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ZS6BNE's Blog

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RaDAR - A new radio sport

Posted: 28 Sep 2021 05:00 AM PDT https://zs6bne.wordpress.com/2021/09/28/radar-a-new-radio-sport/







Through the QSO Today virtual expo I introduced the idea of RaDAR Sport.
Since then I have done much to contribute towards the idea, in ZS at least.
The RaDAR Challenge has been with us for many years, unusual ham radio fun.
It was designed to cover a whole twenty four hours with the hope of international RaDAR to RaDAR communications. It was mostly touch and go
with no defined times, modes or frequencies and usually local groups made arrangements to meet somewhere, somehow on the bands.




I want to take RaDAR to the next step starting in November as a trial run
for future years. The three dates per year will remain but the times will become shorter and planned using UTC as a reference time. My suggestion is
that the RaDAR Sport Challenges start at 14:00 local time in whatever time
zone you live and the end time16:00 local. That gives a full two hours to
make as many deployments as possible. The requirement is still five QSOs
per deployment point.




Individuals or teams of individuals will line up at the start time. No motorised transport, you are either on your feet, on a bicycle or in a
canoe. Travel distances for on foot and canoes, as always, one kilometer
and two kilometers if travelling by bicycle. This allows us to compare
apples with apples.




During the past few weeks I have been developing the online RaDAR Sport log
and has been tested mainly by the CW guys in ZS. It caters for RaDAR Grid exchanges. This online system will need to be used during the RaDAR Sport challenges. It will allow the world to see the activities taking place throughout the world and chasers can now have better opportunities to work RaDAR Sport participants and they will have a general idea where the
stations are active having international access to the online logbook.




I have also built an Evaluator so each period can be evaluated separately
or an evaluation of the international 24 hour period can be done in
literally, seconds. The Evaluator has been tested and has become very
popular. An option to do the RaDAR Sport evaluations still needs to be
written but the infrastructure is now there to evaluate just about any type
of contest. In the case of RaDAR, accurate grid exchanges are critical. No points for unmatched grids or incorrect times.




Keeps these ideas in mind and try to do the November challenge according to these rules.




The online logbook can be accessed on http://www.radarops.co.za/radarsport/RaDAR_Sport.html




The Evaluator can be accessed on http://www.radarops.co.za/radarsport/evaluate_Sprint.html




System access is controlled via registered PINs so RaDAR Sport participants
can request a PIN from Eddie ZS6BNE in time for the RaDAR Sport challenge.
This is there to limit any abuse of the system.




Hope to see your callsigns in the log! 73 de Eddie ZS6BNE

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