CTARC Report on Meeting of 22 May '21

The outdoors meeting at the CTARC Clubhouse, which took place on Saturday, 22 May 2021, is reported on by Tony ZS1TK on Page 6 of the June 2021 edition of Ragchew.

It was to be the last actual meeting at the CTARC club house before the new Covid-19 regulations and restrictions took place.

Download the June 2021 Ragchew [here]. 

CTARC Report on Meeting of 24 April '21

On Saturday, 24 April 2021, some twenty-five CTARC members and friends attended an open-air meeting at the clubhouse in Rondebosch.

The usual Covid-19 safety precautions were in place and everybody cooperated with the face mask and social distancing requirements.

It was a very casual meeting, and Rob ZS1SA gave a short 20 minute report on what is happening behind the scenes at the clubhouse and decisions taken by the Committee. Thereafter we had the opportunity to chew the proverbial rag and socialise together. It was great to see old friends and everyone had a good time. At 14h00 the meeting ended. 

A more complete report, with photos by Tony ZS1TK, is in the 2021 May edition of Ragchew, which you can download [here].

We look forward to our next outdoor meeting at the clubhouse, which will take place 9weather permitting) on Saturday, 22 May 2021.

CTARC More Photos of Fleamarket - 7 Mar '20

Tony ZS1TK kindly sent us his photos of the CTARC Mega-Flea Market of 7 March 2020.

Here they are:

John ZS1EQ provided sterling service at the braai fires.

Tony ZS1TK's stand.

Our dear catering ladies provided scrumptious boerewors rolls
throughout the afternoon

   

Photos by ZS1ZD  *  Photos by ZS1PC

CTARC Ragchew - December 2017

The December 2017 edition of the Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre's bi-monthly newsletter "Ragchew" is now published. Grateful thanks once again to our editor, Anne, for all her sterling work!

Download the PDF file [here];

Ragchew is also on our Newsletters Page

 

CTARC Report-Back on September Meeting - 23 Sep '17

On Saturday, 23 September 2017, the Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre held its monthly meeting at the clubhouse in Rondebosch. Starting promptly at 14h00, our chairman, Rob / ZS1SA welcomed a gratifyingly full clubhouse to the meeting.

We had to start with the sad news of a silent key. OM Geoffrey Tyler / ZR1GFT, who passed away recently in hospital after a brief illness. A moments silence was held in memory of Geoff. We offer  our condolences to his widow, Val and her family. Geoff will be missed.

Rod then had the far happier task of handing over a club award to Richard / ZS1RIC, who won the Golden Wellie (for consistent club attendance through thick and thin). Richard had been unavailable at the July AGM when his award was announced.

Rob then gave a brief report-back on our recent Committee Meeting of last Monday, most of which had to do with progress in the repair and refurbishment of our club antennae. It will take several more work parties to get the club on air on HF. The intention is to get the A3S beam antenna up and running as soon as possible, to take advantage of various contests that are in the pipeline.

We also noted the recent Repeater Working Group meeting where Rassie / ZS1YT was elected chairman and CTARC club member John / ZS1EQ was elected vice-chairman there.

Rob also welcomed visitor Paulo / IU2EFB, visiting Cape Town from Italia. Paulo is in Sea Point at the moment and we hope to work him on air.

Then it was time for the main part of the meeting – Show and Tell.

Rob kicked off by showing us a very handy little cable tester that he built from a circuit in QST. It enables you to test coaxial cables for intermittents, shorts and open circuit, and is far handier than an ohmmeter. The circuit is very simple indeed, using just two LED's and a couple of SO-239 coaxial sockets. Rob also showed us his “chicken stick” -  a nifty device for safely discharging the large capacitors on a valve linear amplifier.

Rob was followed by Mike / ZS1FP. Mike showed us a very handy little power supply unit that he adapted from a broken one that he had found. Using a regulator and variable trimpots, he was able to convert it into one that has four switchable voltage outputs.

Mike also showed us a three-pin mains tester, using three neon tube indicators (two green and one red) that can show instantly whether a mains socket is correctly wired or not.

If that weren’t enough, Mike also showed us a canny tester he made that enables one to conveniently measure the current in a mains appliance by way of a clamp-on ammeter that clamps around an insulated single wire loop that extends from an insulated socket box.

Nick / ZS1ZD was next. He showed us a directional DF antenna that uses two loops (etched on a printed circuit board) in the same plane. It works on 144 Mhz / 2 metres. It has a small amplifier and detector circuit that drives a meter to indicate maximum signal. Sensitivity is deliberately reduced as one approaches the fox by way of three switchable ranges and a variable gain control, to obtain a proper null on the meter.

Tom / ZS1TA followed, with a demonstration of various things:

Firstly, he showed us PowerPoint slides of the noisy conditions at his QTH, especially on 40 and 80 metres. He shared with us his dealings with the municipal power authorities.

Then he showed us a solid project box for a homebrew azimuth-elevation control box that he started building some time ago.

Then he showed us an extensive series of SSTV images he has managed to send and receive by satellite using MMSTV.

Finally he showed us a project he is working on to control satellite tracking antennas with Arduino  / Rasberry Pi type of controllers.

Chris / ZS1CDG was next with two beautifully constructed projects. First was a morse code keyer that can send and read CW signals. Neatly constructed with an LCD readout. Then he also showed us a working milliWatt 10 metre band beacon that he has built. He demonstrated it live on one of the ham rigs in the shack. It transmits a repeating CW ID message.

ZS1AGH / John was next. He showed us an  app available for Android Smart phones for teaching morse code via the Koch method. This app, by IZ2UUF, can be downloaded and used by anyone with an Android smartphone.

Richard / ZS1RIC was up next. He showed us two mast constructions that are small-scale models for bigger ones that he has done as a project for other radio hams. The first is a winch arrangement for a coaxial mast, very similar in fact the the CTARC main mast which he constructed for our club. The second was an ingenious fold-over mast with a thrust bearing in the base, where the rotator may be positioned at the bottom of the mast, allowing easy access for maintenance. Both very well conceived and manufactured items.

Hans-Jurgen / ZS1HJH showed us a very fancy (and surprisingly inexpensive, for what it is) Software Defined Radio he obtained recently. The item, smaller than a pack of cigarettes, covers from 10 kHz up to 2 GHz, with a visible waterfall bandwidth (depending on the kind of computer you run it on) of up to 10 MHz continuous display and recording. Hans-Jurgen, who is no stranger to high-end specification and measurement, put the SDR through its paces and found it to be accurate in frequency to a few Hz at 1.5 GHz, and very accurate in terms of signal level measurement too. Later on he demo'd the unit with the accompanying SdrUno software, running on a PC tablet. Very impressive.

Noel / ZS1FW also showed off his homebrew code practice oscillator project that he built.

With the  Show and Tell section complete, we then held the raffle for the club’s Antenna Fund. Tickets had been on sale for R5-00 since the start of the meeting. Hylton / ZR1HPC managed the raffle and invited Paulo / IU2EFB to draw the winning ticket at random. The raffle was won by Tony / ZS1TK, who generously donated his portion of the takings back to the club. Thank, you, Tony!

The formal section of the meeting concluded, members then had the chance to chat over a cup of coffee and to buy and sell items at the Swop Shop. (ZS1SX, ZS1FP and ZS1TM all brought a variety of items along, and parted with some of them). The club still has a few bits and pieces available, which members will be able to peruse at our next meeting in October.

All in all a most interesting afternoon. Thanks to Rob for running the meeting, to all the participants who Showed and Told, and to all who attended.

Photos are here: Page 1  Page 2.

Our next main members meeting at the clubhouse will be on Saturday 28 October. More details to be announced on the bulletins, in Ragchew and here on this blogspot.

CTARC Report Back on November Meeting - 26 Nov '16

The Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre held its final meeting for the year on Saturday 26 November 2016. Committee members arrived at the club house and started setting up the braai fires, tables, chairs and canopies from 11h30, in time for the main crowd to start arriving from 12h00 onwards. The weather was good and the wind not too strong. We were very pleasantly surprised to see how well attended the function was - around 50 people at one stage.

Our chairman Rob / ZS1SA opened the meeting at 13h00 and welcomed the club's members, guests and families. He then introduced Dennis / ZS1AU, who had donned his famous tuxedo for the official announcement of the Len Wells Ham Spirit Award trophy.

Dennis took some care to communicate that the award is not limited to CTARC members alone. A degree of subterfuge had to be employed to enviegle the prospective recipient into attending the meeting without giving the game away!

Congratulations go to Ettienne / ZS1AX, who, with his wife Yolanda / ZS1CX, are this year's recipients of the Len Wells Ham Spirit Award. Dennis told us that there had been seven nominations (and he broke with tradition by naming them), but Ettienne was top of the list for his steadfast sticking to his beliefs throughout a dispute with officialdom, where he even had to appear before a disciplinary committee. In the end, having won his point, Ettienne offered magnanimously to serve on the SARL Committee, which he now does. Ettienne accepted the trophy plus the certificates for himself and Yolanda from Dennis.

Ettienne gave a short speech on receiving the award, and thanked our club for the steadfast support he received throughout his stressful ordeal earlier on in the year.

The official business done, we all settled down to an afternoon of great camaraderie, natter, chewing the rag and meeting up with our friends. We were sustained throughout this by delicious hamburgers, ably cooked by Tony / ZS1TM and served up by Anne, Elsabe and Sandi, who were kept busy for a large portion of the afternoon feeding and watering hungry and thirsty hams.

We were very pleased to see a number of new faces at our meeting - some are radio amateurs who have just qualified, others are interested people from around Cape Town. Three new members signed up at the meeting! Welcome!

Members who had placed their orders earlier were able to collect their fancy gold CTARC Name Badges, which look very classy indeed. So classy in fact, that we suspect another batch of badges will be produced before long.

CTARC A3-sized Year Calendars for 2017, laminated and in glorious technicolor, were also on sale. A few were left over and will be on sale again at our January meeting. These useful calendars list all CTARC Monthly Meetings, Events and Committee Meeting dates as well as the public holidays for the year. They also make interesting table mats!

Paul / ZS1S brought along a beautifully constructed MW receiver - solar powered and with a large square loop antenna. This unique rig kept us freely entertained with music throughout the afternoon.

Peter / ZS1PGC brought along his RigExpert antenna analyser and he and Paul were busy checking Paul's discone antenna later on.

The Bring-&-Buy Swop Shop was also in operation. Tony / ZS1TK, Ian / ZS1SX, and Karl / ZS1KC all brought various items along to swop or sell. Excited clusters of radio hams were to be seen crowding around certain car boots which were opened to reveal their treasures within. These Swop Shops will be a continuous feature of our monthly meetings henceforth, with the Mega-Flea Market on 5 March next year being a major event.

Very grateful thanks must go out to a number of people without who's sterling efforts the meeting would have not been so enjoyable:

Rob and Anne, for organising the food and liquid refreshments, and especially to Anne, Elsabe and Sandi, for serving up the food all afternoon long;

Tony / ZS1TM, for patiently and expertly braai-ing the hamburgers;

Noel / ZS1FW, providing the bags of ice that kept the beers and cool drinks cool throughout the afternoon;

Dennis / ZS1AU, for making it all the way here to deliver the Len Wells award (and for wearing that tux in the blazing heat!). Also Tony / ZS1TK, for providing kindly transport for Dennis to and from the meeting;

All others who assisted with setting up, running the event and cleaning up / packing away afterwards.

The meeting ended at around 16h00. A most satisfying event indeed.

We look forward to seeing you all at our next meeting, which will be at the Clubhouse at 14h00 on Saturday 28 January 2017. More info on this meeting will be published in due course.

Photos of the November meeting are [here].

CTARC Report-Back of AGM - 24 Jul '16

On Saturday 23 July 2016, the Cape Town Amateur Radio Centre held its AGM at 14h00. In spite of some rather soggy winter weather, the meeting was well attended.

The meeting was opened by CTARC chairman Rob / ZS1SA, who welcomed members and visitors, and then delivered his Chairman's Report for the past year.

This was followed by the Secretary's Report by our well-organised secretary, Anne.

Our vice-chairman, Noel / ZS1FW, then read out the Treasurers Report on behalf of Danny / ZS1BL who was unable to attend the meeting.

Our chairman then had the pleasant job of handing over the Club Awards for the year.

The Golden Wellie Award (the Wellington boot is in fact black in colour), which celebrates that member whose attendance of club events (through rain, hail, sleet, snow, dust storms, hurricanes and other meteorological phenomena) has been most consistent, this year was awarded to Tony / ZS1TK.

The Club Participation Award, which is awarded for significant club involvement, assistance and participation, this year was awarded to Barry / ZS1FJ in absentia.

The Buck Taylor Trophy (the CTARC's top award) was awarded to Davey / ZR1FR for his extremely helpful and generous assistance of our club recently.

At this point, the chairman stood down and handed over the reigns to John / ZS1AGH while nominations for the post of club chairman and the committee were called for. The entire committee was re-elected, with Rob as chairman, for another year. The committee's details are [here].

The formalities now concluded, the club's members and visitors were asked to briefly assemble outside the clubhouse for a group photograph (see below).

Thereafter we returned to the clubhouse for a bowl (or two) of not one but two delicious varieties of hot soup kindly provided by Anne and Elsabe, as well as a glass of warming sherry for those who required a little further warming on that cold afternoon. A good opportunity to catch up and natter with friends then ensued.

Paul / ZS1S later on continued with some repair work to the antenna cable feed-in panel, which has been in need of refurbishment since our recent Antenna Work Party.

By about 16h45 the meeting had run its course and we made our way home.

Below are some photos of the event:

The quiet before the storm...
Anne & Elsabe await the arrival of the hungry masses

Rob / ZS1SA has just acquired a transformer,
Note the unique model of his car (next to the number plate)

Members settle down for the meeting

Rob / ZS1SA reads out the Chairmans Report. Throughout the event
the slide show from the 70th Anniversary celebration was projected

Anne delivers the Secretary's Report

Noel / ZS1FW delivers the Treasurer's Report

Tony / ZS1TK receives the Golden Wellie Award from Rob /  ZS1SA

Rob / ZS1SA announces the Club Participation Award for Barry /  ZS1FJ

Davey / ZR1FR receives the Buck Taylor Trophy from Rob / ZS1SA

John / ZS1AGH takes over as temporary club chairman while nominations
are received for chairman and committee and the voting takes place.

Rob / ZS1SA, our re-elected club chairman commits himself
and the committee to another year at the helm of the CTARC,
in service to the club's members

Group shot outside the clubhouse.
In the foreground is John / ZS1AGH'S prized Dart.

Left to right: Wolfgang /ZR1WHL, Hans-Jurgen /ZS1HJH, Mike /ZS1PE,
Noel /ZS1FW and Richard /ZS1RIC

Anne and Elsabe provided litres of very delicious soup!
(Chicken Noodle on the left, Butternut on the right)

And to keep the chill away there was a glass of sherry

Much discussion taking place after the AGM, as is always the case

Paul / ZS1S and Mike / ZS1FP.
In the background are Tony /  ZS1TM and Rob / ZS1SA

Gerald / ZS1GRM makes an emphatic point to John / ZS1AGH
and Geoff / ZR1GFT

Noel / ZS1FW and Charles / ZS1CJO

Wolfgang / ZR1WLH, Hans-Jurgen / ZS1HJH and Richard / ZS1RIC

CTARC Report Back on 70th Anniversary Function - 26 Jun '16

John / ZS1PM delivers his fascinating account of  the post-war days
of ham radio, and of his work with Dr Wadley

This is a brief first report-back which will be updated presently with a more comprehensive one, along with more photographs.

The CTARC's 70th Anniversary celebratory luncheon was a great success! Members past and present met at the Wild Fig Restaurant in Mowbray from 12h00 on Saturday 25 June. We had the chance to enjoy a flute of champagne in the downstairs bar while waiting for all the guests to arrive.

At around 12h45 we moved upstairs into the function room which had been beautifully laid out in preparation for the event. Once the guests were settled, Danny /  ZS1BL as Master of Ceremonies introduced us to the programme and to our chairman, Rob / ZS1SA. On a projector screen in the background, a presentation (weeks in the making!) by Rob & Anne ran continuously, showing photographs highlighting the history of our club from its founding in 1946.

Rob formally welcomed us to the event and started the meeting with the sad news of the passing of Tippy Marais / ZS1CL /sk. A brief moment of silence was held in his memory. Rob then gave us a concise history of the CTARC (in its numerous manifestations and localities) up to the present day.

The first course was then served.

Speeches and comments were then delivered by:
John Blackman / ZS1PM
Shaun Overmeyer / ZS1RA
Paul Johnson / ZS1S
Deon Erwin / ZS1ZL
Dennis Wells / ZS1AU
and
Bernie Crockford / ZS1BW
(A more comprehensive account of these will be written here shortly)

We were then served the Main Course (where we had a choice of three different options). Towards the end of this, Tony / ZS1TK presented Anne with a beautiful bouquet of flowers for all her efforts and then, being the perfect gentleman, a bouquet for his dear XYL, too.

Later on,  the delicious dessert (Malva pudding) appeared before each one of us.

The afternoon concluded at around 16h30. As guests departed, they were each presented with a commemorative certificate of attendance. Some of us stayed on for coffee at the downstairs patio until around 17h00.

All in all, a great event! All the more so due to the sterling efforts of all those involved, in particular:

Anne (our club secretary), for organising the whole event with her characteristic precision, practicality and common sense. (In addition to all this she also designed and produced the invitations and menu, and with Rob put together the historical slide show!);
Rob / ZS1SA, for his involvement with the slideshow and for chairing the event;
Danny / ZS1BL, for his able role as MC;
All those who kindly prepared and delivered speeches;
Paul / ZS1S, for making videos of all the speeches;
Nick / ZS1ZD, for taking the photographs, and for the certificates, name labels and 70th anniversary logo;
The management and staff of the Wild Fig Restaurant for their superb venue, excellent service, scrumptious fare and also for the kind loan of their video projector;
All the others involved, in various capacities.

Our next meeting will be the important Annual General Meeting, to be held in July. Details will be published in due course.