Wayne.B wrote in
:

Is there a HCWA? If so, you and I will both be eligible next year.



Hmm...true! I don't think it exists, though.

Internet sure has ruined ham radio here. I haven't had an antenna up in
years. Nobody complains I'm on their private net frequency on Skype...(c;

On Sun, 17 Dec 2006 15:31:44 -0500, Larry wrote:

Internet sure has ruined ham radio here. I haven't had an antenna up in
years. Nobody complains I'm on their private net frequency on Skype...(c;

My rig is on the boat. Pactor, Winlink, APRS and Airmail are the best
things that ever happened to ham radio in my estimation, and serve a
real purpose when you are cruising offshore or in any
non-wifi/cellular area.

Wayne.B wrote in
:

My rig is on the boat. Pactor, Winlink, APRS and Airmail are the best
things that ever happened to ham radio in my estimation, and serve a
real purpose when you are cruising offshore or in any
non-wifi/cellular area.




I have a 3W 800/2W 1900 bidirectional cellular linear from
cellantenna.com, the DA4000. It's really a nicely made piece of
equipment. Alltel is on 800 Mhz, here, so I'm using an 11-element
Decibel Products, gamma-matched 800 Mhz paging point-to-point antenna a
friend who was in the paging business for years gave me. Haul the beam
up the main on a lanyard and point it in the direction of shore with 24W
ERP really makes a hot CDMA cellphone going down the coast. I also use
it in my service truck out in the country fixing church organs for fun
and profit. My old V60i still has AMPS and that helps, too...(c;

I've never used the ham email services. Pactor was a mistake as it's way
too expensive and proprietary, of course. But, if you want service, you
have to bite the bullet and buy it. Too bad, I think.

When Iridium went bankrupt, I stumbled upon an Iridium
phone/charger/etc., for $25 as they thought it was going dark. I kept it
for a museum piece, then suddenly Iridium was back, of course. It
connects but I don't buy service as I don't need it. If I were going
seriously to sea, I'd buy Iridium service. I've carried it to sea out
250 miles just to see how well it connected and it works great just
anywhere in a plastic yacht.

On Saturday, I read about the code requirement being dropped. I have
an SSB on the boat, but my marine license greatly restricts what I can
do with it (no weather nets or email). So based on some advise I found
on the internet, I downloaded the test and answers and studied only the
answers ( it is a multi choice test) for 2 days. Tonight I'm excited
to say, I passed both the technician and general tests.

In Feburary I will need to submit my temporary general certificate and
the FCC will upgrade it to full General status.

I never would have done this if I had to learn code. I thank who ever
had the idea to give it the heave ho.

-Mark

"Mark R." wrote in news:1166597141.744688.9730@
73g2000cwn.googlegroups.com:

In Feburary I will need to submit my temporary general certificate and
the FCC will upgrade it to full General status.

I never would have done this if I had to learn code. I thank who ever
had the idea to give it the heave ho.

-Mark


Congratulations, Mark! Welcome to ham radio! I'm an old ham, but also
hate code. They didn't make me ride a horse before giving me my drivers
test...same idea. Ham radio has been dying of "old age" for a couple of
decades, now. I'm hoping we can save it by stopping this "keep 'em off
my bands by making them learn Morse" mentality the old fogies at ARRL
have used from the 30's to keep ham radio for themselves.

Ok, now, GET BACK TO WORK ON THE EXTRA TEST! When I see your call come
out on www.qrz.com, I wanna see EXTRA, not General in that block! Don't
disappoint me, ok?

73 DE W4CSC/MM2
Larry
I was 11 when I got mine....er, ah, back in 1957....
It's been a helluva ride!
Take a look at what 70,000 watts on 40 meters does to a big insulator.
Put my ham call into the call search box at www.qrz.com. Every ham radio
operator's real information is exposed for all to see....even your
birthdate! How embarrassing...(c;

Had breakfast with an old friend this morning. He got HIS license in
1934 from the "new" FCC!

In article m,
"Mark R." wrote:

I never would have done this if I had to learn code. I thank who ever
had the idea to give it the heave ho.

I had the technical knowledge back in the late 60s, but didn't get the
code up fast enough for the ticket I wanted, so got a CB back when they
were licensed. Had fun building antennas and bouncing around the world
on 5 watts, the only reason I wanted the ticket anyway.

Someone posted a link to a test here a while back and I discovered that
I still can pass the tests I want without cracking a book. Maybe will,
though I already have too many hobbies to keep up with.

--
Jere Lull
Xan-a-Deux ('73 Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD)
Xan's Pages: http://members.dca.net/jerelull/X-Main.html
Our BVI FAQs (290+ pics) http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/

Jere Lull wrote in news:jerelull-0805D7.20221020122006
@news.bellatlantic.net:

Had fun building antennas and bouncing around the world
on 5 watts, the only reason I wanted the ticket anyway.


Come on, Jere....Fess up! NO CBer ever ran 5 watts!

The ham who gave me the test for Amateur Extra used to be called the "Mud
Duck" on AM CB. He had twin 5-element monsters up 100' and ran about 4KW
of carrier at 100% modulation....(c;

I can talk about him now, because he's gone...died of cancer. Any ham
would have been proud to see his huge CB station....



Larry
--
Why is it, in any city, all traffic lights act as if they have rotary
timers in them, like they did in 1955, and are all set to create
maximum inconvenience and block traffic movement, entirely?

In article ,
Larry wrote:

Jere Lull wrote in news:jerelull-0805D7.20221020122006
@news.bellatlantic.net:

Had fun building antennas and bouncing around the world
on 5 watts, the only reason I wanted the ticket anyway.


Come on, Jere....Fess up! NO CBer ever ran 5 watts!


Well, you found one. License was in Dad's name, and I was more than a
little "respectful" of him. This was when the FCC *did* investigate, at
least in our area.

Still have a SSB CB in the closet. That was sorta interesting.

--
Jere Lull
Xan-a-Deux ('73 Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD)
Xan's Pages: http://members.dca.net/jerelull/X-Main.html
Our BVI FAQs (290+ pics) http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/

Jere Lull wrote in news:jerelull-17F4D3.01260926122006
@news.bellatlantic.net:

Come on, Jere....Fess up! NO CBer ever ran 5 watts!


Well, you found one. License was in Dad's name, and I was more than a
little "respectful" of him. This was when the FCC *did* investigate, at
least in our area.

Still have a SSB CB in the closet. That was sorta interesting.


In 1957, both when I got my ham license and at the start of 27 Mhz CB
operations, I got 20W1956. I built the Knight Kit CB-1, which was nothing
more than a bunch of parts and a Bud box when it came. You had to wind
your own coils around the provided forms, even. CB was new. Noone had
parts..(c; It was a regenerative receiver that hissed away madly all the
time and a simple 1-tube transmitter with only 1 channel. I used to lay
crystals out on a piece of paper with the channel numbers on it so I could
rapidly swap crystals when one of the rich CBers said, "Go to Channel 8" on
his fancy Gonset or Globe mobile that had from 3 to 9 channels. Oh, how I
dreamed of owning one of those radios...(c;

The sunspot cycle was the highest it had been in 50 years. With only a
vertical dipole strung between two 2x4s nailed up a tree, you could easily
work Florida to California from upstate NY on 4 watts, all anyone had.

Heath came out with a little 4-transistor regen walkie talkie kit really
cheap. It was a 3" x 3" box about 9" tall. The front of it had a big
knob, only one, that was on-off-volume and a red pushbutton on the side for
PTT. It was only one channel, too, Channel 11. Everyone was on Channel 11
because that's what most radios came with. Every kid in my school wanted
one. Walkies were unlicensed under 100mw. Burgess sold a lot of large 9V
transistor batteries because of me. I got so I could build one in an hour
without opening the instructions....(c; I must have made 50 of them. The
little Heath soon replaced our 1-wire Morse Code network we'd used for many
years across the town...buzzers and batteries...car batteries.

My dad finally came around, much later, and got one of those new fangled CB
calls we all scoffed at...rookies. He was KLP-9928. Oh, the shame of
having a rookie call in the house...(c;

CB was great fun, but my life was ham radio. A bunch of old hams, who used
to hang out in Jerry Hess' surplus electronic junk shop around an old coal-
fired potbelly stove hooked us boys. Tiring of us hogging their HF
stations almost every night, they decided the only way to get rid of the
nuisances was to get them their own ham licenses and stations. Jerry had
tons of parts from WW2 and Korea to donate. All the boys got 5Y3 and 6V6
Novice transmitters and loaner receivers. Mine was a Hallicrafters Sky
Buddy. AM soon followed. I got a Heath DX-100 AM monster kit for
Christmas and passed General. I was 13. The DX-100 also worked 100W of AM
on CB....(c;

Name withheld - 5th Amendment Invoked....