February Meeting - Astronavigation and the Chronometer

John Andrews, ZL2HD will talk about astronavigation and how the chronometer was key to James Cook's voyages. Cook was a leading navigator of his time and was given one of Harrision's Chronometers in order to test it. Cook has been quoted as saying have one chronometer or three, but never two!

Following that will be a fun quiz (no, not the Amateur exam this time) with prizes.

Date: Thursday 23 February 2017
Time: 7:30 pm
Location: Tawa Community Centre

Digital Television Update

Radio Spectrum Management has granted a short-term licence, number 256129, for additional tests of Digital Amateur Television transmissions from our Mt Belmont site.

The first transmissions will consist of an un-modulated carrier on 506 MHz during testing of the modified transmitting antenna. The dates and times of these tests will be notified on this website.

November 2016 Meeting Cancelled

Due to the Tawa facility being used for Business Continunity purposes by the WCC, we are not able to meet there this week.

We will look at how we can reschedule the meeting and the speakers.

We do not have a December Q-Bit, so most likely we will not be in communication until Janurary 2017. Have a safe and happy Christmas.

73

John ZL2HD

President, Wellington VHF Group, Branch 74 NZART 

September Meeting - Our AREC investments

A look at the last year’s purchases for our AREC section The Group has received a huge amount of new radio equipment from AREC National to help us serve LandSAR and other agencies, as well as to make us better prepared for any major disaster we may be called on to help with.

While the radios are generally supplied, we have had to ensure that they are usable and protected during travel. This means hard cases, power supplies, antennas and cables, programming and training and experience.

August Meeting - Young Physicist Tournament 2016

Catherine Pot is a student at Onslow College and has been a member of their Physics Club for a number of years. The club as a team that competes in the Young Physicists Tournaments. Last year we heard how the Onslow team went at the international competition, and this year Catherine has been to Russia with the team to compete.

We are lucky to have Catherine and her father Michael talk to us on the trip and the competition. Catherine will also speak on one of the subjects that was presented.

Van der Pauw - Geometry and the 4 wire resistance measurement

July Meeting - Visit to the new Rescue Coordination Centre

Time changed to 8:00 pm

The RCC has recently been moved and upgraded to support larger mass casualty events or multiple simultaneous searches. Last month we heard about the new beacon receiving and locating systems. Although all beacons sold in New Zealand are GPS equipped, not all beacons in the RCC search area are GPS enabled.

The RCC is key to maritime searches and more and more land searches as the use of personal 

Thanks to Rodney Bracefield for last month's exciting talk and for arranging this month's visit.