You can watch the ATV QSO Party here!

[VK3LL]

The fifth annual ATV QSO Party is scheduled for Friday 21st and Saturday 22nd August Melbourne Australia time. This event is sponsored by Amateur Radio Victoria and the Melbourne ATV Group. The first event was a part of the celebration of 100 years of Amateur Radio Victoria. The convenor of this event is Peter VK3BFG and it will be centred around the Melbourne digital ATV Repeater, VK3RTV. Skype has been used as a conduit between remote stations and repeaters but this year VK3RTV will stream with high quality through the world wide facilities of YouTube.

You can view this high quality version here on this web page (below). This facility will enable interstate and international anchors to relay VK3RTV with a very high quality. Of course this output can also can be viewed by amateurs and the general public anywhere in the world. The YouTube relay will take place by courtesy of Ralph VK3LL.

The event will start on Friday night Melbourne time at 8 PM with connections to repeaters VK2RFM and VK2RTV in Sydney with anchor Gary VK2CRJ, VK4RMG in Brisbane with anchor Peter VK4EA, VK5RDC in Port Pirie with anchor David VK5DMC and VK3RBO in Bendigo with anchor Ross VK3CE. It is expected that some remote stations will Skype in to Peter VK3BFG. The Skype name for the ATV QSO Party is 'datvqsoparty' and remote stations should send a request to this Skype name for inclusion in its address book.

Peter VK3BFG will act as net control and ask participants to make their transmissions. All inbound Skype calls including those from interstate and international repeaters will be transmitted to VK3RTV, the output of which will be sent to the British Amateur TV Club Streamer and now the high quality version on YouTube. Most amateurs will transmit to their local ATV repeater, thus maximising the use of amateur radio.

Saturday morning Melbourne time will see a connection to DATV Repeater WR8ATV in Columbus, Ohio in the USA. The local anchor will be Art W8RMC who is a part of the team that developed the DVB-S Exciter called the DATV Express. Later in the morning the QSO Party moves to California where Don KE6BXT will anchor the WÂTN repeater network in Southern California. Saturday night will see action through the Home Counties Repeater GB3HV in the UK.

Any stations wishing to participate can contact Peter VK3BFG at pcossins@bigpond.com. Make a diary date to view and/or participate in this exciting event.

Watch the event live here:



NOTE: After the live stream starts, use the YouTube settings control (lower right) to select the "480" stream for the best viewing experience.

Cheers,
Ralph VK3LL