This weekend (which starts this evening) is the Japan Ham Fair. There is a D-STAR repeater setup at the Hamfest site and they have asked everyone to connect in and say hello. The repeater is JP1YJJ with the A (439 MHz) and B (1.2 GHz) modules attached.
http://www.jarl.or.jp/English/4_Library/A-4-6_ham-fair/ham-fair.htm for pictures on last year's event. The operating times are 01:00 - 08:00 UTC 8/23/2008 (8PM-3AM EDT, 5PM-Midnight PDT) 01:00 - 07:30 UTC 8/24/2008 - Let's all try to give them an call and say hello! - Their repeaters are not currently running the DPLUS software, so you will need to "Source Route" or "Zone Route" to their repeater. Use the following D-STAR Calculator link to get example programming. (Choose your source repeater to see exact programming) http://www.dstarinfo.com/Calculator/DSTAR%20Web%20Calculator.aspx?Source=KI4SBA&Destination=JP1YJJ&DM=A Once your radio is programmed, make a call. A few hints and suggestions * Many operators will speak English, but go slowly with them, they are having to translate * When making a call, you will have to tell them where you are calling from o CQCQCQ This is WA4YIH on the Cumming Georgia, USA KI4SBA Repeater Module C. K I 4 S B A Port C o Repeat your CQ after about 30 seconds * They will have to program their radios to respond, give them time * There may be a QSO in progress * Notice the times listed above. If the sun is high in the sky on the East Coast of the US, the Ham Fair is closed. * Best times to talk will probably be after midnight, eastern. * You might not be the only one trying to call Japan At Dayton this year, there were a number of people trying to call into the Hamfest repeater. Sometimes there were QSOs going on, sometimes the calling stations didn't identify where they were calling from. The best solution is to be patient. Once you make a contact, there might be a number of additional folks in Japan that have figured out how to talk back to you, and you just might have a JA pileup! Who knows, it's a hamfest, there might even be new D-STAR operators and radios listening! That'll make you the "old timer!" Thanks to Mark Holmes and Gerry Dalton as sources for some of this information. Mark Thompson, Feel free to make sure that every list you distribute to, knows about this. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
