"Dee D. Flint" wrote in
:


"Alun" wrote in message
...
[snip]
I tend to think that a single class of licence would be a good idea,
although many people argue that there should also be a beginner's
licence, and I am not totally opposed to that. I don't see a genuine
need for more than two licences, though. Also, I don't think subband
restrictions by licence class make any sense whatsoever, as the
propagation is the same for the whole band.


It's not a matter of propagation. It's simply that band restrictions
are far easier to enforce. With a quick lookup of the call sign, you
can tell if the operator is staying within his privileges.


I agree that is why the FCC like it. It would work just as well with whole
bands, though, and actually offer a better incentive, e.g. there would be a
real incentive to get the bands inbetween the entry level ones to fill in
when propagation doesn't work on those ones for where you want to talk to.

Ideally, I would give an entry level licence very restricted power on
the whole extent of a limited number of bands in different parts of
the spectrum. Needless to say, I wouldn't have a code test for any
licence. The problem would be the transition from the present
situation to such a scheme. The vested interests of those currently
licenced probably make this idea impracticable.

Enforcement issues make this idea impractical not the "vested
interests" of those already licensed. It is impossible to determine if
a person is staying within his/her power restrictions unless you are
right next to the transmitter to make measurements. I've worked QRP
stations that nearly pegged my meter and other times could not pull a
kilowatt station out of the mud.

Power limits would rely solely on the honor system. This has worked
reasonably well so far for two reasons: 1) the majority of hams are
decent people and 2) the basic radio comes out of the box with 100
watts, which works reasonably well so there is not a lot of temptation
to hook up an amplifier and work illegally.

However you say "very restricted power". I'm assuming that you mean
something substantially less than today. So then you would have a
situation where the beginner has purchased a radio that significantly
exceeds his power privileges with no one being able to detect that
he/she is exceeding those privileges if they choose to operate it at
full power.

Or are you going to propose that they cannot purchase or own a radio
that exceeds their power privileges?? This would be a very bad
proposal. That would require mandating that hams show their licenses
to purchase equipment. It would have to also be illegal for a non-ham
to purchase such equipment even for a gift. It would be illegal for a
beginner to purchase almost all used equipment on the market. He'd, by
law, have to take the expensive, new equipment route. Or the
manufacturers might respond with cheap, low quality equipment that
would be unsuitable to connect to an amplifier (once the beginner
upgraded) as it would have the same problems as amplified CBs do now.

There may even be other ramifications of "very limited power"
privileges.

It is far better to select easily enforced requirements (i.e. band
limits) than items that are not easily enforced or items that require
creating an entire hierarchy of new regulations to support it.

Most of the rewards and privileges we get in life often have little
relationship to what we did to get them. Just look at our jobs.

Dee D. Flint, N8UZE



You are sure right about jobs, Dee! And I admit power limits have their
difficulties, although I still think they are appropriate for less
qualified hams, whether they can really be enforced or not. I still think
that a real incentive is to get more bands, not just more bits of the same
ones.

Alun, N3KIP