Great service and free. Not much of that left.


"Larry" wrote in message
...
" paul.delaney@affinity-
one.com.au wrote in news:1192504101.344339.124940
@t8g2000prg.googlegroups.com:

Hi I am interested to hear any comments about the GPS Tracking
(track
your boat via PC) for boat owners small and large alike.

Would this technolgy benefit owners?

Does anyone already have experience of GPS Tracking?

All comments welcome.

I own a tracking company based in Perth WA and want to get
honest
views.



We ham radio operators have been using vehicle tracking for
years. We have tracking equipment on runners at local footraces,
bike races, high altitude balloons, boats, cars, etc.

Ours was invented by Bob Bruninga at the US Naval Academy, WB4APR
is his ham call, hence the APRS (Automatic Packet Reporting
System) name. You can monitor packet radio activity across the
planet on our little APRS system at:
http://www.findu.com/
The APRS system has been expanded to also include weather station
data at hams' homes, Citizen Weather Observer Program, messaging,
and other data collection and distribution uses you'll read about
on the pointers from the page.

Boats could easily be tracked by having an HF-licensed ham aboard
and broadcasting the HF packets using LSB on the upper limit of
the 10.5 Mhz ham band. APRS uses 10.151 LSB so its two FSK
sidebands are barely inside the band allotted. This band has
very wide coverage 24/7. There is also and extensive relay
network findu is connected with on the 2 meter VHF FM ham band.

Google APRS to find more sights. K4HG-8 (the -8 is so we can
have up to 15 unique calls on APRS from 15 unique stations per
ham) is his mobile in the Florida Keys. He's one of the guys who
run findu.com. The map on that page shows you his vehicle's
current position.

Boaters don't have to pay-pay-pay for this service anyone can
track their boats with. All they need do is buy the HF/VHF ham
equipment which is really cheap, a packet modem and download the
free APRS software. Some ham radios are made specifically to
support APRS. All you do is feed them GPS data (RMC will do)
from any NMEA network and the radio will broadcast APRS, itself.
Findu is free for anyone. You can even filter it to show only
boats broadcasting. A huge network of findu ham-to-internet
relay stations feeds it. We have one in Charleston run by the
Charleston Amateur Radio Society (CARS), who also run a VHF
packet relay station to expand its range.

73 DE W4CSC/MM

Larry
--
You can tell there's extremely
intelligent life in the universe
because they have never called Earth.

"jlrogers" wrote in news:sFpRi.5737
:

Great service and free. Not much of that left.



All services on ham radio are voluntary and always free. It's
what we do best. Ask any of these cruisers who have used the
message services of the 14.300 Mhz Maritime Mobile Service Net
over the past decades.

We are not allowed, by FCC regulations in the USA, to accept any
gratuities for services rendered over ham radio. We hams
wouldn't have it any other way.

The phone company fought tooth and nail for decades with their
FCC minions to prevent hams from making phone patches for third
party persons. Some countries still have laws preventing hams
from making free phone calls over their ham radio stations for
3rd parties.

In times of dire emergencies, like hurricanes or earthquakes, ham
radio is always the communications system that comes out of the
pile.....since as far back as young ham David Sarnoff reported
the SOS he heard on his ham radio from "Titanic" in 1912.

Larry
--
73 DE W4CSC

In article ,
Larry wrote:

All services on ham radio are voluntary and always free. It's
what we do best. Ask any of these cruisers who have used the
message services of the 14.300 Mhz Maritime Mobile Service Net
over the past decades.

Can you point me to a good overview list of such services in the ham
community (for beginners).
I never came around to do the licence, but am starting boating again.
As an MSEE it is quite easy to get the ham licence - so as I do not have
any plans on building tranceivers myself, I should get started quite
easily. And with a Macintosh computer running OS X I do understand that
quite a few services can run on it when connected to a ham radio. (If
you have pointers for such sofware too :-)

TIA

Marc

--
Switzerland/Europe
http://www.heusser.com
remove CHEERS and from MERCIAL to get valid e-mail

In article , Marc Heusser wrote:
And with a Macintosh computer running OS X I do understand that
quite a few services can run on it when connected to a ham radio. (If
you have pointers for such sofware too :-)

I'm not a ham, but as a Linux and OS X user this is of vague interest to me (of course, this tech. applied to sailing is also of interest). Anyway, here's a link to a list of stuff that you should be able to get to work (how useful (any of) it is I can't say):

http://packages.debian.org/stable/hamradio/

In case the "Debian GNU Linux" throws you, OS X is built on Unix, Linux is Unix (more or less - enough that it won't make a difference for your purposes).... but Linux != OS X (just is case you were adding two and two and making 5).

Justin.

--
Justin C, by the sea.

Justin C wrote in
:

http://packages.debian.org/stable/hamradio/

Thanks for the pointer, Justin! I want to try a few of these on my
new Nokia N800 Linux internet tablet....(c;

Larry
--
You can tell there's extremely
intelligent life in the universe
because they have never called Earth.

On Wed, 17 Oct 2007 21:18:42 +0200, Marc Heusser
alid wrote:

In article ,
Larry wrote:

All services on ham radio are voluntary and always free. It's
what we do best. Ask any of these cruisers who have used the
message services of the 14.300 Mhz Maritime Mobile Service Net
over the past decades.

Can you point me to a good overview list of such services in the ham
community (for beginners).
I never came around to do the licence, but am starting boating again.
As an MSEE it is quite easy to get the ham licence - so as I do not have
any plans on building tranceivers myself, I should get started quite
easily. And with a Macintosh computer running OS X I do understand that
quite a few services can run on it when connected to a ham radio. (If
you have pointers for such sofware too :-)


Here are a few starting points:

http://www.findu.com/

http://www.ew.usna.edu/~bruninga/aprs.html

http://www.winlink.org/

http://www.winlink.org/Client.htm#AirmailBookMARK

Marc Heusser
alid wrote in
:

Can you point me to a good overview list of such services in
the ham
community (for beginners).
I never came around to do the licence, but am starting boating
again.
As an MSEE it is quite easy to get the ham licence - so as I do
not have
any plans on building tranceivers myself, I should get started
quite
easily. And with a Macintosh computer running OS X I do
understand that
quite a few services can run on it when connected to a ham
radio. (If
you have pointers for such sofware too :-)

TIA

Marc


Sure, Marc. Start at www.qrz.com where there is lots of free
information. I've no idea what the Swiss testing and licensing
is, however. Your national prefix is HB9 and I have many Swiss
friends because of a Swiss friend, Werner AA4IX who lives here.
He's 83, from Steffisburg/Thun on the Thunersee in Berner
Oberland.

I'm sure you can find a local Swiss ham radio club to help you
get into the hobby. On your boat, I highly recommend the Icom
M802 marine SSB because you simply hold down a couple of buttons
and turn it on to open it up for all frequencies, including ham
radio use. Many boaters use ham equipment they're not supposed
to for marine HF, here, because ham rigs are much cheaper. Who's
going to arrest you in the middle of the Atlantic?...(c;

I found this website with MAC software for ham radio:
http://machamradio.com/HamsAndX.html

Swiss ham radio goes way back:
http://www.oneillselectronicmuseum.c...histsec_1.html

Here's some more websites:
http://www.eham.net/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._organizations

I think the Swiss national ham radio organisation can help you:
http://www.uska.ch/

http://www.w4mnr.com/w4mnrlinks.htm
http://www.hb9drv.ch/
http://forums.ham-radio.ch/index.php?
s=cf25a2958ac3f9529f331160d60dadf0
http://forums.ham-radio.ch/member.php?u=3

Best of luck to you! Ham radio means you're not alone out there.

Larry
--
73 DE W4CSC
Charleston, South Carolina USA
http://www.qrz.com/callsign
put w4csc into the callsign box...(c;

Thank you both, Larry and Wayne. That should get me started.

In article ,
Larry wrote:

I've no idea what the Swiss testing and licensing
is, however.

Basically the same as in most countries. There is a beginners licence,
and a full licence (CEPT).

As an MSEE you do not have to pass any technical exam (where there is a
difference between beginners and full licence), just 50 pages of
regulations, which are the same for both. So in essence it only requires
to learn some 100 or 200 items of regulatory rules, that's it.

Marc

--
Switzerland/Europe
http://www.heusser.com
remove CHEERS and from MERCIAL to get valid e-mail

Marc Heusser
alid wrote in
:

As an MSEE you do not have to pass any technical exam (where
there is a
difference between beginners and full licence), just 50 pages
of
regulations, which are the same for both. So in essence it only
requires
to learn some 100 or 200 items of regulatory rules, that's it.



In the US, they don't care if you have PhDEE, you take the test.

At least they've stopped with the stupid Morse testing that's
like making you show them you know how to ride a horse before
they let you take the driver's test for cars.....

Larry
--
You can tell there's extremely
intelligent life in the universe
because they have never called Earth.

In article ,
Larry wrote:

In the US, they don't care if you have PhDEE, you take the test.

Am I glad US and Switzerland seem to recognize each other's licences,
should I ever get to US again :-)

Marc

--
Switzerland/Europe
http://www.heusser.com
remove CHEERS and from MERCIAL to get valid e-mail