On Mon, 8 Nov 2004 20:50:06 -0600, "DR. Death"
wrote in
:

snip
I never stated we should add more amps.


You were defending the sale of illegal radio equipment which, if I'm
not mistaken, includes amps. The fact is that if there were fewer amps
there would be fewer idiots using them. Same with guns. But guns are
legal while CB amps are not. Neither are modified and 'export' radios.
But legal or not, the same rule applies -- the fewer that are in
circulation the fewer that will be in use.


Where did I state in this post that I defended the sale of exports or amps?
I stated that eliminating amps would not eliminate fools on C.B.


Your statement was in opposition to the OP who suggested that the sale
of illegal equipment should be curbed. To me that sounds like you are
defending the sale of those items.


snip
I don't know if where you live is anything like the Rockies or the
Cascades, but you don't have to walk far to find a spot that will work
even with a handheld cellphone. In the deep woods, CB seems to be more
reliable than cellphones anyway -- you can usually raise a logging
camp or ranger post no matter where you are. But if you plan to go
into such remote places where normal services don't work, it's your
responsibility to anticipate an emergency and provide for legal
communications.


In a perfect world, yes. But I guess you carry every part that fits your
vehicle when you leave the house.


.....huh? The law isn't perfect and neither are people. But that's not
a valid excuse to violate the law. Yet you go one step further and
justify the expense and effort of illegal operation as a forethought
towards an emergency situation. Well, if emergency communications is
important enough to demand that much thought and effort, illegal
operation is probably the -worst- choice. As I stated before, there
are other methods that are both better and legal, and not suprisingly
enough they require less effort and expense than illegal operation.
Add to that the practical uselessness of the freeband as an emergency
communications channel -- it's no better than CB in that communication
with emergency services is, at best, a bucket-brigade. You can get
direct comm to emergency services using satellite and cell phones, and
even using ham radio via skip or satellite. This saves not only time
(which can be critical in an emergency situation), but also prevents
the miscommunication that usually accompanies "human repeaters" (you
played that 'pass-the-message' game in grade school, didn't you?).


snip
If you are getting that much interference in a radio dead-zone then it
isn't much of a radio dead-zone, is it? And if the other end of your
comm can't seperate your fundamental from all the QRM then just how
'remote' is this place? Doesn't seem that remote to me. It sounds like
you are just making excuses.

Your more than welcome to go fishing, hunting, 4 wheeling with me and bring
your cell. It might be usefull for telling time but useless to talk on in
some places that I frequent. You obviously live in an area with great cell
coverage. I do not. You are looking for excuses to argue.


On the contrary, it is -you- that is making excuses to run illegally.
If you are in a radio dead-zone then how does your signal get out at
all? It won't.

I live in Spokane, WA. I have worked with a couple logging companies
in both the Cascades and Rockies (which is why I mentioned those two
mountain ranges previously). You can bet that there are places where
comm sucks. There are large areas where there is no cell phone
coverage, at least not officially. But at those altitudes, all you
need to do is climb up to a peak with a 3-watt phone and you can
easily hit a cell tower 50 miles away. If you don't believe me, take
note of a recent incident on Mt. Rainier where a climber was rescued
after contacting a hunter 40 miles away with his FRS.

And if you are in a canyon or deep valley, it doesn't matter how much
power you run, there's nothing you can do on radio unless you have VLF
or satellite.


I also like to shoot skip on sideband and the best place for that is
the freebands.


The best place for that is the ham bands.

If your a ham which I am not. If the FCC would have allocated part of the
C.B. band to SSB only, maybe the freband would be less attractive.


It's not hard to get a license. It's been done by hundreds of
thousands -- maybe millions -- of people around the world.

I never stated that it was hard.


I never stated you did.


I have looked at the sample test questions
and have no doubt I can pass.

And the upper portion of the legal 40 is mostly used for SSB. The FCC
didn't declare this rule, but neither did they declare Ch. 9 as the
emergency channel. In fact, Ch. 9 used the be the 'calling' channel
while other channels were used for emergencies in different zones. It
wasn't until about 1970 that Ch. 9 was universally adopted by the CB
community as the emergency channel. Anyway, it doesn't take a
declaration from the FCC to work SSB anywhere on the legal 40. What
the FCC -has- declared is that operation outside the legal 40 -- i.e,
the so-called 'freeband' -- is illegal.

I have used the upper 40 on SSB. But found that many people talk AM on those
freqs. which makes it hard to use SSB for DXing.


In case you hadn't noticed, the ham bands have much more spectrum and
MUCH better DX conditions. Seems to me that ham DX would be much
easier than freebanding.


You can wave the illegal
flag all you want, I will still use the freeband.


That pretty much sums up your argument -- you'll do it because you
want to. No valid reasons, no legal justification, and no regard for
better alternatives. It all boils down to the fact that you want the
benefits without the license. Am I wrong? If I am then at least
provide a -legitimate- reason for violating the law because your other
excuses are bogus.


snip
Ambulances (and other emergency vehicles) have lights, sirens and
reflective paints to provide a measure of safety while they drive
faster than the speed limit, and sometimes even those measures don't
work. So what makes you think you were being responsible by speeding
to the hospital without such measures? You endangered the life of your
son, yourself, and other people on the road. You took a chance with
other people's lives and you got lucky. That's not being responsible.

You can wait on the ambulance if you choose. I live in a rural area and by
the time the ambulance arives I can already be in the ER. I just hope you
are never in this situation. Or maybe you just don't care enough about your
family to expidite them to the hospital.


......uh, yeah. right. You live xx miles from the hospital. If you
leave your home at the same time the ambulance leaves the hospital,
and you are both driving the same speed, you each get to your
destination at about the same time. But in the process you have risked
the lives of your son, yourself and others on the road by your urgent
driving, you have further endangered your son because he may not have
been in a condition stable enough to transport, and while you were
driving to the hospital you could have been administering first aid
from directions given by professionals over the phone. You can make
any excuse you want, you can try the what-if-it-was-your-kid sympathy
trip, you can plead the concerned-father routine, and you can even
justify your actions by the fact that you were lucky and nobody got
hurt. But the fact is it would have been better to stay home talking
with 911 and wait for emergency services to arrive.


If you had called for emergency assistance they probably would have
sent out paramedics that could have treated your son at the scene, and
arrived faster than you made it to the hospital. Of course I expect
your next excuse is that you live in a remote location that takes too
long for emergency vehicles to respond, or that there's no place for a
helicopter to land near your home, or some crap like that. But those
are just excuses. The fact is that 911 can provide specific info over
the phone on whatever poison you have laying around your house, and
provide instructions that can render immediate aid. And because many
poisons work fast, that information not only saves lives but prevents
excessive injury when the poison is non-fatal. Now THAT would have
been the responsible thing to do instead of speeding to the hospital.


Yes a chopper could land in the field behind my house. The chopper happens
to be 40 miles from here. Again I can already be in the ER.

Unfortunately, most people don't think about those things until it's
too late.

And some people wait for EMS and they are too late.


You are starting to sound like my grandma did when she talked about
seatbelts. She came up with every excuse in the book until it finally
boiled down to something like, "What if the car catches fire and I
can't undo my seatbelt because I'm unconscious?" Even my 80 yo granny
finally figured out that she was just making excuses because she
simply didn't want to wear a seatbelt. If my grandma can figure it
out, why can't you?


"You can burglarize a house and still be responsible about it."
"You can murder someone with a gun and still be responsible about it."
(and before you condemn me for that last analogy, remember that it's
the same analogy -you- used earlier in -your- post).

NO, I stated that eliminating guns would not stop murder. People were
killing each other long before firearms were invented. I simply used that
anology to point out that eliminating amps would not stop foolish
behavior
on the C.B.


Don't backpedal -- you equated illegal radio equipment with guns so I
did the same. You claimed that you violate laws responsibly, an excuse
that anyone can see is hogwash when using -your own- analogy. Don't
you understand that 'law' is a method of enforcing responsibility?
Basically, law -is- responsibility in a written form. The only way to
'responsibly violate' a law is if there is a more important (and
legally justifiable) responsibility. Rushing your son to the hospital
would have been such an example if there were no better alternatives.
Regardless, 'freebanding' hardly compares with a medical emergency.

Never stated that freebanding equals a med emergency.


You used the example of a medical emergency to justify your violation
of the law, and with respect to both speeding -and- amps.


You missed my point entirely. I could try to explain it again, but you only
see things in black and white.


No, I see things logically. And I see you making excuses instead of
valid arguments. I'm still waiting for a justifiable reason for using
amps and/or freebanding. Do you have one or not?


snip
..... IOW, just because
you don't hear any licensed activity doesn't mean the freqs have been
abandoned. If that were the case, 121.5MHz would be a very popular
'freeband' freq.

Never stated that they were abandoned. I know who has legal access to the
freebands. And it is not licensed mud-ducks.


Do you want a list?


snip
.... There is no valid reason to plan on
using illegal radio operation for emergencies when better and legal
alternatives exist.

How much do you pay a month for your satt phone Frank? Must be nice to have
that much money to burn.


I don't. I rent one when I need it. They don't cost that much to rent
when you are only going out for a week or so at a time. And the
expense is well worth the security, as I have found out more than
once. But ham radio has it's own satellites which don't cost a penny,
and the equipment isn't any more expensive than one of those 'export'
radios or a big amp. Also, in the past few years I have been playing
with LF and VLF. For example, the 1750m (lowfer) band is license-free,
and one watt will give you -reliable- comm for 30+ miles in -any-
terrain -- even better in the winter months (-despite- all the band
noise). And it's suprisingly cheap, comparable in cost to a legal CB
radio setup.

So -that- excuse doesn't wash, either.


If more hams were to educate C.B.ers on the benifits of becoming a ham
instead of treating us like we are the spawn of Satan, maybe I would get
my
ham ticket. Most of the hams that I have met have been quite rude and I
don't wish to waste my time and money on a hobby I don't think I would
enjoy.


Not all hams are rude. On the contrary, most hams that I have met are
quite agreeable. They are people, just like everyone else. And I don't
know why you wouldn't like ham radio when that is basically what you
are doing already on the 'freeband'. The only difference is that you
would be doing it legally. Does that take the fun out of it for you?

No it doesn't. It may very well be fun. In fact there are a lot of good
things I would like about ham radio, mostly the tech side. I didn't state
all hams are bad, just the ones I have talked to, they tend to treat C.B.ers
as second class citizens and I won't be a part of that.


I don't believe that attitude is required under Part 97. You might
check anyway just to be sure. Regardless, do you really think that
they should embrace you when you basically **** in their faces by
blatantly disregarding the reasons they got their licenses? If you do
then you are, at best, naive.


You do not sound as if you enjoy C.B., maybe you should get your ham
ticket
so that you can associate with your own kind.


I do enjoy CB. And it's because I enjoy it that I hate to see it get
messed up by idiots with amps, as well as get a worse reputation
because of 'freebanders' calling themselves CBers -- CB is legal;
freebanding is radio piracy and is a violation of federal law. I'm not
a ham, and I don't want a ham license because there is nothing in that
service that interests me. If ARRL-of-Borg ever convince the FCC to
assimilate the 1750m band, maybe then I'll think about getting a ham
license. Until then I'm just a responsible and legal CBer.

Good for you. I'll stick to freebanding.


I have no doubt you will. After all, you have invoked just about every
excuse ever used to defend it. I expected more from you on the amp
issue, but that's ok -- maybe next time. Anyway, I thank you for yet
another opportunity to debunk the standard lineup of lame excuses that
freebanders use to violate federal law. If you should ever go legit
and get your license, drop me an email and I'll send you plans to
build one damn fine amp!






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