[Dstar] Australian D-Star Network News

Thu Jul 2 22:54:07 CST 2009

G'day,

Here is this month's news and information on VK D-Star.

North East Victoria D-Star;

The D-Star trial at Mt Wombat was a great success. It gave operators in
North East Victoria and Southern NSW experience at operating on D-Star via
the VK3RWW Portable repeater. The D-Star presentation and training session
at the Shepparton and District ARC club went very well and the club has
decide to initiate a project to purchase a UHF D-Star repeater and install
it at Mt Wombat. The Shepparton ARC web site can be found at
http://www.sadarc.org/ 

Central Coast Club D-Star installation;

The NSW Central Coast Club is well on the way to finalizing their D-Star
repeater installation. They currently have the repeater on air and are
building the Gateway server. The D-Star repeater callsign VK2RAG is located
at the Somersby repeater site near Gosford

International D-Star News;

The International D-Star News letter has called for articles for it's next
edition. If you have any items you would like to submit please visit t
www.DSTARINFO.com/newsletter<http://www.DSTARINFO.com/newsletter> for
details.

Australian D-Star Reflector;

The Reflector 003 server suffered a motherboard failure a few weeks ago and
has been off-line since. The good news is that the reflector is getting a
new 'industrial strength" server. The new server is currently being
installed and the reflector should be back up and running next week.

Dedicated D-Rats Reflector:

The owner of D-Star Reflector 015 has made port C (ref015C) available for
Slow Speed Data (SSD) transfers using D-Rats and other D-Star SSD and chat
applications. Note that SSD is discouraged on most of the VK D-Star
repeaters as it has can have a negative impact on voice communications.

World Wide D-Star Map;

A new D-Star repeater map is available from
http://home.comcast.net/~timmik/dstarsearch.html  This map shows you the
location of all the D-Star repeaters that are connected to the International
US Trust Server. It does not include the Japanese or the stand-a-lone D-Star
repeaters.

Australian National D-Star Network Status.

VK2RDS

The ADSL uplink issue is still being worked on by the local Admin team. They
have replaced the router and the modem and have found a problem with the
Dplus linking system which they are working to fix with the assistance of
the US software developer. This problem prevents outbound linking. The
broadband connection to the D-Star International Network is now running on
test. Access to VK2RDS is now available via the DV-Dongle and gateway
linking, however only one DV-Dongle is allowed to connect to the repeater
Gateway at a time.

VK2RWN

The router issue is being worked on by the VK2RWN Admin who plan to replace
the current network router shortly. The repeater will be moved to a new
building shortly and may be off air for a time during the move.

VK3RMM

The 2 mtr C port is now operational on 146.9625 MHz with good reports from
most areas including Bendigo, Geelong and Echuca.

VK4RWN

We believe we have come up with a way to fix the duplicate IP issue on this
Gateway and will try to implement this in the next few weeks. There has been
little progress made with the 70cm and 23cm DV RF modules due to the current
employer (day time job) demands on many of the Gold Coast Admin team
members.

VK6RWN

The jitter and lose of audio issues when callsign routing to VK6RWN have
been fixed with the replacement of the old router with a new DrayTek router.
Tests and reports have indicated that the callsign routing on this repeater
is now working well. Work has commenced on the 23cm Digital Data filters and
building the 23cm DV side of the repeater. Thanks to the WARG D-Star Admin
team for all their hard work.

D-Star Repeater Status Summary

VK2RAG - Under Construction / Test

-         Currently No gateway connection

VK2RDS - Operational on all bands except 23cm DD. 

-         ADSL uplink issues are causing some jitter (poor audio)

-         Limited DV-Dongle access.

-         Outbound linking unavailable.

VK2RWN - Operational on all bands except 23cm DD & DV. 

-         ADSL uplink issues are causing some jitter (poor audio)

-         No DV-Dongle access

VK3RBA - Operational 

-         Currently No gateway connection

VK3RDK - Operational

-         Currently no gateway connection

VK3RWN - Operational

VK3RWW - Not Currently Operational

VK3RMM -Operational on 70cm & 2mtrs

-         Currently no gateway connection

VK4RWN - Operational

-         70cm DV& 23cm DV off air

-         duplicate IP address an issue for Linking

VK4RDS - Operational

VK4RBX - Operational

-         Currently no gateway connection

VK5REX - Operational

-         Experimentation continues with Home Brew equipment and D-Star
HotSpot

VK5RWN - Operational on all bands except 23cm DD & DV

-         Gateway not operational

VK6RWN - Operational on all bands except 23cm DV

VK8RAD - Check with local repeater operators.

Reflector 003 - Not Currently Operational

For more details visit www.dstar.org.au <http://www.dstar.org.au/>  or
http://www.wia.org.au/members/repeaters/data/

Weekly Nets

The WIA D-Star repeaters port C connect to the following nets each week:

EMDRC Net

 <http://www.emdrc.com.au/> www.emdrc.com.au

Thursday 8pm ESST (10:00 UTC)

VK3RWN C

REF003 C

Ozark Mountain D-STAR Net

http://www.w0omd.org/

Monday 12noon ESST  (02:00 UTC)

W0OMD C

REF001 C

If you would like your local D-Star repeater to participate in other D-Star
nets please email me.

A list of D-Star nets can be found at http://www.dstar.org.au/reflectors.htm
and http://www.dstarinfo.com/Nets/Nets.htm

Reflector Connections.

When the reflector is back on line:

VK3RWN Port C is connected to Reflector 003 C

(This port can be disconnected using the UnLink command when required. 

It will automatically re-link after a preset time of no RF activity.)

The following connections are normally established on Reflector 003:

VK2RDS Port B is connected to Reflector 003 B

VK2RWN Port B is connected to Reflector 003 B

VK3RWN Port B is connected to Reflector 003 B

VK4RDS Port C is connected to Reflector 003 C

VK5REX Port B is connected to Reflector 003 B or VK5RWN C

VK6RWN Port B is connected to Reflector 003 B

Reflector REF003 port B is the Australian National D-Star connection port.

NOTE: The D-Star linking application occasionally has problems. If you are
taking on a link (such as port B) and getting no response it is possible
that the linking system may need to be reset. Please place an email
notification of the problem on this list for assistance.

User Callsigns

There has been some discussion on the use of multiple callsign suffixes.
Many operators use a different suffix for each radio, M for mobile P for
portable etc.. ( e.g. VK3UR M or VK3UR P ) This can be confusing for remote
stations and friends when they callsign route to you. They may not know
which radio or callsign you are using at the time and will probably use your
base callsign ( VK3UR ) to contact you.

Hint; Use the same callsign on all radios unless you are using 2 radios at
the same time.

DPRS Beacons

Remember to set your Auto transmit beacon rate for DPRS to 10 Minutes for
mobiles and 30 Minutes for home stations. If your station is unattended turn
off all DPRS beacons.

Linking (Dplus)

The Linking and Unlink functions on Ports A & C of all WIA D-Star repeaters
is available to operators.

Linking allows operators on the local D-Star repeater port to link to a
remote D-Star reflector or repeater port without the operator needing to
program anything special in their URCALL field. This enables a virtual
repeater to be set up between the local port and one or more (if using a
reflector) remote D-Star repeater ports around the world.

Operational hints;

-                   The local WIA repeater systems are configured to
automatically unlink the connection in 15 minutes if there is no local RF
activity.

-                   At selected times when nets are scheduled the repeater
system will automatically drop any links, temporarily disable operator
linking on the port and set the system up for the net. After the net is
completed operations will be restored to normal.

-                   The local WIA repeater will transmit a link status text
message to all radios on the RF port every 10 minutes.

-                   An voice announcement indicating the port you are on is
linked will be played every 15 minutes.

For details on how to use D-Star linking please read the Guide at
http://www.dstar.org.au/Australian_D-Star_Repeater_Linking_User_Guide_V1.1.p
df

WIA D-Star repeater Port Bs are not enabled for operator link control.

Non WIA D-Star repeaters may or may not have operator linking available.

You can use Callsign Routing, Node Linking or Multicasting when you wish to
call any remote operators. For help with radio configurations for Routing
visit the D-Star Calculator at
<http://www.dstarinfo.com/Calculator/Default.htm>
www.dstarinfo.com/Calculator/Default.htm

More information on D-Star is at www.dstar.org.au <http://www.dstar.org.au/>

Cheers,

Richard

VK3JFK

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