(Steve Robeson K4CAP) wrote in message ...

(Steve Robeson K4CAP) wrote in message
...
Subject: Who are the FISTS members on RRAP?
From: (William)
Date: 4/28/2004 7:54 PM Central Standard Time
Message-id:

Inflamatory questions won't be answered.

So far that's been just about ANY question put to you.

Hey! Whatta you know? I agree with that.

Which pretty much makes you a coward, especially in as all of the
questions were the result of stupid statements YOU made...Like how
"unlicensed
radio services play a "major role" in disaster communicaitons".

Still waiting for you to pull THAT rabbit out of your....hat.


Steve, K4YZ

Try stuffing this stupid statement back into your....hat.

" Sorry Hans, MARS IS "Amateur Radio". "

No Amateur Radio = No MARS.

MARS IS Amateur Radio.

There's nothing to "stuff". MARS, under current regulations and plans,
would cease to exist without Amateur Radio Operators to flesh it out.

Sorry you don't agree.

Sorry you're not man enough to understand.

Steve, K4YZ

Maniliness? That has nothing to do with it.

No wonder you're the Pariah of RRAP.

KØHB wrote:
"Mike Coslo" wrote


And ya know, a homebrew tuner might just
be a good project too!



Antenna tuners (more properly called feed line tuners) are a crutch for
people who can't manage to build a proper antenna to fool their
transmitter into thinking it has a proper antenna.

I thought a crutch was on a car!

- Mike KB3EIA -

"Mike Coslo" wrote


I thought a crutch was on a car!


My Cororra has no crutch. It has an automagic tlansmission, powel
blakes, powel steeling, and white warr tiles.

Sebentee tlee to you and the XYR,

de Hans, K0HB/4ID

(Steve Robeson K4CAP) wrote in message ...
Subject: Hans' views/complaints about NCI and the ARRL and NCVEC
petitions
From: Mike Coslo
Date: 4/29/2004 2:41 PM Central Standard Time
Message-id:

Nothing is ever improved by making it simpler.

I dunno about that, Mike...I kinda liked the velcro-closed bikini bra my
former g/f used to wear!

73

Steve, K4YZ

Former?

You sure got a lot of "former's" in your life.

Why am I not suprised?

Subject: Who are the FISTS members on RRAP?
From: (William)
Date: 4/29/2004 6:29 PM Central Standard Time
Message-id:

(Steve Robeson K4CAP) wrote in message
...

There's nothing to "stuff". MARS, under current regulations and
plans,
would cease to exist without Amateur Radio Operators to flesh it out.

Sorry you don't agree.

Sorry you're not man enough to understand.

Maniliness? That has nothing to do with it.

No wonder you're the Pariah of RRAP.

I can be the "pariah" of anything, Briam, but it doesn't negate this
simple truth:

No Amateur Radio = No MARS.

That you seem to want to make an argument out of it when no argumant can
exist is silly. That you have a hard time telling the truth (or at least being
able to accept it) is evident. This is directly related to your inability to
suck-it-up as a man and admit that there are greater truths in the world than
your own made up ones.

Sucks to be you.

Steve, K4YZ

Subject: Hans' views/complaints about NCI and the ARRL and NCVEC
petitions
From: (William)
Date: 4/29/2004 9:28 PM Central Standard Time
Message-id:

(Steve Robeson K4CAP) wrote in message
...
Subject: Hans' views/complaints about NCI and the ARRL and NCVEC
petitions
From: Mike Coslo
Date: 4/29/2004 2:41 PM Central Standard Time
Message-id:

Nothing is ever improved by making it simpler.

I dunno about that, Mike...I kinda liked the velcro-closed bikini bra
my
former g/f used to wear!

73

Steve, K4YZ

Former?

You sure got a lot of "former's" in your life.

Why am I not suprised?

You've only had one woman in your entire life, Brain?

You met and dated one and only one woman your ENTIRE life?

Yes, there a lot of "former" girlfriends. A bit jealous, are you?
Perhaps it's that residual fecal material behind your ears from plugging and
unplugging your head in the wrong orifice all the time...

You might try toothpaste, too....

Steve, K4YZ

Mike Coslo wrote in message ...
Steve Robeson K4CAP wrote:
Subject: Hans' views/complaints about NCI and the ARRL and NCVEC
petitions ...
From: (N2EY)
Date: 4/29/2004 11:58 AM Central Standard Time
Message-id:

"Carl R. Stevenson" wrote in message
...

Many people's mileage varys on that ...

Whose mileage, Carl? Yours?

Is Morse Code "mainstream" in amateur radio or not?

Judging by the amount of RF I hear on HF and the presnece of a key jack on
even the most prestigeous of HF transceivers, I'd have to say "yes, it's
mainstream".

In amateur radio, anyway.

Kids aren't put off by code tests *or* written tests, in my
experience. And I do have a bit of experience in that area....

You must know different kids than I do ... the vast majority of the ones I
know couldn't give a rat's backside about learning or using Morse.

How many kids do you really know, Carl? How many of them would be
interested in *any* sort of radio avocation?

The quote I posted here demonstrates that the realities of getting
"kids" into amateur radio are quite different from what Carl has
presented.

In CAP we have dozens of kids chomping at the bit to "get on the air". Of
the current "crop" of Cadets at th local unit, seven out of 12 are licensed
Amateurs, six of them have already one on to General.

What ages are we talking about?

Testing = knowledge = bad

No ...

Irrelevant/unnecessary requirements = waste of time/lack of interest = bad

OK, fine. Now imagine FCC enacts free upgrades. How are you going to
argue that the General written test is "relevant" or "necessary" when
about 2/3 of the then-licensed Generals never passed the test for the
license they hold? How are you going to sell the idea that the General
written is "necessary"?

And who's making the call on what's irrelevant and what's
unnecessary...?!?!

FCC makes that call. And note this: One of the arguments for dumping
Element 1 is the claim that when it was dumped for Tech, the whole ARS
didn't fall apart.
So if we get over 323,000 free upgrades to General with no testing and
the ARS
doesn't fall apart.....

Isn't that the "call" of the person seeking Amateur licensure...?!?!

Nope. A person might think that 20 wpm code tests given by FCC
examiners are relevant and necessary to an Extra license, but they
will have a hard time finding them today..

Sure. But that part of the ARRL proposal isn't the problem. And if the
majority of NCI members support NCVEC's "appliance operator" class,
and their "copy of Part 97" idea, will NCI support that, too?

Read the numbers ...

Where? You won't even tell us how many members NCI has, or how many of
them are US hams. How many NCI members actually answered the survey?

The League and CQ Magazine always provide the numbers of those responding
to surveys.

the majority of NCI members did NOT support either the
"commercial gear only for newbies" or the "low voltage finals only for
newbies" proposals from NCVEC - that implies pretty clearly to me that they
want newbies to be able to tinker, build, modify, and experiment, just as
did the Novices of our beginning days ...

Yep, I built my first station and many more since then. And a key part
of being able to do it was being able to start with simple projects
that gave good results. Like a simple Morse Code transmitter and
receiver.

Suppose a 'kid' with a brand-new license told you she wanted to build,
not buy, her ham radio station. Tools, skills, time and $$ are limited
- we're talking about a middle-schooler, not an adult.

What would you suggest to her as a first project, Carl?


I'm a bit curious too...........

If I were to butt in here, I would say that aside from the obvious CW
transceiver, simple and easy to build, There are plenty of other
possibilities.

AM transmitters. - Yeah, groan.

Simple SSB transmitters. There appear to be a few out there that can be
homebrewed. If not, Jim should design one!

The reality of modern amateur HF SSB operation is transceivers, not
separate transmitters and receivers with the difficulties of
zero-beating - although it *can* be done...

All these would be somewhat more complex than the classic CW
transmitter, but that brings me back to the point I like to make about
what hams "should know". Now that we are probably moving beyond the time
when a super simple transmitter is the rig of choice for the budding
homebrewer, it is more important than ever that the same should have a
well grounded knowledge of basic electronics.

It's still very practical to build a simple CW *transceiver* from
scratch. Plenty of designs out there, as well as kits. A rig doesn't
have to be SOTA to be useful.

Aside from homebrewing entire radios, the youngster can do things like
building interfaces to their computers from their radios.

Sure, but that misses the point.

Note that
there is a PSK31 Transceiver that can be built from Rocky mountain Labs
IIRC that while it isn't quite a homebrew design, it isn't a bad start -
it's like building a modern da version of a Heathkit.

Sort of. While the little PSK rigs are fascinating, they are QRP
monobanders that cover a tiny slice of one band each. And you have to
have a computer to use them. They're certainly an option, though.

Antennas are another matter. There is a lot of quackery on the matter
of antennas these days, and some serious guidance is needed to keep the
kids from getting discouraged. And yaknow, a homebrew tuner might just
be a good project too!

Knowledgeable guidance is needed. That's in short supply sometimes.

Someone oughta write a book. hmmmmmmm.

ARRL used to put out a book called "Understanding Amateur Radio".
Great stuff. Lots of practical projects.

Discouraging homebrew is possibly the most damaging part of at least
one of the proposals out there as far as attracting young people.


Exactly.

I just don't think that there are that many youngsters that want to
simply mash the PTT button on their Yeacommwood transceiver and yak as
their primary activity in the ARS. We won't attract too many people that
way.

I agree 100%.


I'm firmly convinced that kids that might want to join the ARS want to
BUILD!

And since the most practical first projects are related to a certain
mode...

Boils down to this: Both the ARRL and NCVEC proposals are trying to
recapture the success of the old Novice license, although their
approaches are somewhat different. Yet they fail to see that said
success wasn't impeded in the least by a basic code skill test.

73 de Jim, N2EY

"N2EY" wrote


It's still very practical to build a simple CW *transceiver* from
scratch. Plenty of designs out there, as well as kits.


Which you might postulate as an argument to retain the Morse
examination, except that knowledge of Morse is not a requirement to heat
a soldering iron.


A rig doesn't have to be SOTA to be useful.


"Any sufficicently advanced technology is indistinguishable from
agic." -- A. C. Clarke

"Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently
dvanced." -- K0HB

"KØHB" wrote in message
. net...

"N2EY" wrote

It's still very practical to build a simple CW *transceiver* from
scratch. Plenty of designs out there, as well as kits.

Which you might postulate as an argument to retain the Morse
examination, except that knowledge of Morse is not a requirement to heat
a soldering iron.

Exactly. When I was in college we buit a 10w CW transmitter
and tested the results into a dummy load. No knowledge
of code was needed or expected.

Cheers,
Bill K2UNK

"Carl R. Stevenson" wrote in message ...
"Mike Coslo" wrote in message
...

But do you think my proposal will work? We have a number of years of
operation under such a system, and I have not heard of any problems with
the database administration of the orphan licensees.

- Mike KB3EIA -


It's not *just* the database administration. Another aspect of the problem
is that the *rules* have to be maintained for those orphaned classes. How
do you deal with the sub-band by class privs without consolidation.

Easy! See below.

By consolidating into just three classes (including the new beginner class
with meaningful HF privs), the rules can be simplified greatly.

Not really. See below.

That will
ease the administrative burden on the FCC (and the VECs) in ways that go
beyond just the database issue.

Let's get down to the *real* differences in operating privileges
between license classes.

Above 30 MHz, we have the following:

Novices: Limited privileges on a few bands

All other classes: All privileges.

The proposed "NewNovice" won;t change that situation at all, so the
regs don't get any simpler for VHF/UHF.


Below 30 MHz:

Technicians: Nil

Novices & Technician Pluses: Small bits of 80/40/15/10

Generals: All privileges *except* some parts of 80/40/20/15

Advanceds: All privileges *except* some parts of 80/40/20/15

Extras: All privileges.

On HF, we now have 4 sets of privileges:

Novice/Tech
General
Advanced
Extra

and the differences between the last three are only on four popular
bands.

Now suppose we do the free upgrades. Here's the result:

"NewNovices": Small but different bits of 80/40/15/10

Generals: All privileges *except* some parts of 80/40/20/15

Extras: All privileges.

Three sets of operating privileges remain. All we've really lost is
the Advanced set, which was simply some 'phone/image space on
80/40/20/15.

Now suppose instead of the free upgrades we do the following:

"New Novices" - Revised set of privileges. Existing Novices, Techs and
Tech Pluses get NewNovice HF privileges. Existing Techs and Tech
Pluses keep full VHF/UHF privs.

Everybody else stays the same.

Here's the result:

Above 30 MHz, we have the following:

"NewNovices": Limited privileges on a few bands

All other classes: All privileges.

Below 30 MHz:

"NewNovices", Techs & Technician Pluses: Bits of 80/40/15/10

Generals: All privileges *except* some parts of 80/40/20/15

Advanceds: All privileges *except* some parts of 80/40/20/15

Extras: All privileges.

On HF, we still have 4 sets of privileges:

NewNovice/Tech
General
Advanced
Extra

and the differences between the last three are only on four popular
bands.

Let me make it even simpler for ya:

Giving free Generals to existing Techs and Pluses, rather than just
giving them "NewNovice" HF privileges, doesn't simplify the regs at
all. We still need a section to describe the NewNovice privs.

Giving Advanceds a free upgrade to Extra *does* simplify the regs
slightly, by eliminating the Advanced subbands on 4 HF bands. Big deal
- they amount to a few lines of text and a few blocks in the band
tables.

As for VEs, the rules on testing and element credit are
straightforward. clear and in the regs already. Works like this for
the "legacy" licenses:

If you have or had a Novice, you get Element 1 credit only.
If you have a Tech plus, you get credit for Elements 1 and 2, and
possibly 3 depending on the date.
If you have an Advanced, you get the same credits as a General -
Elements 1, 2 and 3.

Simple as that.


And note this:

The NCVEC proposal includes a whole bunch of unnecessary junk such as
restrictions on the type of equipment that can be used, special
callsigns for "Communicators", and the "signed Part 97 statement"
nonsense. (Note that since those special callsigns are only for
Communicators, upgrading means a new callsign and more admin work for
FCC. Since the new-callsign-with-upgrade thing would be an FCC
requirement if NCVEC has its way, it wouldn't be part of the vanity
rules and they couldn't charge for it.

I ask again: Show us why the "legacy" license classes *must* be
immediately eliminated.

73 de Jim, N2EY