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#61
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Activity on 2 meters
"Howard Lester" wrote in message acomip... I thought about installing my 2m radio in my car so that I have something to occupy part of my cross-country drive next year (I hope), but maybe it's not worth it. If I knew there were folks along the way regularly monitoring .52, I'd do it. Fugetaboutit! K0CKB and I travel many thousands of miles a year in a coach with "K0HB & K0CKB monitoring 146.52" prominently displayed on the back. We also frequently announce our presence on .52. In the past 5 years we've had precisely 2 QSO's on .52 as a result. Don't bother. 73, de Hans, K0HB |
#62
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Activity on 2 meters
"KØHB" wrote
K0CKB and I travel many thousands of miles a year in a coach with "K0HB & K0CKB monitoring 146.52" prominently displayed on the back. We also frequently announce our presence on .52. In the past 5 years we've had precisely 2 QSO's on .52 as a result. Don't bother. Thanks, Hans. That'll save me from making a bunch of unnecessary holes in my nice car.... and the price of a fancy new repeater directory. *sigh* I'll wait until I get to 1-land and get to know my new neighbors. N7SO |
#63
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Fifth pillar
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#64
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Activity on 2 meters
On Fri, 6 Jun 2008 23:05:49 EDT, Steve Bonine wrote:
If there are a dozen repeaters with zero activity, most will go dead in any disaster because it takes real human interest and work to provide emergency power. I'd rather have two or three solid repeaters than a dozen where the maintenance is hit-and-miss and there's no one who really cares whether they are up or not. You assume that those repeaters do not have backup power. I found that this was not the case in the ham communities of San Francisco and Portland (OR) areas, the two places that I have had extensive experience with VHF/UHF repeaters. Backup power is relatively easy to get at those sites where ham and commercial facilities are co-located, which are most of the places where the ham repeaters are. Similarly, you assume that because a repeater is silent that "the maintenance is hit-and-miss and there's no one who really cares whether they are up or not". Again, my experience does not bear this out. Most of the repeaters that are reported "silent" are because they are kept alive by a small group of people whose activity is not always observed by the casual ham. I'm the trustee of two club repeaters maintained by one of the other members who is a 2-way radio tech. Our 2 meter machine is used all the time by ham-licensed truckers driving up and down the Interstate. The other is used only by the few club members who have the 223 MHz band in their radios. The casual listener would consider that one "unused", which is not the case. Similarly, during the many hours each day that I spend in my Comm Center at home - a cross between a home office, a library, and a ham shack - I maintain a speaker watch on the UHF repeater that my other local club uses for commute-hour rag chews and is available for use for hospital disaster communications. Except for the commute hours, it is "silent" but I'm there to answer any calls and to join in the rag chews. That seems to be the norm for the "silent" repeaters in this "no pairs available" area. We do have several where there's pretty frequent use, though. Repeater-based ham radio is alive and well in Webfoot Country. -- 73 de K2ASP - Phil Kane From a Clearing in the Silicon Forest Beaverton (Washington County) Oregon e-mail: k2asp [at] arrl [dot] net |
#65
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Activity on 2 meters
KØHB wrote:
"Howard Lester" wrote in message acomip... I thought about installing my 2m radio in my car so that I have something to occupy part of my cross-country drive next year (I hope), but maybe it's not worth it. If I knew there were folks along the way regularly monitoring .52, I'd do it. Fugetaboutit! K0CKB and I travel many thousands of miles a year in a coach with "K0HB & K0CKB monitoring 146.52" prominently displayed on the back. We also frequently announce our presence on .52. In the past 5 years we've had precisely 2 QSO's on .52 as a result. Don't bother. 73, de Hans, K0HB The last time I tried to have a QSO on .52 the other guy didn't have a radio in his car. Hard to communicate that way. Dave WD9BDZ |
#66
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Activity on 2 meters
KØHB wrote:
K0CKB and I travel many thousands of miles a year in a coach with "K0HB & K0CKB monitoring 146.52" prominently displayed on the back. We also frequently announce our presence on .52. In the past 5 years we've had precisely 2 QSO's on .52 as a result. Hans, reminds me of a story about a person I knew complaining that he called several times and I didn't answer (the cell phone.) I just looked at him and said, "I know. That's why I have caller ID." Do I need to put a smiley face here so every ones I'm just teasing Hans a teensie bit? Jeff-1.0 wa6fwi |
#67
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Activity on 2 meters
Phil Kane wrote:
On Fri, 6 Jun 2008 23:05:49 EDT, Steve Bonine wrote: If there are a dozen repeaters with zero activity, most will go dead in any disaster because it takes real human interest and work to provide emergency power. I'd rather have two or three solid repeaters than a dozen where the maintenance is hit-and-miss and there's no one who really cares whether they are up or not. You assume that those repeaters do not have backup power. I found that this was not the case in the ham communities of San Francisco and Portland (OR) areas, the two places that I have had extensive experience with VHF/UHF repeaters. Backup power is relatively easy to get at those sites where ham and commercial facilities are co-located, which are most of the places where the ham repeaters are. I am assuming that a repeater with ZERO activity is a repeater with no one who cares about it. In one of your previous posts you mentioned a repeater in your area which is "only" used during commute times and FD; this is not zero activity and indicates that there is a core group of people who care about the repeater. The kind of repeater I'm talking about is one that might have been quite active a decade ago, but has been running on inertia for several years. Maybe it still responds to a signal on the input frequency, but the chance of it having usable backup power is extremely low. Another issue is potential damage during the disaster; if there is not a group of people who use the repeater, no one will be there to make the perhaps-trivial repairs necessary to get it back on the air. Similarly, you assume that because a repeater is silent that "the maintenance is hit-and-miss and there's no one who really cares whether they are up or not". Again, my experience does not bear this out. Most of the repeaters that are reported "silent" are because they are kept alive by a small group of people whose activity is not always observed by the casual ham. I'm the trustee of two club repeaters maintained by one of the other members who is a 2-way radio tech. Our 2 meter machine is used all the time by ham-licensed truckers driving up and down the Interstate. The other is used only by the few club members who have the 223 MHz band in their radios. The casual listener would consider that one "unused", which is not the case. The key word in your sentence is "used". "Zero activity" is incompatible with "used". I said, "I'd rather have two or three solid repeaters than a dozen where the maintenance is hit-and-miss and there's no one who really cares whether they are up or not." I did not imply that if a repeater is silent that the maintenance is hit-and-miss. What I said is that if there is not a group of people who care about the repeater, it's likely to be useless in a disaster, and I stand by that statement. Similarly, during the many hours each day that I spend in my Comm Center at home - a cross between a home office, a library, and a ham shack - I maintain a speaker watch on the UHF repeater that my other local club uses for commute-hour rag chews and is available for use for hospital disaster communications. Except for the commute hours, it is "silent" but I'm there to answer any calls and to join in the rag chews. That seems to be the norm for the "silent" repeaters in this "no pairs available" area. We do have several where there's pretty frequent use, though. Any repeater that has a regular group that uses it during commute does not fall under the category of "zero activity", and obviously there is a group of people who care about it. Repeater-based ham radio is alive and well in Webfoot Country. Good. I think that perhaps you misinterpreted my initial comment to be that a repeater needs to have constant activity to be viable, and that's not what I was trying to say. I do stand by my initial statement that, given the choice of a dozen zero-use repeaters or a couple of busy ones, I'll take the lower number of busy ones because they will be more likely to survive a disaster. And again let me point out the difference between urban and rural environments. The simple fact that you have a higher population density almost guarantees that you have more people using the repeater(s). Of course, if you have many repeaters, the person-per-repeater number may be as low as ours. Our situation here in rural Minnesota is rather marginal. We do have a local club with a core group of people who care enough about the repeater to keep it going. On the other hand, our UHF repeater has been down for almost a year now, and somehow the group has not been able to get it back on the air, primarily because one person has promised to provide a new site for the repeater and has not followed through on that commitment. We had an actual disaster a few months ago, not in this immediate area but in rural Minnesota. There was a need for ham radio communications because the incident was "down in a hole" where cellphones wouldn't work. (Floods often happen in river valleys.) The response was not what it should have been. Part of this is due to the low number of hams, and part is due to the lack of organization. 73, Steve KB9X |
#68
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Fifth pillar
"KØHB" wrote in
: "Michael Coslo" wrote in message ... If we want to generate traffic on the repeaters, the simplest way is to generate some traffic on them. Get a friend and talk on the thing. Next thing you know, others will join you. If enough places do that, there will be plenty of traffic. I didn't make my point very well. We don't need to "generate traffic", we simply need to clean out the dead "legacy" assignments and free up room for things like DStar and other emerging technologies. I just had a look at our local (Minneapolis/St Paul) pair assignments. In the 2M and 75CM bands there are 108 repeater pairs assigned. You read right --- ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHT! Yet I can scan both bands for hours on end and hear nothing. I'm not sure that the idea of getting rid of analog repeaters so that D- Star repeaters can be given those frequencies is really going to do much. If your area has 108 repeater pairs coordinated, and no activity, I suspect that a D-Star repeater will be likewise not have much activity. At this time you would probably just have one more repeater that isn't used. Your area's problem is lack of interest, not too many repeaters. My point is if Hams start using the repeaters, they might bootstrap interest. After interest is generated, then the possible next conversation might be "Hey, we have that old repeater on the south side of town, maybe a group of us can get together and go digital.... - 73 de Mike N3LI - |
#69
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Fifth pillar
"Mike Coslo" wrote in message 36... I'm not sure that the idea of getting rid of analog repeaters so that D- Star repeaters can be given those frequencies is really going to do much. If your area has 108 repeater pairs coordinated, and no activity, I suspect that a D-Star repeater will be likewise not have much activity. At this time you would probably just have one more repeater that isn't used. Your area's problem is lack of interest, not too many repeaters. My point is if Hams start using the repeaters, they might bootstrap interest. After interest is generated, then the possible next conversation might be "Hey, we have that old repeater on the south side of town, maybe a group of us can get together and go digital.... Condensing that, could we say "You guys can't have a pair for your newfangled technology until you busy up all the silent analog repeaters." ? 73, de Hans, K0HB Still listening. |
#70
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Fifth pillar
KØHB wrote:
Condensing that, could we say "You guys can't have a pair for your newfangled technology until you busy up all the silent analog repeaters." ? Respectfully no. my lack of communication skills is showing sorely. What I am saying is that if the sum total of communications is Zero, no one will use a new repeater, D-Star or analog. Further, I am saying that if no one is interested, who among the disinterested is going to put up that repeater? Finally, if interest is generated, perhaps some of the interested will remove that unused analog repeater, and put a digital one in it's place. Or the condensed version: An unused digital repeater sounds the same as an unused analog one. ;^) - 73 de Mike N3LI - |
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