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- Written by: Maintenance Guy
- Category: News
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I know that several members are interested in the history of the Chernobyl Duga radar array, as am I - but this newly-released YouTube video adds a new dimension, and one which, as a computer guy, really brings the whole project to life.
Anyone who has ever operated, maintained or programmed mainframe computers from the 60's 70's or 80's, or programmed in assembly language will likely find this particularly interesting.
All credit for this wonderful short documentary goes to it's creators - the 'Chornobyl Family' YouTube channel. It is far and away the best Duga-related video I've ever seen, and gives a fascinating insight into Russian computing during that period - culminating in the production of the ES-106x mainframes - clones of the legendary IBM/370 series.
Reading between the lines, one of the reasons why the whole Duga project ultimately failed was because the number of simultaneous mathematical calculations required to predict ballistic missile trajectories in real-time was simply beyond the K340A.
Have a watch here: https://youtu.be/kHiCHRB-RlA?si=e4fmyHvXLasxuGLA
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- Written by: Richard G0LFF
- Category: News
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Running the 15m lunchtime net last Friday, I was called by NJ2BB, the Iowa-class battleship USS New Jersey with Bob N4XAT on the mic. The USS New Jersey is a museum ship, much like HMS Belfast, and is moored at Camden, New Jersey, USA.
Communications with NJ2BB were good, averaging 5/4 to 5/5, peaking S8 with me in my car at the Jack & Jill windmill site. Bob exchanged reports with George G4PTJ, Chris G4ZCS and Barry SA7GDB. Barry is also a regular on the net. Unfortunately, David WB1EAD could not hear Bob.
Bob is hoping to operate from U-995, a U-boat museum in Laboe, Germany in June next year. If all goes well, Fraser OZ1JKU (ex G0JDR) and I plan to meet up with Bob on the U-boat.
Bob was using a Kenwood TS-870D barefoot into the ship’s twin stub antennas mounted about 60 feet ASL. With a 50,000 ton ground-plane it works pretty good hi.
Dick G0LFF
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- Written by: Chris G4ZCS
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August is, I have found, usually a quiet month for radio, however this month the sun made sure of that.
An extreme event occurred that raised the flux index to 333, a level that I had never seen before. It should have bought a DX bonanza but for some reason the A index rose from a friendly 2, way up to 99 with a total radio blackout. It was so bad that I went into the lounge to watch TV instead but found that it too had pixelated itself into oblivion. In desperation I gave myself a refresher course in operating the DVD player!
When things calmed down a few days later, I found most of my contacts were with the west of America; California, Oregon, Washington, Montana, Utah, and the Dakotas were regulars together with the western provinces of Canada, but almost nothing from the mid-west states and provinces. A nice surprise for me was a FT8 contact with a station in Alaska for a new grid square.
Much as I tried, I could hear nothing of N5J in the Pacific - which was frustrating as Samoa had been easy to hear just a few weeks earlier.
The end of the month brought the retirement of Laurie Margolis G3UML, having worked in BBC news for 50 years. To celebrate, the BBC Radio 4 did a short piece remembering his contact with Bob Mcleod VP8LP who went on air to confirm the invasion of the Falklands in the 1980s. The piece included a short recording of Bob talking to Laurie on SSB. By coincidence the night following this broadcast, Bob was on 15m and I was lucky to break his pileup for a quick chat on SSB, he even remembered my name!
Bob has dropped in to our lunchtime nets over the years and my log shows about 15 contacts.
A couple of weeks earlier I made a FT8 contact with VP8VK who lives in the far west of the Falklands on Saunders Island. She and her family share this island with 5,000 sheep, 150 cattle and loads of penguins. The card shows a contrast to last month’s tropical island!
Since my last report I have reached an annual total of 190 DXCCs. These new ones include; K8, EP4, 3B8, TO8, OJ0 & OH0, TR3, and CY9. Mostly on 15m, FT8 but also some CW and a couple of SSB contacts. So now we enter September and look forward to the equinox.
Things have started to change with some bands closing several hours earlier, however still a few to work!
Cheers & good DXing
Chris, G4ZCS
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- Written by: Maintenance Guy
- Category: News
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Eric GM5RDX has just returned from a very successful DXpedition to the Caribbean islands of St Maarten, Anguilla and St Kitts, where he operated his Yaesu FT-891 and mAT-30 ATU station with a G5RV antenna.
Eric has produced this extremely professional video, in so doing demonstrating one of his many other skills. He has also clearly done his background research, particularly around Louis Varney and the G5RV antenna, and has used some of the info from our website as part of that process.
To add another connection to MSARS, he was worked by Rob M0KPD/M on each of the three islands, and Rob kindly forwarded me the link to Eric's YouTube video, which you can access directly here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xK85d867RzA
Definitely worth a watch.
Thanks to Eric, and I hope he gets away with his radio gear once more sometime soon.
Berni M0XYF
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- Written by: Ken Gibson
- Category: News
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Our lunchtime HF net, now on 15m, started when I contacted HO Townsend WA5MLT (later K5CX) on the 1st of September 1979. My eldest son David had just gone to Oklahoma University in Norman to take his Masters degree. I found that HO was living in Norman and he kindly offered to keep an eye on David and this led to our setting up regular skeds which enabled Stella, David’s mother to maintain a check on her 20 year old son (as mothers do).
Gradually as our regular skeds progressed, MSARS members and other amateurs joined in, and our weekend chats became a regular meeting place for US and UK participants.
Apart from HO Townsend who some of you may remember attended G5RV’s funeral as a representative of the ARRL, we had Dell Popplewell K4NBN (No Bad News) in Jacksonville, Mike Brown N4MAD in Pensacola (where I met Bob D’Imperio N4XAT who is still with us) and many others including more recently David WB1EAD in the State of Maine and Barry, SA7GDB in Sweden.
Stella and I enjoyed spending holidays with most of the US participants, many of whom in turn visited us in Cuckfield over the years to our great delight.
When I retired in 1991 the then weekend nets began to run every weekday and from a simple natter between 2 friends the net now 45 years old has continued to flourish. I have, so far filled 35 log books with my hand written records of our daily chats. That’s more than 72,000 individual entries and I hope that there are many more to come.
Age and a host of old men’s ailments have now forced me to admit that I can no longer guarantee that I will be there at 13:30 to call the net together every day and I am hoping that there will be sufficient MSARS members from now on to open the net if I am absent.
I’ll join in the lunchtime net when possible and will continue to run the Sunday morning net now on 7MHz while I can. Sean and our long term friendship is another story yet to come.
It’s been a great pleasure to run the lunchtime net for so long but nothing lasts forever and I’m sure that my absence will make no difference to the net continuing for years to come.
73 es 88 to you all,
Ken G3WYN
