WESTLAKES NEWS FOR 29TH JULY 2012:

Welcome to this week's local news broadcast. This is VK2ATZ, The callsign of Westlakes Amateur Radio Club located at Teralba, Lake Macquarie. Your reader this morning is Barrie. There may be a simulcast being transmitted this morning on 3.565 MHz courtesy of Warren VK2UWP. Callbacks follow at the conclusion of this news.Then at 9.30am is a relay of the Australia-wide amateur radio news from VK1WIA. The activity room was buzzing with activity once again yesterday with the latest project been built. That is the receiver built with 1 valve and parts from the club store or from members junk boxs. The competition is going to be close for the judging with almost completed projects. This is what the club needs - more members getting involved in club activities. Also Herb was there demonstrating his audio amp with parts bought from the club store. Next Thursday commencing in the classroom (1000 hrs) VK2RJ Les with applying his knowledge to interested members who wish to know more about the WINDOWS 7 operating system. So far there are about 8 people who will be going. If you have a laptop with Windows 7 on and you wish to come along please contact Les VK2RJ. Make sure your laptop has a fully charged battery. The canteen will be open for lunch as Diane will be there. The meat tray this week was carefully selected from the ticket tumbler by Gloria who just happened to be in town with Keith - VK2PKT. You will be thinking that either Gloria or Keith won the meet tray. Well the lucky winner was Garry VK2DBI. Well done Garry and enjoy the meat tray. On the lunch menu yesterday other than pies and sausage rolls was a stew served up with mash potatoes and slices of a French bread roll. From the members who ate it came great reports. Next weeks menu will be sausages either on a roll or bread. If you have something you want put on the menu please see Diane in the canteen. Diane likes to provide a different meal each weekend. Reminder of our Field Day which will be held on the 16th of September. This is a Sunday. All the usual stall holders will be there as well as Andrews Communications. Westlakes famous jelly bean guessing competition, BBQ and raffles will be there. This is your club so if you have anything which you would like to donate ( no TVs, VCRs or computer monitors). Ring the club for further details. Stall holders as well as boot sales are most welcome. The next Westlakes Club general meeting will be held on the 4th AUGUST as both the President and Vice President Geoff VK2GL will be in the chair. Ricketty Kate is once again been run at the club and this fund raiser will basically cover the clubs Council Rates. Please support this raffle. Confidence of a record ILLW year. With nearly 340 registrations so far in the 15th annual International Lighthouse and Lightship Weekend in August, what will be the lucky 400th entry? We have seen the Moritzburg light in Germany score the 100th followed by Point Fermin in the USA as 200th and St Tudwal's lighthouse in Wales as the 300th. Organisers of the fun event held on the third weekend of August are ready for the 400th registration and as it seeks to break last year's record of 470 from 55 countries. Several nations are meeting their total at this time with a virtual flood of registrations in the final weeks. Westlakes A.R.C. will once again be operating from the Norah Head Lighthouse. All the beds are full but you still can come down and operate the radios. Tea and coffee will be available as well as sandwiches for lunch. Plasma TV interference: There is a video on Youtube that shows you what Plasma TV interference sounds like. Take a look as it is very interesting. WORLD NEWS: With a new technology dubbed nPola, Seoul Semiconductor claims it has achieved a breakthrough in LED lighting: nPola LEDs produce 5 times more light that standard LEDs with the same surface. What's more, Seoul sees the potential for a further tenfold light intensity increase. The new product, which SSC holds the unique patented technology rights to, has been under development by SSC for over 10 years. The brightness has been dramatically improved by 5 times over the conventional LED on a same surface area and will be improved up to more than 10 times in the future. Currently, the brightness of a power chip LED in mass production is around 100 lumen but this new product, introduced by Seoul Semiconductor, produces 500 lumen which is 5 times better than a conventional product. As an example, when making a LED bulb for a 60W household bulb replacement, generally, 10-20 LED packages are used but when this new product is applied, the same brightness can be achieved with only 1-2 packages. During the technology presentation in Jong Lo Gu (Korea), Seoul Semiconductor CEO Jung Hoon Lee expressed strong confidence in the new product by saying "For the past 20 years, I've worked very hard in this industry and it is safe to say that this new product is the culmination of 20 years of core technologies. It is the final stage of the LED development process." SSC will immediately begin production of this new product, and it will start sales in strategic markets abroad. Professor Nakamura Shuji, who is also known as the father of LED, was also present at this event to comment on the technology of SSC. Professor Shuji Nakamura, continuously discussed as a candidate for the Nobel prize in physics, is currently a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and is also an advisor to SSC. Cree expands CR series LED downlights for residential and commercial applications July 24, 2012 | Christoph Hammerschmidt | 222908040 Cree expands CR series LED downlights for residential and commercial applications LED lighting technology company Cree, Inc. introduces a new 4-inch CR4 LED downlight and a higher lumen output 6-inch downlight. The new six-inch CR6 downlight uses 87 percent less energy than comparable incandescent lighting and delivers payback in less than one year in many commercial installations, the company claims. Both new products are powered by Cree's proprietary TrueWhite technology to deliver exceptional 90+ CRI. This technology delivers high light quality and maintains color consistency over the rated lifetime of the product, all while maintaining high luminous efficacy, the company claims. The downlights can easily be installed into most standard 4-inch and 6-inch recessed housings – making them suitable for use in both residential and light commercial, new construction or retrofit, applications. The CR4 LED downlight delivers 575 lumens and more than 60 lumens per watt and is a direct replacement for a 50 Watt 4-inch incandescent downlight. The new CR6 LED downlight delivers up to 800 lumens and up to 67 lumens per watt and is a direct replacement for a 90 Watt 6-inch incandescent downlight. The CR Series is dimmable to 5 percent, is designed to last 50,000 hours and features a five-year warranty. The new CR Series is qualified for both residential and commercial Energy Star standards. This higher standard of performance opens up opportunities for more incentives and rebates available from utilities and other entities – further lowering price and barriers to mass LED adoption. The CR6-800L can replace up to 90 Watts incandescent lights and uses only 12 Watts of input power. With typical commercial usage of 12 hours per day and the U.S. national average $0.11 per kWh electric costs, lighting-related HVAC impact and relamp maintenance reductions, many upgrade installations will pay for themselves in less than one year. In European markets with their typically higher energy costs, the lamps most likely will return the investment even faster. Heathkit Declares Bankruptcy, Closes for Good (Again) The July 19 edition of The Herald-Palladium -- a newspaper serving the communities of Benton Harbor and St Joseph, Michigan -- is reporting that Heathkit Education Company has declared bankruptcy and has officially closed its doors after defaulting on its lease. According to the paper, Heathkit employed more than 1800 people in its heyday after World War II; when it finally closed, its workforce totaled fewer than six people. This is the second time since 1992 that Heathkit Educational Services has shuttered its doors. In August 2011, Heathkit announced it was returning to the kit building business, and in September, that it would once again be manufacturing Amateur Radio kits. Heathkit owner Don Desrochers told the newspaper that he has filed for bankruptcy and a bank now owns what’s left of Heathkit; the bank is disposing of some items via online auctions. “The situation was purely one of the economy,” he explained in the article. “Heathkit was primarily dependent upon federal and state funding for schools. Spending in education continued to drop down, and it was economically unfeasible to continue operating. When we got back into the kit business, we were losing the education business faster than we were growing the kit business. It was not sustainable.”Desrochers -- who served as Heathkit’s President and Chief Executive Officer from 1995-2000 before purchasing the company in 2005 -- told The Herald-Palladium that closing Heathkit was hard for him: “It was a tough decision, but you can’t operate and lose money. Hopefully the employees will find other employment. They were great, loyal employees for a long time.” . Do you have a news items that you would like read out on a broadcast? Contact Richard VK2FRKO on email address vk2frko@tpg.com.au or give the item to Richard at the club. Now to wind up. Westlakes Amateur Radio Club Inc. is located in York Street, TERALBA - and is open on Saturday Afternoons from around 12 noon. Also on a Tuesday evening from around 6pm. To make contact at other times, try dialling (02) 49 581588 where an answering service operates. Visitors are always welcome at the club. We have plenty of tea, coffee, long-life milk, and an interesting selection of biscuits.