1AGH for the photos.