The AM Forum

This bill could potentially put our 440 MHz frequencies in jeopardy if passed. More information can be found on the ARRL web site: http://www.arrl.org/news/spectrum-management-bill-threatens-amateur-frequencies

.

The FCC isn't initiating this. First line of linked report from previous post: "On February 10, Representative Peter King (R-NY-3), Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, introduced HR 607, the Broadband for First Responders Act of 2011."


The area around 432 MHz is a very active CW and SSB section

ARRL Band Plan 70 Centimeters (420-450 MHz):
420.00-426.00    ATV repeater or simplex with 421.25 MHz video carrier control links and experimental
426.00-432.00    ATV simplex with 427.250-MHz video carrier frequency
432.00-432.07    EME (Earth-Moon-Earth)
432.07-432.10    Weak-signal CW
432.10    70-cm calling frequency
432.10-432.30    Mixed-mode and weak-signal work
432.30-432.40    Propagation beacons
432.40-433.00    Mixed-mode and weak-signal work
433.00-435.00    Auxiliary/repeater links
435.00-438.00    Satellite only (internationally)
438.00-444.00    ATV repeater input with 439.250-MHz video carrier frequency and repeater links
442.00-445.00    Repeater inputs and outputs (local option)
445.00-447.00    Shared by auxiliary and control links, repeaters and simplex (local option)
446.00    National simplex frequency
447.00-450.00    Repeater inputs and outputs (local option)

Unless you're way out in the middle of nowhere where you can't hear any 70 cm activity, the band is active all the time. 70 cm FM repeater activity in metro areas is generally quite active, along with numerous D-Star repeaters and EchoLink activities, and even a number of EME stations. The same can be said for 2 meters and even 220 MHz.

From what I hear on 440, if they turned off all the repeater that are just copies of the ones on 2-meters, there would be little or no activity. Hams better wake up to the fact that 440 is prime real estate for commercial use. Our puny use of it is not going to keep the hounds at bay.

I know there was a decision made by the FCC to tighten bandwidth restrictions on all radios above 148Mhz. At work we have to purchase new radios that create a smaller "FM footprint". I can't remember the spec but it was a fair amount of bandwidth.

Our 70 cm band is quite heavily used for repeater links, remote base stations and repeaters in the west, especially on the west coast where 2 meter FM channels are all occupied.

The US Gummint also has more designs on that spectrum. Stuff like wind profilers and etc have been trashing 450 for years. Same for our 23 cm band.

Isn't this guy one of the kind who has raided the Social Security trurst fund, spends money whe don't have and thinks any radio specturm should be sold to companies who contribute to his re-election/retirement fund? Sounds like a politican to me.   He should be subjected to a barrage of emails from hams about this. 

Patrick, it's the type of proposal from Rep. King that makes it risky to invite outside groups to "evaluate" the Amateur Service.

http://amfone.net/Amforum/index.php?topic=26371.0

> > The objective of the bill -- which is supported by the ARRL -- is
> > for the Secretary of Homeland Security to study the uses and
> > capabilities of Amateur Radio communications

Jim said:
Without making this a politcal thread but more about political actions and threats to our bandspace, I would invite you to check out the following URL which shows who got how much $$$$$. Personally, I was stunned. I think Rep. King is more concerned about First Responders. Pay close attention to the Telcom Services & Equipment and Telephone Utilities. I didn't see his name listed in any of them.

http://www.opencongress.org/money_trail (http://www.opencongress.org/money_trail)

All Congressman and Senators have raided Social Security for decades. Get real and please stay on topic.

The short answer is no. There never was a "trust fund", "lock box" or any other pool of SS money!

But, on topic, Steve's right. At least here in the east, Bill, 440 is really nothing more than a 2 meter mirror band.
Other than that use it's pretty dead here.

And between my home QTH and the Baltimore/Washington area, there is precious little repeater activity on 144 or 440 MHz compared to 20 years ago.

I know there used to be quite a bit of 440 schtick over in the Lynchburg, VA area when I was there. Of course you had your denziens of RF engineers from Antenna Specialists, GE/Ericckson, & Allen Communications.

Once you get past HF and lower VHF, there isn't a lot of difference in propagation regardless of frequency. Other than for what little frequency-sensitive experimentation that goes on in amateur radio, 2m is just like 70cm, which is just like 1 gHz as far as propagation is concerned.  The differences lie mostly in ease of access and demand for the spectrum by competing services.  If we don't use our VHF/UHF/microwave spectrum, we'll eventually lose it, and the vast majority of hams won't even miss it.  Hell, we can't keep 10m occupied when there is no skip propagation.

I am leery of the very concept of auctioning off spectrum; it's a scam concocted by politicians to siphon off more revenue from the public.  The radio spectrum isn't the government's to auction off; it is a public resource already belonging to the citizenry.  The government's only legitimate claim is recouping their expenditure for licensing and policing the spectrum in the manner as necessary to give every member of the citizenry fair access to what limited spectrum is available.  

In other words, this is in reality a hidden federal tax imposed on everyone who lives in the country. The ungodly sums of money paid by the corporations who win spectrum auctions doesn't come out of thin air or from the good graces of the CEOs and stockholders. It comes as part of the overhead expense of operating a business, meaning that the prices of the products the companies sell are driven up a little in order to pay for the spectrum purchased at auction. This cost is passed on to their customers in the form of higher commodity prices, and since those commodities and telecommunications are ubiquitous in the business world and society in general, this expenditure ultimately trickles down to you and me, the public.

The number of Amateur licensees has been declining for years and for years the "Old School" operators have been complaining about how easy it is these days to get licensed (both true!). With the decline of HAMs has come a decline in band usage. That is how it works. What needs to be done is to increase the number of HAMs out there who will use the 70cm bands, we need more Technicians! That means we need to either engage a younger generation in amateur radio or embrace the "HAM-Cram" testing model. I suggest we do both!

 I think that these days very few people get interested in radio because there is so much more to do in terms of global communication, so it is difficult to engage a kid in something that is over a century old (although it is interesting to consider the close similarities!).

 My bet is that most of you got into radio because some relative, or neighbor or what have you kind of showed you the ropes. Or maybe it was the only way for you to have a conversation with anybody from somewhere else. It's not the same these days with SKYPE, the Internet, Twitter, cell phones and instant messaging. It's a different world and we need to accept that and adapt to it rather than just bitch about it. That does not mean that we have to give up 70cm though. It is well used here on the West Coast by many HAMs, many of whom are involved in ARES/RACES. Giving up 70cm would mean we would have to use 1.25M instead, which we are not set up for. That means that we would have collectively wasted millions, if not billions, of dollars on our 70cm equipment.     

You should check your statistics. As an example, for total amateur radio station licenses, January 2009, 664,272, and April 2011, 698,074. And for Technicians, January 2009, 323,248, and April 2011, 342,572. If you want to promote activity on 70 cm, you need to sell why it has value to amateurs over any other VHF/UHF band.

ARRL has their undies in knots over 70 cm but far more hams use HF and 160 m. which are in the process of being destroyed by unintentional radiation from appliances and about which ARRL has done absolutely nothing as far as I can tell.

The number of HAMS may be increasing, but the number of hams has been on the decline for at least a decade. FCC data base statistics don't tell the whole story.  Compare the congestion on 160-80-40 to-day with what it was a generation ago, and then take a listen to your local 2m repeater activity.

This decline in activity is not necessarily a bad thing.  If the level of congestion had continued to rise as the number of hams increased exponentially, as was the case in the late 50s and early 60s, saturation point would have soon been reached, with dire consequences. Uncontrolled growth was stopped dead in its tracks by incentive licensing, which is about the only good thing that can be said about that debacle. Since then, we have seen slo-growth, no-growth and periods of negative growth. While there has recently been a small but steady increase in numbers in the FCC data base, activity on the bands has continued to decline, not just on HF, but on 2m repeaters as well.

What we should hope for would not be a return to exponential growth, but for the active ham population to reach a stable equilibrium point with a reasonably comfortable level of congestion. Remember, "growth" was one of the main instigators that fuelled the anti-AM mood and the obsession with "bandwidth" that existed from the early 60s through about the mid 90s. OTOH, too much negative growth could result in loss of our frequency spectrum by default, particularly at VHF and above.

SSB's struggle for acceptance in the early 1960s was successful in part because of rapid growth in those days among licensed radio hobbyists who primarily operated on HF.

When that lump of activity moved toward 2m in the late 1970s, the level of HF congestion plateaued, and in the past 10 years has begun to improve markedly.

Somewhere preceding and concurrent with that was the increased popularity of AM on HF, where we eventually encountered only a few leftover attitudes about "bandwidth," and the League's discredited companion mantra, "spectrum efficiency."  

A number of years ago, I had a conversation with Fredrick Wentland, now retired from the NTIA¹, who often was quoted or cited by the ARRL as providing the sentiment behind the League's push for "bandwidth" conservation.

The problem for the group in Newington is that he said he never placed the kind of emphasis on the matter that the ARRL had done (surprised? not me). In fact, he said when he was a kid his best memories of "ham" radio involved listening on a Hammarlund receiver of the era.  

We would have been on AM, and he said those of us who are on AM are contributing to the hobby like anyone else.

So the mentality that inexplicably held AM in lower regard may have had a basis in congestion on the phone bands in the 1950s, that was largely resolved by the 1960s.  Anything beyond that had no such basis and was rooted in traditional rivalry and bias.



¹In 2003, Fredrick Wentland was named Associate Administrator for Spectrum Management at the Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).

The "HAM-Cram" testing model has done tremendous damage to our radio service. Hearing all the CB-isms, rancid CB operating habits, foul language, and CB lingo on our bands shows me that these HAMs (sic) are not in decline. On the contrary, they are infesting our bands like cockroaches in a city tenement. When we have "Extras" who don't even know how to make a simple dipole antenna, something is seriously wrong. People who obtain licenses through cram sessions are no more qualified to be in amateur radio than those who memorized the old Baltimore Catechism are qualified to write discourses on theology.

BTW, the term "HAM" (spelled in all capital letters) is itself a CB-ism. And there already is a band for those HAMs (sic), a band which is not currently being threatened by anyone: 27 MHz. When will we start hearing phony Southern accents and "Smokey Bear" reports on 2 meters?

Good use of 70 cm and other bands comes from those who can innovate and build. The very existence of repeaters on the amateur VHF and UHF bands is due to people who bought land mobile equipment that was rendered obsolete by a change in the FCC rules and adapted that equipment to our bands. The late K2IEZ was such a pioneer in New Jersey. Glorified CBers who cram for exams are hardly an asset to amateur radio. The "old school" kind of amateur radio was a good stepping stone to careers in communications and electronics. It led me to a 39 year career in broadcast engineering. And THAT is what we need to be teaching to our young people.

The hottest places in Hell should be reserved for those who run cram sessions for our licensing exams. Quality, not quantity!

 My apologies for using the wrong nomenclature.

 I won't argue that there are not poor manners on the radio (and everywhere else, including the Internet) these days (something that never happened on the radio before I obtained my Tech license in 2002 I am sure), but how can you be certain that these offenders are actually licensed through ham-cramming? From the way you put it I presume that one of the problems is they are not identifying every 10 minutes either, am I right? I have seen posts on different forums where people admit to operating without a license with impunity (one forum posting I recently read said that this subject comes up at least once a week in a new posting, and the person is flamed to a crisp in no time at all). This is a different problem to me than the Spectrum Management Bill, HR 607 that the OP is about.

  If there are not enough people using the bands then perhaps the FCC would be well justified to take them away from amateur use and auctioning them off. My post was only a suggestion as to how amateurs might address declining use of 70cm. It is my opinion that 70cm gets used mostly by newly licensed technicians more than by the Extras who have been licensed for many decades. Perhaps that is an incorrect assumption on my part though.

73
 Hans KG6TJU   

This is one of the reasons why I began to operate AM 98% of the time.  I grew tired of SSB qsos in which no topic was off limits.  Most of the time on AM you still find the civility and adult polite society of on-air operating that was common place when I became a ham.   The same can be said for CW.  On 75 SSB it is like unbleeped satellite talk radio every 3 or 4 kc.   

Hans, welcome to the board -- don't sweat the use of the term HAM.

Capitalized or not, it's a nonsense term that means nothing to those outside the hobby. The reference doesn't even have a foundation within the hobby.

It's just a stupid nickname that distracts from simply saying what we do. I use it only as a pejorative.

---

To the points in your post --  short range FM lends itself to clandestine activity. Even the police have figured out they can create a back channel for their own chit chat, stepping around dispatchers and assigned channels to stay in touch among patrol officers. Indianapolis (Indiana) city police are probably the most celebrated case of operating with impunity this way.

Because of some political sensitivities^*, the ARRL delayed any public acknowledgment of the problem for weeks after the scandal of illicit radio use by police that had been uncovered and reported by a local television station. When Newington did finally express some awareness, their people gave only a third-party summary, and did not include any salacious details of what police were saying on these back channels that the TV reporter had documented, triggering the FCC probe.  

Normally you could expect a preachy, judgmental, patronizing editorial along with the group's coverage. Instead there was only a tepid response from a onetime ARRL contest manager.

http://www.arrl.org/news/fcc-indianapolis-police-department-address-unlicensed-operations

It's also true that the newly licensed radio hobbyist typically begins to operate on FM repeaters, where there no longer are large numbers of seasoned licensees to help mentor the newcomers into procedural traditions and, to encourage compliance with regulatory matters to the lesser extent that was ever needed.  

I mean, once licensed, you're in and there's not much in the way of Rules to meet.

As for use-it-or-lose it,  I think this explains why the group in Newington has discontinued its "spectrum efficiency" rap that was used for so many years.  The first time an outside industry does a monitoring survey of band occupancy, they can make a case that we are not effective stewards of spectrum those commercial interests may then petition to acquire.

This threat may have been the motivation behind all the cross band and internet-related connections among repeaters, to leverage what little activity there is into "occupancy" on multiple outlets.



^* The League may have wished to avoid taking responsibility for this scenario. It was widely thought by various licensees participating in public radio blog discussions that the ARRL's "emergency responder" campaign targeting municipal workers gave such workers the idea they could use "HAM" radio for casual activity like this, licensing matter aside.

Oh, please.

Ability to take a test, no matter how difficult, is no predictor of on-the-air behavior.  How does on-the-air behavior relate to whether one can make a dipole or not? 

I don't know what you're listening to, Phil, but I sure don't hear any evidence of this "infestation" you're talking about.   There have been complaints about poor behavior on the bands for as long as ham radio has been in existence.  Take a look at some of the early 1930s QSTs and read the "Phone Band Phunnies" column, where the ardent CW aficionados in the ARRL poked phun at the antics in the phone bands.


If they are, so what? 


The beauty of ham radio is it's a hobby with many niches and one need not conform to someone else's narrow view of "good use" to have fun with it.  History is all well and good, and there are many around that still convert commercial gear to these bands but others just have a great time with commercially-purchased equipment.   Where's the sin in that?


It still can lead to a technical career, and it doesn't matter a whit where they came from.  Why you would put the hate on someone just because they came from CB is beyond me.


The purpose of the exam is to ensure someone knows enough about theory and rules/regs so as not to cause interference with other services.  It's not a personality detector.  It's not intended to weed out potentially unsavory behavior.  It's not intended to point someone towards a career in broadcast engineering. 

The worst behavior I've heard on the air has been from old school hams, none of whom so far as I'm aware had been CBers.  W4VAN, W2VJZ, and others come to mind.

Granted, passing an exam by itself does not guarantee good behavior. But it still irks me to hear CB-type operating habits on our bands. Some examples: During Field Day a couple of years ago, someone on 20 meter SSB referred to his ARRL Section as his "twenty". I have also heard a lot of CB lingo on 2 meter repeaters, particularly in New Jersey, and a couple of CB types dropping F-bombs on a repeater near Scranton.  The assorted filth, music, deliberate jamming, and other antics on 75 meter SSB are another case in point.


The problem with our dumbed-down exams and the cram sessions is that the people coming out of this system don't even know those things! We have Extras who don't know how to make a simple dipole antenna.  Back in 1968, questions about that were on the Novice exam. It is telling when CEPT in Europe will not recognize our General Class license for reciprocal operating privileges anymore! That, my friend, is a national embarrassment. A couple of days ago, the FCC Daily Digest mentioned an Extra Class operator in Philadelphia who was fined for repeatedly operating on 26.7 MHz. Don't you think that a so-called "Extra" should know better? As for technical careers in broadcast engineering, two-way radio, and related fields, the "old school" type of amateur radio licensing was a help in orienting people toward such careers, despite the fact that amateur radio itself is just a hobby.

Last night I read an article in QST about the 1937 DX Contest (yes, it was a 1937 QST). The end of the article listed dozens of stations that were disqualified for operating out of the ham bands.

Tests have nothing to do with it Phil. All the behavior you mention existed long before the tests were dumbed-down and long before CB radio existed.

Please find another reason to hate amateur radio and the FCC. Your current one is not legitimate.

The number of ham licenses is somewhat erroneous in that it doesn't accurately reflect the number of hams who passed away who are still shown on the FCC database. The ham population is aging rapidly, and the ten year renewal period skews the reality of the  situation. I 'm not arguing that the number of hams isn't increasing, but perhaps not by the numbers some folks quote. Secondly, amateur use of t420 to 450 MHz is as a secondary user. The bill, in its present form is flawed and undoubtedly will undergo numerous revisions before final passage. I hope the DOD has firm plans for a military need PavePaws) and justification to keep those frequencies reserved for military use.

Pete

I don't hate amateur radio. I just hate the dumbing down of amateur radio and the deterioration of operating habits that I have been hearing over the past 15 or 20 years. If I hated amateur radio, I would have surrendered my license and sold my equipment years ago.

As for the FCC as it has existed since the beginning of the Reed Hundt era: What's not to hate about it?

That may well kill HR-607. Another thing that may kill that bill is the proposal to auction 450-470 MHz. That segment is used by a plethora of radio services, including public safety, GMRS, medical transport, and broadcast auxiliary. Regarding the latter service, perhaps the NAB should worry less about mandating FM receiver chips in cell phones and more about losing the band that allows radio stations to do remote broadcasts, such as those high school football games that are so popular in the South. There are a lot of police departments operating repeater outputs around 453 MHz. Forcing them to buy new radios and move to 700 MHz would be an unfunded federal mandate that today's cash-strapped municipalities can ill afford.

Whenever something stinks in America, follow your nose to the money trail!

For those attending Dayton this weekend ... if you care at all about the threat to 440 that may affect you or your fellow amateurs who do use the band ... you can drop by the ARRL area and help do something about it.  They will draft and print a letter to your congressman, from you, that you can sign and they will deliver it to Washington on your behalf.  It only takes a couple of minutes to do.

Your examples still fail to support your contention that poor behavior is the result of "CBers" or the difficulty level of the exams.  

Another beauty of ham radio is that most receivers are tunable and you can adjust them so as not to receive unwanted signals.

 
That very well could have been true back in the day also.  In pre-internet days guys asked their elmers things, or referred to various books on the subject.  Now the internet is their elmer and questions are public for all to see.  I think what you're seeing is a manifestation of the public nature of questions rather than any decrease in knowledge over the years.

If someone doesn't know how to build a dipole, why not help them instead of ridiculing them?  Nobody is born with an innate knowledge of ham radio.  Assisting them will give them a positive experience and encourage them to learn.


Lindsay Lohan is a national embarrassment; not sure that ham radio licenses rise to that level.  Other countries, such as the UK with their Foundation and Intermediate licenses, are not allowed full CEPT privileges either.

There is PLENTY of bad behavior on the bands here in Europe as well, by CEPT Class 1 license holders.  Perhaps cussing people out in English rather than one's native language is a bit easier, but there's more four letter English profanities thrown out around here than I ever heard in the US.  The Germans and Italians in particular tend to get into dustups on the air  ;D


He almost certainly did, and was most likely operating there purposely.  Again, this has been going on for years and it's in no way attributable to license exams.  Guys have been, and will continue, to operate there illegally regardless of what the FCC has on their ham exams.


So is the "new school", if newcomers are welcomed, mentored, and encouraged to learn.  If they are greeted with a bitter "get off my lawn" attitude just because they passed the license exam they were given, they most assuredly will get a bad taste of the hobby and will possibly lose interest and move on.  This attitude is FAR more destructive to ham radio than any "CB behavior" or "dumbed down exams" could ever be.

Phil, rather than constantly griping about the FCC and CBers, how about answering technical questions or helping guys gain knowledge in their hobby here on AMFone?  I know you're a very sharp guy and have plenty to offer.  Helping improve things will be far more productive than just pissing and moaning about it.  Or so it seems to me.

 I have to say, as a "new Ham" that I don't fell welcomed by all, even though I passed the exam on my own, without a "Ham cram" session. I also passed the General on my own merits. I have two teenage sons, one of whom passed on his own and the other passed after a cram session. All three of us have been building our own antennas (dipoles and Yagis so far) mostly from scrap (as a matter of fact we just last week purchased our first commercial antenna from HRO). But the downside is that we still feel intimidated by people like Phil with his "Get off my lawn" attitude. And bringing it back to the original post subject I think this pervasive attitude that the Amateur bands have gone to the dogs is part of the problem that is leading to the loss of frequencies. Just because you personally don't use them doesn't meant that you should let them go without a fight. If anything I think maybe you ought to start using them again in order to better preserve our right to use them.

 For the record, I am not in favor of dirty language and bad manners, not on the radio nor in day to day life, but the unfortunate fact is that in this day and age these things are pervasive in our society. It is not just on the radio. All you have to do is look around you to see it. What is accepted today on TV would have been pornography just 20 or 30 years ago.

 KG6TJU
Hans

Hans, hats off to you and your boys and don't let the bitter OMs get you down.  *They* are the embarrassment to the hobby, not a couple guys using CB lingo, that don't know how to build a dipole, or using coarse vernacular, because their caustic effects spread farther and wider.

Ham radio hasn't gone to the dogs.  It's as strong and fun as ever.  It's unfortunate that some have selective memories or can't stand anything other than a "HIHI FINE BUSINESS OM WX HR IS WINDY AND WET" type of QSO, but that should have no bearing on you .  There are a lot of guys and gals like yourself - seek 'em out, have fun, and avoid those that delight in wallowing in their own misery.

And don't be afraid to ask questions.  We have an outstanding brain trust here on AMFone and likely, there's not a question that someone here hasn't asked themselves.  As I said, nobody's born with an innate knowledge of ham radio  ;D

Two things here. First, it was ham radio that got me into my love of electronics and served to drive me into most of my employment opportunites. However, I failed my first crack at the novice exam back in 8th grade. Ultimately it took me close to 15 years before the opportunity would present itself again. I will say the question pool evolved immensely since then. I was dissappoined with the lack of technical 'challenges' from the novice all the way upto the the extra licenses. Because of that, you will have people that don't give a hoot about what they learned but that they are there.
Secondly, and more to the original impetus behind this thread, about 2 years ago at my work place, we were told that all of the radios we have, (which numbers in several hundreds), have to be either tossed or some of the other newer radios be modified to satisfy the FCC new FM bandwidth regs. I originally read this on their website and realized it will effect a ton of first responders among others.

For those of you on-topic types attending Dayton this weekend ... if you care at all about the threat to 440 that may affect you or your fellow amateurs who do use the band ... you can drop by the ARRL area and help do something about it.  They will draft and print a letter to your congressman, from you, that you can sign and they will deliver it to Washington on your behalf.  It only takes a couple of minutes to do.

Actually, while your League was off to Dayton on a junket, an independent group of active, concerned licensees took matters into their own hands and successfully obtained a promise from the sponsoring congressional legislator to disconnect the Amateur Service allocation from his bill.

The group of constituents in Rep. King's district actively avoided mentioning the League or any connection with Newington and the ARRL.

---

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:
Mike Lisenco, N2YBB
n2ybb@arrl.org
917-865-3538

May 19, 2011, Massapequa Park, NY - A delegation of Amateur Radio operators from the Long Island / New York City area met this morning with Congressman Peter T. King (R-NY) to discuss his recent proposed legislation, HR 607, and its impact on Amateur Radio.

Congressman King said that he fully understands and appreciates the importance of Amateur Radio and the service it provides to the community, and that he would see to the modification of the bill so that the 420 - 440 MHz band would be excluded from the spectrum to be auctioned. The delegation included Mike Lisenco, N2YBB, ARRL Section Manager for New York City / Long Island (NLI), Peter Portanova, WB2OQQ, NLI Local Government Liaison (LGL), George Tranos, N2GA, NLI State Government Liaison (SGL), and Jim Mezey, W2KFV, NLI ARES Section Emergency Coordinator (SEC).

"The Congressman went on to explain that it was never his intention to remove the 70 centimeter band from Amateur use. He further asked us to `get the word
out' and inform the Amateur Radio community that 70 centimeters is not in jeopardy," said Lisenco.

Lisenco, Mezey and Tranos spoke about the importance of Amateur Radio emergency communications while Portanova, who is also the local AMSAT representative, addressed satellite and other amateur use of the 70 centimeter band.

The Congressman was very receptive to the group, who also extended an invitation to attend Field Day locations in his District.

---

Mike's effort is praiseworthy because it successfully stepped around the inevitable boogey-man-style fundraising and political coloration in the League's effort.  I am delighted they have deprived Newington a chance to try to drag this out to recruit more subscribers and trumpet how essential they would like us to believe the ARRL remains in efforts to promote, protect and advance the hobby.

Now thats a funny post.    ;D

I am not so sure bad ham operating behavior in the U.S. was just as prevalent in the past as it is now.   Even if that is true, it doesn't make the status quo acceptable.  

I think the general on-the-air comportment found on HF SSB has coarsened over the past 20 or 30 years, but maybe not so much because of testing but because there seems to have been a rise in vulgar behavior, immaturity and self centered behavior in American society in general.   The internet seems to have fostered a dual personality problem with some people--they are very nice or at least civil in person but are contentious, rude and belligerent on the Internet, where they can contact people at a distance and hide behind anonymous usernames.   Some of those people who are hams, in particular those licensed since the Internet became common place may have carried that behavior over to ham radio operating.  

Another difference is that most people now are becoming hams as adults.   In the past, more new hams were kids, usually high-school aged.   There is a difference in the way adults and kids learn, or in whether or not they are teachable.   Adults may arrive with an attitude, or pre-conceived notions about ham radio.  They may not have the interest or time to learn much but they have the money to purchase a lot of pug and play gear right out of the box and get on the air.     This may or may not be okay depending on what you think about it, but it saddens me when I contact such a person and encounter a lack of interest in learning, and a complete resistance to assimilating into what I'll call the ham radio culture, and adoption of the traditional ham norms of behavior.

As an example, I recall working a ham whom I learned did not have a dummy load.  I was flabbergasted to further learn that he refused to get one and use it.  This was a relatively new ham and he saw no requirement for one, stating that tuning everything up on antennas was okay.   I was aghast -- it was (and is) inconceivable to me that a ham with an operating station would not own at least one dummy load and use it regularly.   Getting one and using it was one of the first things I learned.   I recall his  thinking was that it was not required by FCC so he saw no need for it.  I use this to illustrate how in some cases, adults may not be as teachable as kids.  Of course this is not always the case, but I think we need to have more kids taking up the hobby.

This is harder to accomplish, because the network of ham radio clubs is in disrepair.   The ham radio clubs are simply not as vigorous as they once were, so they are no longer as likely to be a place for new hams to go and learn and receive mentoring.   One solution to that is getting ham radio clubs set up in schools.   The ARRL has an education fund for this purpose and I encourage contributions to it.   They have had some noteworthy successes, but there are many schools with no ham radio presence.   It is not a complete solution but it can help.

Rob

Rob,

The cost/benefit ratio is poor when trying to recruit young people.  Among the trends and characteristics you mentioned, another difference between then and now is the pervasiveness of handheld wireless technology. Kids have never known a life without such communications. As such, it is not a surprise they would be blasé about a hobby where the pursuit of chit-chat on the radio isn't very different from what they already can do.

A much better recruitment target is the older demographic, but the notion flies in the face of the popular concept that younger=better, which is why neither the ARRL nor local clubs do much to introduce the hobby to older folks.

Yet, the benefits could be far easier to obtain.  People past a certain age remember radio when it was a greater part of society, they today have the spare time and income to support a hobby like ours, and they may wish to share life's stories with others among us who are in the same age group.

Moreover, the older demographic will always be there.  As folks pass on, "younger" folks will take their place in the age group, providing the same opportunity for recruitment and sustainable growth in the hobby.

My point is that there are Extras who don't know the most basic things! The Extra Class license was supposed to be the top grade and, at one time, people had to be licensed for at least two years as General or (post-1968) Advanced Class before they could even take the Extra Class exam! Questions such as calculating the dimensions of a dipole antenna are beginner and Novice stuff...and I will gladly help a newcomer who needs help in building an antenna. But an Extra Class licensee should certainly know such basic stuff. I also feel that the question pools should NOT be divulged. Remember how Dick Bash (KL7FBI) was excoriated in the late 1970s for publishing his "Final Exam" series of cram books and cheat sheets?

When I took the Extra Class exam in 1976, it was almost as difficult as the commercial radio operator exam. Thanks to cram sessions, the license means nothing today. The broadcast industry had problems with cram schools that cranked out "six week wonders" who needed the First Class commercial license in order to run the transmitter and take meter readings at directional AM stations, who knew nothing, and who would sometimes totally mess up the transmitter or the phasing system for the antenna.

And, Hans, let me be the first to welcome you into our community. Feel free to ask questions of anyone in this forum. You will find that the AM community is one of the last vestiges of the "old school" amateur radio, although by no means is it the only place where you will find this.

GREAT NEWS!

I also believe that publishing the FCC exam Q and A has been a liability.   I also have decided that there should be a CW test, if only for 5 wpm.   Every ham should know CW upon being licensed because it is needed in order to communicate with a very elementary homebrew transmitter.  Ideally new hams should desire to build such a thing in order to learn about radio, either from scratch or from a kit. 

I also think the FCC should start proctoring the examinations again because I have never believed the VE system was just as immune from being fixed.

Instead, we seem to be moving in the direction of not even requiring any sort of examinatination at all.

Yes, AM is like the ham radio I knew as a kid.

 I disagree but for one reason. Some people just cannot learn auditory inputs for some reason (myself for one). I tried for a long time to learn code but to this day I just can't, even at 5 wpm. There is another older ham at the local HRO (WR6XXX) who tried for decades to pass the code requirement before giving up. When the code requirement was dropped he passed the General and Extra exams like a breeze. He is extremely knowledgeable and would put many other Extras to shame with what he knows. I daresay that the code requirement was in some ways discriminatory.

 Hans
 KG6TJU   

S-1040 Senate “Companion” Bill to HR 607 Avoids Impacting Amateur Spectrum
From the ARRL web site:
...On learning in February that a Senate version of HR 607 was being drafted, ARRL Chief Executive Officer David Sumner, K1ZZ, met with staff members of the Senate’s Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee who were working on the bill to share the ARRL’s concerns with regard to HR 607. “They seemed very receptive to our argument and appreciative of the public service contributions of radio amateurs,” Sumner said. “It is gratifying to see that S 1040 avoids impacting our spectrum allocations.”...
The complete story is here: http://www.arrl.org/news/senate-companion-bill-to-hr-607-avoids-impacting-amateur-spectrum
It seems the ARRL preempted the Long Island boys by several months but who's keeping score  :D

You must have skipped class the day they explained Congress has two chambers.

Let me know if you can find out when your League friends learned the House bill would be changed to exclude Amateur allocations.

As far as any public disclosures, Rep. King's constituents beat the ARRL obtaining his promise to do so.

Stealing Sam's line, "Now that's a funny post"  ;D

If you ever want to learn the code, think of it in musical terms. It is really just a rhythm and, in fact, musicians often have an easier time than most of us to learn the code characters. If you can remember a melody, you can learn the code.

In my younger days, I was an AM broadcast band DX'er and SWL. When I joined the radio club at my high school, I found out that it was an amateur radio club and the moderator, my math teacher, sat me down and had me listen to those damned code records. I soon built associations in my mind between the code rhythms and the letters. For example, "L" (._..) sounded like "to L with you" and "P" (. _ _ .) sounded like "vier drei drei fünf", part of the telephone number of a business that advertised heavily on a German-language radio program that I listened to back then.

While code proficiency is no longer required, you will find that CW has a lot of advantages. Some DX stations only operate CW. On VHF and UHF, a lot of the weak signal DX work, such as what one hears in one of the segments that HR-607 proposed to auction, is on CW. So, without CW, it is as if you are using half a radio. Don't sweat it...if you are interested and have the patience of a saint, you will get it. And a good operator will slow down for you...the prosign QRS works wonders for new CW operators.

Thanks K2PG, I appreciate the advice. I have been told before to think of it as though it were music. Trouble is I can't carry a tune in a bucket, let alone remember a melody. I do keep trying though. I have the ARRL CD "Your Introduction To Morse Code" and I listen to it when I can but it seems to become background noise to me. Also I am not an auditory learner (more visual/tactile), so unless it is written I have a very hard time learning it (I was always a poor student in lecture based classes, except for one particular class where the instructor incorporated some excellent blackboard drawings into his lectures.) If there was a text used I could limp on by on the text without paying any attention to the lectures. That used to frustrate the Hell out of my instructors when I would literally sleep through class and then pass the exams quite easily.

 Hans KG6TJU

On ARRL website there is press release saying FEMA top banana has stated ham radio is top backup commo when all else fails (or words to that effect).  The occasion was some sort of high level fed. gov't gathering at which FEMA, FCC and White House officials were present.

Now, that would have been an excellent opportunity to press for some sort of RF filtering requirement on consumer appliances, or the enforcement of current requirements such as they are, but there was no mention of any such point being made.

http://www.arrl.org/news/fema-administrator-calls-amateur-radio-the-last-line-of-defense

So the FCC responded by (1) deregulating the broadcast service so that an FCC commercial ticket is no longer required for most engineering and technical duties, and (2) discontinuing the First Class Radiotelephone licence itself, replacing it with that ugly yellow "General Radiotelephone" certificate, good for life, and absolutely worthless for anything.

Dick Bash exasperated the FCC with his cram books, so the FCC "solved" the problem by allowing the publication of their own cram book, releasing to the public, verbatim, the entire pool of Questions-Answers used to make up the exams.

In response to complaints that the 13/20 wpm code tests were discriminatory against persons with certain disabilities, the FCC offered a "waiver" to allow such individuals to become licensed with only a 5 wpm code test, if they presented a doctor's note attesting that their "disability" hampered or precluded their learning the code. There turned out to be widespread fraud, from physicians who inadvertently and who wilfully wrote and signed notes. So what did the FCC do? They "solved" the problem by giving everyone a blanket waiver without a doctor's note, by reducing the code requirement for all classes to 5 wpm. This became a moot point when the code test formality was discontinued altogether.

So what's next?  ...I'm regularly seeing opinions posted on sites like QRZ.com and eHam that since the vast majority of hams now buy everything from antenna all the way to microphone and key, ready-built from the factory, there is no longer any need for technical questions on the written exam; just FCC rules, common operating practice and basic electrical safety - and of course, detailed knowledge of all the "subbands" and sub-sub bands.