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Dave Heil[_2_] · March 31st 08, 04:43 AM posted to rec.radio.amateur.moderated

wrote:
On Mar 30, 7:37� pm, Dave Heil wrote:
wrote:
On Mar 29, 1:18�pm, Dave Heil wrote:

One question which begs asking is why foreign
phone stations should have
a shelter from U.S. stations when U.S. stations
have no similar shelter
available to them? �

Because there are so many more US stations
than foreign ones in any
particular country (except Japan 4th class).
Working the USA is 1 DXCC
country.
That's an explanation, though perhaps not a valid one. �
We W's manage to
work all the DX there is to work despite the presence
of strong QRM from
W QRM--both those who are ragchewing and those who are
working DX.

Sort of. Remember that often the DX is transmitting outside the US
'phone subband.

Rare stuff, yes. Less rare stuff, not as often.

Things aren't the same as in the old days when
many DX stations were
rock bound or ran lesser quality equipment or had
less than optimal
antenna systems. � In fact much of the world runs
the same Kenwood, Icom,
Yaesu and Ten-Tec equipment as the American stations.

Good point!

� The garden
variety foreign stations sometimes QRM's the rare stuff. Many
of the
garden variety foreigners are also in the chase for that
same rare DX.

Agreed.

The time is long past for divided phone band segments.
� I believe that
the phone bands should be harmonized worldwide.

Be careful what you ask for.

In much if not most of the rest of the world, there are no subbands-by-
mode. The amateur regs simply state which modes are allowed on each
band, and leave the rest up to gentleman's agreements.

Point well taken. It works pretty well for the most part. Contests are
a different matter. Let's take the 40m band as an example of when it
doesn't work well. In a phone contest, foreign SSB stations can often
be heard CQing as low as 7.010 despite the fact that the IARU bandplan
calls for them to no go below 7.030 or .035 as I recall.

Harmonizing the US phone subbands to the rest of the world would mean
either imposing US regs on other countries, or removing subbands-by-
modes from US regs.

It seems to me that countries which do not have subbands-by-mode would
resist following the US example and adding them, if for no other
reason than that they'd no longer have a refuge from US 'phone QRM.

I'd like to get away from that "refuge" concept as some sort of foreign
entitlement. I'd also like to get away from the idea that U.S. phone
operation is "QRM". We're big boys and they're big boys. We don't
piddle in our end of the pool and they don't piddle in theirs.

Proposals to remove subbands-by-mode from the US regs have met with
clear and strong opposition from US hams. The recent proposal from the
"Communications Think Tank", which would have eliminated subbands-by-
mode, was strongly opposed in comments to FCC - so much that CTT
removed the proposal. Any such proposal means "data in the phone
bands", too.

I'm not proposing that we do away with sub-bands by mode. What I'm
proposing is to expand our phone bands down to 14.112 and 21.151 on SSB

Here's a similar question: Why do 'phone stations need
to be protected
from data signals but CW signals don't need that protection?
IOW, why
not allow data modes in the 'phone bands?

I think the answer to that is that CW ops are typically using narrow
receiving filters while phone ops may be listening through 2.4 or
2.7
KHz filters. � A little of that digital signal cacophony can wreak
havoc with a phone QSO.

Can't such interference be dealt with using a notch filter? A PSK31
signal is only a few dozen Hz wide, for example.

....but a Pactor signal is a couple of hundred Hz wide and an RTTY signal
is only a little less. I can vary the width of my notch filter as well
as the center frequency. Can everyone do that? Passband tuning helps too.

Even more basic, isn't it the responsibility of all operators to avoid
transmitting on top of existing QSOs? Why would digital ops behave
differently in this regard when faced with 'phone signals vs. CW
signals?

That's one reason that I think it is a good idea to maintain sub-bands
by mode. Many digital ops aren't listening to audio at all. Many CW
ops are using filters as narrow as 100 Hz. Phone ops may hear them but
they may not hear a phone signal, especially if it is weak.

Dave K8MN