cant we all get along?

You can thank the FCC for throwing in the towel; years ago they used to monitor the airwaves for this type of behavior and "deal" with it appropriately, now it's pretty much "every man for himself" on CB.

Also keep in mind when propagation gets big as it has lately, you tend to get signals from hundreds of miles away of folks talking....makes it hard sometimes to get out a mile, but you can chat with the guy 2 states away.

 

How do you know it's ham people?

 

Just because you hear people out of state doesn't necessarily mean they're hams.

The problem with CB is it's on a frequency that is known for skywave propagation aka "skip". The skip cycle peaks every 11 years, then decreases, then peaks again in 11 years. When skip is rolling, you can hear, and sometimes even talk to, people from several states away.

CB was oroginally on UHF but back in '48 they had trouble getting the radios to work right, so 10 years later they decided on HF...why they didn't go with VHF is beyond me...had they put CB on say 1.25 MHz you wouldn't have all the skip issues, plus those 4 ft antennas would be far more ideal for 1.25 MHz as opposed to HF....guess the technology wasn't advanced enough...?

 

Theres such a thing as DX skip too

 

Your not going to hear HAM's on a CB...Totally different critters...What your hearing several States away is other CB Radios...Or Radios converted for CB...(plus maybe a magical mystery box)

now I'm not going to say those people in the other States are running legal 4w CB Radios...But I'm sure they are, otherwise they would be operating illegally. :smt033

 

Easy get a bigger radio with a fatboy or davemade amp instead of spending money on gps learn how to read a map which is rare these days.