The Monitor

On March 22, Industry Canada published on their web site, all of the comments received on Gazette Notice DGRB-001-01 proposing to drop the 12 Word Per Minute Morse Test in Canada.

A number of carefully thought out and well-reasoned arguments have been presented on both sides. A few comments were received from outside Canada, from amateurs dedicated to the elimination or preservation of the testing requirement.

Over 300 comments were received, with close to 80% in favour of dropping the 12 wpm test. While a count of the number of replies is certainly not in any way a scientific survey, it would appear that the majority of Canadian Radio Amateurs support the RAC proposal.

A complete set of responses can be found on the Industry Canada web site in pdf format at:

http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/pics/sf/comments.pdf (The club’s response to this proposal can be viewed on pages 47 & 54-ed).

No date is given as to when we might expect Industry Canada’s decision on this matter.

The Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations--CEPT--has effectively lowered the Amateur Radio Morse code test speed to 5 WPM for all European countries. The CEPT Radio Regulatory Working Group (WGRR), meeting last month in The Hague, adopted a revision of Recommendation 61-02 to include the 5 WPM standard.

An 8 year old Grade 3 student in the French Immersion program at Glenmore Elementary School in Kelowna BC has just passed the test for a Basic Amateur Radio Certificate. Born October 8th, 1992, Rees Grandison Kelly is also interested in soccer, Tae Kwon Do, and Nintendo games.

Rees was one of several young people who took the Basic Radio course given by Keith Manhard VE7KNG, course coordinator and past president of the Orchard City Amateur Radio Club

Rees has a 6 year old brother (Wesley) who wants his radio license now too, but his father Bruno VE7GPS, says "he'll have to wait cause Dad's too tired for at least a couple of years!"

According to news reports, Industry Canada is planning three months of public hearings into the use of technology, which could be used to block cellular phone signals in restaurants, theaters, libraries or other locations. Industry Canada advisor David Warnes told the National Post newspaper that not only are there widespread complaints about cellular phone use in public places but also inquiries by security firms that want to put jammers in corporate boardrooms to protect privacy.

Canada's mobile phone industry is dead against the government forcing etiquette on the country's eight million users by legalizing signal jamming technology. The organization that represents cellular phone manufacturers and network operators says that it could compromise public safety.

There are currently 8.3 million cellular phone users in Canada, up 27 percent from 1999, and this number is expected to grow by 25 to 30 percent during the remainder of 2001.

On March 22, Industry Canada published on their web site, all of the comments received on Gazette Notice DGRB-001-01 proposing to drop the 12 Word Per Minute Morse Test in Canada.

A number of carefully thought out and well-reasoned arguments have been presented on both sides. A few comments were received from outside Canada, from amateurs dedicated to the elimination or preservation of the testing requirement.

Over 300 comments were received, with close to 80% in favour of dropping the 12 wpm test. While a count of the number of replies is certainly not in any way a scientific survey, it would appear that the majority of Canadian Radio Amateurs support the RAC proposal.

A complete set of responses can be found on the Industry Canada web site in pdf format at:

http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/pics/sf/comments.pdf (The club’s response to this proposal can be viewed on pages 47 & 54-ed).

No date is given as to when we might expect Industry Canada’s decision on this matter.

Mike VE3BSE’s tech-talk for March was on the front end of the TenTec VHF receiver, which utilizes a couple of BF988 dual gate MOSFET’s. Included with the presentation was a schematic diagram along with a handout, which indicated radio performance calculations and measurements. Mike also talked about how this receiver handles intermod and how to measure the noise figure.

If you have a topic that you would like covered in a future talk, please see Mike.

Mississauga, ON: Mississauga Amateur Radio Club, VE3RCX, 0200-0600Z Apr 28, during the AGGIE Canadian Girl Guide Convention. 3.740 7.090 14.135. QSL. Michael Brickell, VE3TKI, 2801 Bucklepost Crescent, Mississauga, ON, Canada L5N 1X6.

Ypsilanti,MI: Tin Lizzy, W8W, 0100Z Apr 13 to 0100Z Apr 23, I-75 Southern DX Expedition, 14.330 28.465. QSL. Jack McCurdy AB8HX, 5949 Huntington Ave., Ypsilanti, MI 48197.

Norfolk, VA: USS Wisconsin Radio Club, N4WIS, 1400Z Apr 16 to 0300Z Apr 17, for opening day of tours aboard the battleship Wisconsin at the Nauticus National Maritime Center. 7.035 7.235 14.035 14.235. QSL. Carey Brown, KT4P, 4821 Rosecroft St., Virginia Beach, VA 23464.

Las Vegas, NV: The Silverdust Amateur Radio Association of Nevada, N7A, 2000Z Apr 21 to 1900Z Apr 22, celebrating the 5th anniversary of the Extra Terrestrial Highway--NV state highway 375--gateway to Area 51. 7.260 14.237 21.371 29.250. Certificate. SARAN, PO Box 9717, Las Vegas, NV 89191-0717.

Plymouth, MI: Stu Rockafellow ARS, N8D, 1300Z Apr 21 to 2000Z Apr 22, commemorating Jimmy Doolittle's B-25 raid. 7.270 14.270 21.370 28.370. Certificate. Chuck VanVleck, 42350 Ann Arbor Road, Plymouth MI, 48170.

Manitowoc, WI: Mancorad Radio Club, W9DK, 1400Z Apr 28 to 2300Z Apr 29, aboard the USS Cobia during the Sub Memorial Radio Reactivation. 7.243 14.243 21.343 28.343. Certificate. Fred Neuenfeldt, W6BSF, 4932 South 10th St, Manitowoc, WI 54220.

Louisville, KY: Amateur Radio Transmitting Society, W4CN, 1100-1700Z May 5, for the 127th Kentucky Derby. 14.090 21.350 28.450. Certificate. Shelby Summerville, K4WW, 6506 Lantana Court, Louisville, KY 40229.

Aquinah, MA: Fall River Amateur Radio Club, W1ACT, 1800-1900Z May 6, operating from Gay Head Lighthouse, NA046. 14.260 21.260 28.460 50.130. QSL. Fall River ARC, 19 Davis Rd, Westport, MA 02790.

Camden, NJ: The Battleship New Jersey Amateur Radio Station, NJ2BB, 1500-2000Z May 6, commemorating Memorial Day and the commissioning of the battleship New Jersey. General-class bands. Certificate. Joe Cramer, PO Box 43, Lanoka Harbor, NJ 08734.

TCA March/April 2001

CAMP X, ON THE AIR AGAIN. Honouring the unsung heroes of Camp X.

QST April 2001

THE NJQRP SQUIRT. An economy sized antenna for 80 meters.

A QRP "EXPEDITION" TO GREAT BRITAIN. Enjoy a "walk upon England’s mountains green" with QRP.

CQ April 2001

THE SUPER-PORTABLE YAESU FT-817 TRANSCEIVER. An in-depth look at Yaesu’s new portable HF/VHF/UHF multimode transceiver.

QSL’ING IN CYBERSPACE. Will QSL’ing via the internet replace the system we now know?

VO2, LABRADOR, CANADA DXPEDITION. Fred, K2FRD, reports that he is planning a DXpedition to Labrador; not a DXCC Entity, but an uncommon contact nevertheless. He will be operating from about June 6th through August 31st, as VO2/K2FRD from a tent. His QTH is about 90 km WSW of Churchill Falls, Labrador, Province of Newfoundland, Canada. His activity will be mainly 10, 15 and 20 meters in that order. Suggested frequencies are: 28415, 28515, 21315, 21415, 14215 and 14295 kHz. He does plan to be active on some nets. For more details on bands, frequencies, schedules, QSL info, etc., check the Web page at: http://sites.netscape.net/thefred3/labr1

The Green Bay Wisconsin based Live-Wire Group has recorded what it believes to be the first documented "Liquid Antenna" to "Liquid Antenna" ham radio contact. The QSO took place on St. Patrick's Day, Saturday - March 17, 2001 at 1719 UTC. The mode used was Single Sideband on 18 point 157 dot 50 MHz. Participating stations included WH2AAT in Orange Park, Florida and N9ZRT in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Both were using 10-foot tall x 2-inch wide columns of concentrated saltwater as antennas. More information on the experiment and the group sponsoring it can be found in cyberspace at www.wireservices.com/livewire.html.

Call it a worldwide ham radio holiday. World Amateur Radio Day will be celebrated on April 18th.

According to the Administrative Council of the International Amateur Radio Union this years theme is "Providing Disaster Communications: Amateur Radio in the 21st Century. Amateur Radio societies and radio clubs worldwide are expected to take part in this very special event.

And in a related item, the International Telecommunication Union has approved publication of the Disaster Communications Handbook for Developing Countries. The International Amateur Radio Union is the principal contributor to the Handbook whose release will coincide with the 76th anniversary of the founding of the IARU. It came into being back in 1925 with ARRL founder Hiram Percy Maxim, 1AW, serving its first president.

The ARISS team has received permission from the ISS controllers to declare April 12^th (Cosmonautics day) a "special event" day for ham radio on the International Space Station. The ARISS team is requesting the crew, on a voluntary basis, to run general QSO’s over the major landmasses of the Earth to help celebrate Cosmonautics Day.

This year the April 12th Cosmonautics Day holiday celebrates the 40^th anniversary of the first human spaceflight by Yuri Gagarin, the 30^th anniversary of the first space station (Salyut 1), and the 20^th anniversary of the first launch of the first reusable space vehicle, the space shuttle.

The following frequencies have been announced for ARISS general QSO’s: Voice and packet downlink: 145.80 (worldwide); voice uplink: 144.49 for Regions 2 and 3 (the Americas, and the Pacific); voice uplink: 145.20 for Region 1 (Europe, Central Asia and Africa); packet uplink: 145.99 (worldwide). The ISS Amateur Radio packet system still is not operational, but ARISS has been working with the crew to get it working and hopes it will be up and running by then.

Bill Wetherill, N2WG, reports he's arranged for students from several middle schools to operate from Radio Central on the battleship USS North Carolina using the call sign NI4BK (the battleship's original call sign was NIBK).

The USS North Carolina Battleship Memorial is in Wilmington, North Carolina. Operation will be 9 AM-noon Eastern Time on successive Wednesdays--April 11, 18, and 25, on or about 7230, 14,260 and 28,560 kHz. Wetherill says a legal-size SASE gets stations working NI4BK a great QSL that includes a picture of the battleship, facts about the battleship and pictures of the students operating from the battleship.

Hams are needed again this spring to monitor and track the 172-MHz burrowing owl tags. ARRL Amateur Radio Direction Finding Coordinator Joe Moell, K0OV, says many radio amateurs and scanner enthusiasts joined the effort to listen for radio tags on endangered Canadian burrowing owls during the fall 2000 southward migration and continued to monitor through the winter. Transmitters have been placed on wintering owls in southeastern Texas, and researchers want to know if these Texas owls go to Canada in the spring or if they stay somewhere in the US. The owls have begun leaving the Texas study site and will probably be on the move at least until mid-April. In the meantime, Canadian burrowing owls should be returning from Texas and Mexico at about the same time. For exact frequencies and more information, visit Moell's "Homing In" site, http://www.homingin.com .

Amateur Radio operators again have assisted in a high seas rescue operation after pirates attacked a private sailing vessel March 20 off Venezuela. The skipper, identified as Bo Altheden, reportedly was shot, and his female companion, ViVi-Maj Miren, summoned help via the Maritime Mobile Service Net on 20 meters. The victim was reported to be recovering in a Trinidad hospital.

The space shuttle Discovery roared off its launch on its way to deliver a new crew to the International Space Station. The ISS Expedition 2 crew includes two hams, Russian cosmonaut and Expedition 2 Commander Yuri Usachev, UA9AD, and U.S. astronaut Susan Helms, KC7NHZ.

Expedition 1 Crew Commander William Shepherd, KD5GSL, capped his more than four-month tour aboard the International Space Station with a ham radio chat with students at his Arizona high school alma mater. Shepherd spoke briefly to students at Arcadia High School in Phoenix as the contact was fit into the schedule at the request of KD5GSL.

Brantford Classic Run. Sunday April 22^nd. More details forthcoming.

Paris to Ancaster Bike Race. Sunday April 22^nd. Same date as the Brantford Classic Run but maybe some of our members can participate in both as we have done in the past.

Durham Region Amateur Radio Hamfest. Sponsored by the South Pickering ARC and the North Shore ARC on April 28^th at the Iroquois Park Rec. Complex 9:00 AM.

Annual Spring Hamfest and Fleamarket. Sponsored by the Skywide ARC on May 12^th at the Westway United Church in Etobicoke 9:00 AM.

Ontario QSO Party – 1800z 21 Apr to 1800z 22 Apr. Note: The date for this contest has been shifted from the last weekend of April to the third full weekend in April.

http://www.qsl.net/master.htm

Probably the world's largest collection of amateur radio and other radio related websites anywhere. QSL.NET also provides amateur operators with free e-mail and webpage hosting services. A tour through the index will literally keep you occupied for weeks.

Members of California's Glendale Emergency Amateur Radio Service provided communications at Glendale Memorial Hospital after a construction accident took down the hospital phone system. With the lives of patients hanging in the balance, the Glendale Emergency Amateur Radio Service was quick to respond.

Incoming calls were routed to a bank of telephones set up in the Emergency Operations Centre at a local Chapter of the American Red Cross. As the phone company worked to repair the break, Amateur Radio operators, stationed at the EOC and at critical areas inside the hospital spent the better part of the day handling calls for doctors, nurses and other staff members using 2 meter and 70 cm repeaters. In all, more than twenty hams participated in the 10-hour emergency telephone outage communications emergency.

(via Newsline)

The FCC has proposed levying a $17,000 fine on an East Palo Alto, California, man for transmitting without a license on amateur frequencies and for transmitting a false distress signal. The FCC issued a Notice of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture March 19 in the case of Joshie Yasin Nakamura Sr, who also is known as "Mervyn Ehambrave" and sometimes as "Marvin E. Barnes."

At the time, the FCC shut down the repeater system for more than two months, saying that the repeater's owner and control operator did not have proper control of the system and that the control operator was permitting unlicensed individuals to transmit via the machines.

The FCC gave Nakamura 30 days to pay up or to seek reduction or cancellation of the proposed fine.

The US Standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in England, and the US railroads were built by English expatriates.

Why did the English people build them like that? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

Okay! Why did the wagons use that odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing the wagons would break on some of the old, long distance roads, because that's the spacing of the old wheel ruts.

So who built these old rutted roads? The first long distance roads in Europe were built by Imperial Rome for the benefit of their legions. The roads have been used ever since. And the ruts? The initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagons, were first made by Roman war chariots. Since the chariots were made for or by Imperial Rome they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.

Thus, we have the answer to the original questions. The United State standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches derives from the original specification for an Imperial Roman army war chariot. Specs and Bureaucracies live forever.

So, the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's ass came up with it, you may be exactly right. Because the Imperial Roman chariots were made to be just wide enough to accommodate the back-ends of two war horses.

Professor Tom O'Hare Germanic Lanuages (512) 471-4123

University of Texas at Austin tohare@mail.utexas.edu