News – Singapore Amateur Radio Transmitting Society

SARTS QSL Bureau Closure

Effective 14 February the incoming SARTS QSL bureau will be permanently closed. The outgoing QSL bureau will still be operational. Please contact Kurita, 9V1XX if you wish to send cards overseas. Singpost is terminating all PO Box services nationwide next month, so our SARTS mailing address for the last 60 years will also be closing. We will advise members of the new mailing address soon.

IOTA 2024

This year’s IOTA team on St. John’s Island: 9V1AZ, Gopal; 9V1AD, Chuck; 9V1AV, JT; 9V1GH, Sanjeev with son Kush; 9V1JO, Johari; 9V1KG, Klaus; 9V1RT, Roland; and Sanjeev. 9V1RB with friend joined as day visitors. Station call sign was 9V1IO.

Thanks to Gopal for the whole organisation; to Haoyuan for letting us use his 7300 with PSU and PAC-12 antenna, Klaus for the Computer, Buddistick, endfed and Keyer, and Roland for the pole and camping trolley.

SARTS entry to IOTA Contest 2024

This year’s IOTA Contest takes place on Saturday 27th – Sunday 28th July 2024 from 1200 – 1200 UTC. Haoyuan 9V1HY is coordinating the Singapore entry, which will likely happen from Pulau Ubin or St John’s Island, likely travelling out on the Saturday morning, getting set up ready to start our time afternoon, then operating through the night before wrapping up on Sunday morning.

Anyone interested contact 9V1HY via telegram. For background on the contest, check the RSGB as it coordinates the event. There is more information about IOTA’s long term year round role and activities on that organization’s website.

Bear-10 Flight Announcement

Date/Time 19 May 2024 (Sunday) 06:45 SGT lift off.
Duration: a few hours
Call sign: 9V1WP-11
APRS: on 144.390 MHz
SSTV on 145.550 MHz

…weather permitting and with positive clearance by air-force controllers at time of planned launch. Flight plan has been approved by RSAF and CAAS, and payload approved by IMDA.

The weather Balloon Experiments with Amateur Radio (BEAR) is expected to reach an altitude of 25 km or FL820.

Tour of former BBC Far Eastern Relay Station

On 15 September 2023 members of Singapore Amateur Radio Transmitting Society were given a tour of the facilities built for the BBC World Service in Singapore which closed in July 2023. Thank you to our hosts at Encompass, who now run the site, to James 9V1YC for organizing the tour, and to Kevin 9V1KT for the video. Hugh 9V1SA posted many of the photos taken by our members in a Wikipedia article about the site.

BEAR-8

from Chew, 9V1HP

Balloon Experiment with Amateur Radio (BEAR-8)

is expected to be airborne on Sunday 28 May 2023 (Sunday) from around 06:45 (SGT) or 22:45 (27 May, UTC). Payload DRA818V.

APRS on 144.390 MHz: Telemetry, location, altitude, temperature and pressure.
SSTV on 145.550 MHz, Periodic snapshot.

TEAM

Project Lead / Payload (2), 9V1LW
Flt Sys / Payload (1), 9V1WP
Flt. Lifting, 9V1FH
Flt. Tracking, 9V1CV
Flt. Co-ord, 9V1YP

Recommended Item	Recommender	Comments
Andrew D. Barron ZL3DW (2018) Amsats and Hamsats: Amateur Radio and Other Small Satellites	9V1YP	Anyone interested in amateur radio satellite, this is a great book to read.
Robert R. Brown NM7M (1992) Long-Path Propagation: A Study of Long-Path Propagation in Solar Cycle 22	9V1SA	I was intrigued to understand why the paths change from Singapore through the year
Robert R. Brown NM7M (2002) On Ion Chemistry and Propagation	9V1SA	What is actually going on up there to make our signals heard worldwide
Carl Luetzelschwab, K9LA (2014) A Long Overdue Review of Gray Line Propagation on the Low Bands	9V1YC	K9LA is a world-renowned expert on ionospheric propagation, and he knows the physics behind it. His webinar is really the best I’ve seen on how to describe low-band “gray line” propagation.