On Sun, 07 Oct 2007 22:20:38 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

Ya think? :)

Ham radio is now nothing more than glorified CB.

=====================================

Check your EMAIL. Good article in today's Wall Street Journal.

On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 09:35:15 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Sun, 07 Oct 2007 22:20:38 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

Ya think? :)

Ham radio is now nothing more than glorified CB.

=====================================

Check your EMAIL. Good article in today's Wall Street Journal.

I did and thank you for that.

Great article. I was never in those guys league, but in my heyday, I
had solid copy on 60 WPM and believe it or not, I could copy 60 baud
RTTY. Learned that trick from my Dad.

It's sad to see a great communications mode just die off. What the
heck could be simpler than Morse code? A little time, a little
practice and your in the groove at 20 WPM.

I saw his comment about Morse and the League - I'm in total agreement
with him on that one. That was the reason why I cancelled my QST and
QEX subscriptions and left my position with the League totally
disillusioned. That was also during the Great W1AW "renovation"
cleverly disguised as a certain high ranking Corporate Officer's wet
dream operating station and his connection to Harris Corporation.

Now that all the old timers on the lower end of 80 are all dying off,
there's nobody left to play high speed yacking anymore. :)

Time marches on I guess. Oh well.

I will get the last laugh though. When all this digital crap lays
down and dies in a massive solar burst, those of us who still have
analog gear and a bug or key will be the ones who can communicate and
then WE WILL RULE THE WORLD!!

Er...ahem...

Sorry. :)

Thanks again - that was a great read.

On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 11:30:25 -0400, wrote:

On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 14:19:56 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

It's sad to see a great communications mode just die off. What the
heck could be simpler than Morse code? A little time, a little
practice and your in the groove at 20 WPM

You needed 6 WPM flashing light to get out of USCG boot camp in the
60s. I guess that went away too now that everyone has a radio or phone
on their belt.

Heh...

Got it in one. :)

"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 11:30:25 -0400, wrote:

On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 14:19:56 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

It's sad to see a great communications mode just die off. What the
heck could be simpler than Morse code? A little time, a little
practice and your in the groove at 20 WPM

You needed 6 WPM flashing light to get out of USCG boot camp in the
60s. I guess that went away too now that everyone has a radio or phone
on their belt.

Heh...

Got it in one. :)

To be a pilot you needed 5 wpm. I just looked at the keys on the Tacan and
read the code. The ID of a station is still probably Morris.

On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 14:19:56 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

I will get the last laugh though. When all this digital crap lays
down and dies in a massive solar burst, those of us who still have
analog gear and a bug or key will be the ones who can communicate and
then WE WILL RULE THE WORLD!!

Then you should practice your skills at hand making a decent triode.
It's unlikely that there will be any close at hand when needed. Almost
everything else is pretty low tech when you think about it.

Garth Almgren wrote in news:5mtvdsFf8cs8U1
@mid.individual.net:

Aw, no fun doing it the easy way.



Actually, I got lots of people higher-class ham licenses who
couldn't put batteries in a 2-cell flashlight, by using Dale
Carnegie's rote memorization techniques.....

One - Run
Two - Zoo
Three - Tree
Four - Door
Five - Hive
......etc.

Never read the wrong answers. Look at the question and associate
what it tells you is the RIGHT answer, whether it's the right
answer or not. Try to make a picture of the question associated
with some silly picture, the sillier the better, with what you're
told is the correct answer. You need a separate silly picture
for each question. Dirty pictures seem to work even better...(c;

Makes test taking real easy. You can learn about ham radio and
electronics later, after you get on the air with your new
license. The object is to get the LICENSE, not become an
electronic technician or professional radio operator. Once you
adjust to this thinking, getting any ham license is real easy,
now that the "Code Test Punishment" is over.

Larry W4CSC
--
You can tell there's extremely
intelligent life in the universe
because they have never called Earth.

Short Wave Sportfishing wrote in
:

I will get the last laugh though. When all this digital crap
lays
down and dies in a massive solar burst, those of us who still
have
analog gear and a bug or key will be the ones who can
communicate and
then WE WILL RULE THE WORLD!!



What nonsense. My PSK31 station can copy a signal so weak I
can't even hear the tones and it barely makes a track on the
waterfall display of Winwarbler, which can copy THREE of them
SIMULTANEOUSLY. You don't even need to buy some bogus "box" hams
always seem to need. Just let the computer listen to the
headphone jack.

I worked a guy in New Zealand on 14.070 PSK31 running 80mw to a
20M vertical! NO MORSE operator is that good.....or that fast.

Bull****.

Larry W4CSC
--
If you have an HF receiver and a Windows PC, download Winwarbler
from:
http://www.dxlabsuite.com/winwarbler/
Plug your receiver's headphone audio output into your computer
sound card's mic or line in jack so the sound card can listen to
the radio. Tune the receiver to LSB on 14.070 Mhz and leave it
there. The sideband receiver's bandwidth is around 4Khz, the
full width of the 20 meter PSK band. Every tiny pair of faint
lines running down that display are SEPARATE stations chatting
away on PSK31 or 63. Click one of the three Winwarbler windows
to highlight and switch to that window. Then, click your mouse
over the center of one of the little tracks, no matter how faint.
Repeat this with the other two channels of Winwarbler on
different stations across the display, ever so slightly a few
hertz apart in frequency. All three stations will print
SIMULTANEOUSLY as they are typing. This technology was invented
BY HAMS, FOR HAMS, to replace quirky, pulsating commercial
nonsense.

PSK stations typically run only 10 watts, not kilowatts, to
reduce interference between each other caused by intermodulation
distortion in the transmitters and overloading of the receivers
listening worldwide. We can run the power up to 1500W PEP, but
that's never necessary or wanted, jamming the narrow bandwidth it
uses. It's simply AMAZING how far DOWN you can turn your power
output on PSK and still carry on a full text conversation with
someone on the other side of this planet. 80 milliwatts to New
Zealand, both ways....simply amazing.

Download and install WinWarbler. It's free. Give it a listen
while you're bored to tears sitting becalmed and fed up doing
boatwork.

On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 18:33:01 +0000, Larry wrote:

Makes test taking real easy. You can learn about ham radio and
electronics later, after you get on the air with your new
license. The object is to get the LICENSE, not become an
electronic technician or professional radio operator. Once you
adjust to this thinking, getting any ham license is real easy,
now that the "Code Test Punishment" is over.

Exactly why it's all glorified CB now.

What a bunch of (as my Grandfather used to say in polite company)
bullfeathers.

Learn electronics later - jeezum pete.

Oh, and do be sure to join the ARRL so they can keep their pensions
intact.

"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 18:33:01 +0000, Larry wrote:

Makes test taking real easy. You can learn about ham radio and
electronics later, after you get on the air with your new
license. The object is to get the LICENSE, not become an
electronic technician or professional radio operator. Once you
adjust to this thinking, getting any ham license is real easy,
now that the "Code Test Punishment" is over.

Exactly why it's all glorified CB now.

What a bunch of (as my Grandfather used to say in polite company)
bullfeathers.

Learn electronics later - jeezum pete.

Oh, and do be sure to join the ARRL so they can keep their pensions
intact.

What was the name of the book series that always pushed the ARRL? Scifi,
where the guy ended up on an alien planet.

On Mon, 8 Oct 2007 15:04:36 -0700, "Calif Bill"
wrote:


"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
.. .
On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 18:33:01 +0000, Larry wrote:

Makes test taking real easy. You can learn about ham radio and
electronics later, after you get on the air with your new
license. The object is to get the LICENSE, not become an
electronic technician or professional radio operator. Once you
adjust to this thinking, getting any ham license is real easy,
now that the "Code Test Punishment" is over.

Exactly why it's all glorified CB now.

What a bunch of (as my Grandfather used to say in polite company)
bullfeathers.

Learn electronics later - jeezum pete.

Oh, and do be sure to join the ARRL so they can keep their pensions
intact.

What was the name of the book series that always pushed the ARRL? Scifi,
where the guy ended up on an alien planet.

Well, there was the Radio Boys mysteries of the early 30/40s. Juvenile
adventures. And of course the Hardy Boys did one involving radio.

There was a series from the early 60's but for some reason I can't
find the name of the series.

And recently Cynthia Wall, KA7ITT wrote a series of youth books about
amateur radio.

There was a Star Trek:TNG episode about amateur radio - Episode 41:
Pen Pals.

Intersting bit of trivia: Several of the Star Trek: TOS and TNG
writers and producers were hams and incorporated Morse code into a lot
of the episodes as "easter eggs" for hams to decipher.

Probably the most famous was the flashing lights on TNG that broadcast
"Shatner is bald". :) Can't remember which episode that was.