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St Helena Island contact by V51JH on VHF FM20 May 2019
On Wednesday the 15th of May 2019 Johan du Plessis (V51JH) installed his new 16m tower and a new X700H Diamond Vertical Antennae with half inch low loss coax.
He started testing the antennae signal strength around 14:00 UTC time using an ICOM 7100 Radio (50 Watt) by making test calls to Dawid Koen (V51DK). Dawid was at that stage mobile traveling to Swakopmund. While conducting the tests Johan heard Garry Mercury (ZD7GWN) calling
him at 15:30 UTC time. Johan was very excited in making his first long distance contact on the VHF band (145.500 MHz). Garry Mercury is stationed on St Helena Island which is approximately 2252 km on a bearing of 286 degrees from Swakopmund, Namibia. The signal strength was at 5/9 for both. Johan also asked Garry to stay on frequency as Dawid (V51DK) is mobile towards Swakopmund indicated that he would also like to try to make contact with Garry, which he was able to do. NARL President visit the DARC, Germany25 January 2019
The NARL President, Werner Muller (V51JP), visited Germany during the Namibia holiday season. One of the highlights of his visit was at the Deutscher Amateur-Radio-Club (DARC) HQ and the DARC QSL bureau.
Museum für Kommunikation Frankfurt
Please click here to see the full news bulletin as well as a downloadable PDF full report on his visit. Namibia Awards (in Germany)25 January 2019
During his visit to Germany the NARL President, Werner (V51JP), had the honour to hand out 2 Namibia Awards. The Namibia award can be obtained by working 5 individual V5 stations from outside Namibia or by working 10 individual V5 stations from within Namibia. http://www.narlnam.com/awards.html
The first Award went to ... Read More Lighthouse Event - V51NAM22 August 2018
The annual lighthouse event took place on 18 & 19 August 2018. The NARL activated the Pelican Point Lighthouse (grid: JG77fc) located near Walvisbay this year. Derek (V51DM), Raymond (V51RAY) and Robert (V51RS) drove through the thick sand to setup their station next to the lighthouse.
Below is a Google Map insert showing the position of the lighthouse. A 4x4 is definitely a required piece of equipment to get there. Towing the cherrypicker also didn't make it easy for the team.
Due to the delay in getting to the site, Robert (V51RS) immediately activated the Lighthouse with a portable radio while the others installed the rest of the antennas.
The rest of the action kicked in when all the antennas were up. Bands operated were 80-, 40- and 20m as well as some satellite contacts via VHF / UHF.
A total of 476 contacts, of which 22 were other lighthouses, have been made with the trio at the Pelican Point Lighthouse using the callsign "V51NAM -Lighthouse". A total no of 3 contacts were made via the birds (satellites) flying overhead.
A few Namibian Radio Amateurs walked away with a 2018 Southern African Lighthouse Award: Werner (V51JP) Pieter (V51PJ) And also for the operators of the Lighthouse station: Derek (V51DM) Raymond (V51RAY) Robert (V51RS) More photos can be viewed in the Lighthouse Gallery. Gamsberg Repeater Fixed05 August 2018
The Gamsberg repeater was fixed on Saturday 04 August 2018. Robert (V51RS), Werner (V51JP) and Olaf (V51OB) drove the gravel road to the Gamsberg in the early morning to be joined by Friedhelm (V51FH) from his farm near Gamsberg. The team arrived safely at the Gamsberg in spite of a close encounter with a Kudu running over the road.
The reason for the broken repeater was quickly discovered. The repeater radio was broken and was replaced. Olaf (V51OB) decided to climb the tower, in spite of the cold windy conditions, to tie some of the loose cables running up the towers. It turned out to be the cables from the repeater of the farmers in the area. HAM radio is also about service to the community and the cables were tied back onto the tower.
The outing was also a good opportunity to activate the JG86 grid for anyone chasing grids for the V5WAGS award. Lots of contacts from South Africa were made.
First V5WAGS Award26 June 2018
The very first V5WAGS award has been issued to Pieter Jacobs (ZS6XT) on 20 June 2018. The NARL congratulate Pieter for this achievement and hope that this is an inspiration to other HAMS to submit their logs and application form for this award.
More information about the V5WAGS award can be found here.
V55V Youtube video02 May 2018
The German club magazine cqDL dated May 2018 posted an article about Martin's (V51W) station, V55V, in Namibia. The article refers to the following video that was posted by Rudi Klos (DK7PE) on Youtube.
Guest Licenses12 July 2016
The NARL welcomes other HAM radio license holders who wish to visit Namibia and obtain a Guest license to contact us. We will assist where possible. Please refer to the Guest License page to get started. More information...
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Sponsors page updated. Guest License page updated. News section updated with V51JP's visit to Germany. More... Exam dates for 2019 updated. More... News |
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