This is *WHY* one must not "Blend" Amateur Radio with "CB"

friedtater! hell ya ! do it if you can pay cash for it!! thats right!! haha!

 

So...Hands Free is no Big deal or anything New...Motorcycles have been using them for years...

I'm sure if some law was passed like that here, there would be plenty of Companys like Road King, and Astatic building wireless Mic head-set's or Blue Tooth type Mic's...Heck, Cobra already has one on the market.

 

Just another way to make money ...

 

And it is fun to run down the road with a cop on 2 meters and him following you. running about 10 to 12 over, You should hear the cbers. It is funny..

 

Better yet ......

I got stopped by one of our officers who did not know me .... He said my plate was not valid ... He infured that it was bought at a gift shop ... funny since I have had the same call letter plate for over 30 years .... He called it in and I heard the person at the com center say " Say HI to Bruce and tell him to stop by next time he is here " .....

The person he got used to work in our Jail shop .....

He told me to drive safe and handed my back my license ..... well maby nest time when the plate sticker matches the plate he will think twice ...
Then again got to watch us old people with strange plates and too many antennas on the car ......

 

This might be an urban myth (I couldn't find it on the web when I looked just now), but I remember hearing a story a few years ago about FCC inspectors who where inspecting radios in trucks when the trucks were stopped at inspection stations. Those found using a radio outside the CB band and did not possess a valid license for the radio were being issued warnings or citations (if found to be using it).

As a licensed General-class amateur radio operator, I will not operate my Yaesu HF rig on CB frequencies (if I must use CB, I use either my Realistic TRC-458 or Cherokee CBS-1000). And, I will not 'peak and tweak' a CB radio, for me or anyone else. Doing that would qualify me for sanctions similar to the guy in Pennsylvania. If I want more channels or power, I use one of my amateur radios intended for that purpose under my license.

As for those who don't see anything wrong with 'freebanding' because you're 'not hurting anyone', well, obviously that's not necessarily true, because in the case mentioned at the start of the thread, someone complained about TVI.

Keep in mind that the offending transmitter operating at 26.71MHz is not even in the standard TV band, but the second and third harmonics are. I would suspect the third harmonic in this case, at approximately 80.13MHz, which would be TV channel 5.

A spurious oscillator and/or bad filtering combined with high power could easily explain the problem reported by the TV viewer.

So your 'harmless' illegal activities may actually be harming someone else and you don't even know it (and most of the junk import radios do not meet FCC regulations because of their poor RF performance). In this case it was television, who cares, right? Wrong. Wouldn't you be upset if someone's poorly functioning television interferred with your radio? They have every bit as much right to operate their unlicensed television as you do to operate your CB radio. But there are rules that require TV's to operate within certain parameters, and if their TV was interfering with other services, they could be directed to stop using it. Same with your CB, or any other radio.

There are very simple reasons these rules are in place, and not just to fuel your conspiracy theories of the government trying to run our lives (granted, they are, but that's not the point here). The point is just because we don't *think* we're causing interference, doesn't mean we're not.

Licensed 'hams' get to use frequencies that others don't because we accept greater responsibility for our right to use other frequencies and modes, and we have to study and test to get those rights and responsibilities, and we are expected to be aware of the performance of our equipment at all times. CB'ers run mostly unchecked on the CB frequencies, and most people don't care. But if you want to use frequencies outside the 40 CB frequencies, then study and test and become a 'ham'.

Or, to put this another way, saying that using a radio that you're not licensed to use is okay, is sort of like me driving OTR, which I'm not licensed to do. I do own and drive a 5-ton truck, but it's a collector truck ('Army' truck), so I am not required to have a special license to drive it. Granted, it's a 6x6 and looks like many 'big rigs' and most people don't think there is much of a difference, but the simple fact is, I have not studied and/or tested (and therefore I am not qualified) to drive an 18-wheeler, so it would be inappropriate for me to do it, in spite of the fact that I could probably do just fine - most of the time. But it's those other times that cause trouble.

So next time you think it's okay to use a radio that you're not licensed for, just ask yourself if you think it's okay to have unlicensed drivers behind the wheel of an 18-wheeler, because your two-way radio may be interfering with something other than a ham band or TV channel.

(stepping off of soapbox)

 

Look it's Gadfly's twin brother everybody!

 

A 'dieing' hobby? I wonder where you found those statistics? Licensed amateur radio is growing in excess of more than 7% year-over-year. As of June 30, 2010, there are 694,346 licensed Amateur Radio operators in the US. (from the ARRL web site)

 

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