2m repetition compliance

[SparkyTris]

Much younger now, I know of one girl who was 8 year old when licensed

that amazes me. I thought the F course was pitched high, personally. especially the non pictorial stuff, like the legislation and ohms law/power law. I was surprised at the somewhat high level of numeracy and comprehension required, if the aim was to get schoolkids in.

 

[mattylad]

I doubt if the occasional sending of a DTMF tone over the air is going to cause any issues, not that there is anyone that will do anything about it even if it was not within the rules.

 

[ericmark]

South America (chile & argentina) - and the Falkland Islands use the 2m band in exactly this way.

Do they? I was unaware of that, I was VP8XBHZ and then VP8BKM, the first was a special 2-meter licence and not the full 2-meter band, seem to remember 145.000 to 145.800 only, the second required a personal interview with the post master, and you got the full 2-meter band 144.000 to 147.999 and also HF. The first licence was for the radio, the second was for the person.

There was also technically an out-of-band repeater in 143.750 out 148.250 from memory, which we were allowed to use.

I can recall only one female with a licence whom I knew 'back then'.

Most of the people on the radio were female, did not talk to many males as a VP8.

I remember my first pile up, lucky someone else walked into the shack to help me, 100 contacts in an hour, it was hard going, clearly less than a minute per contact, and it took me an age answering all the QSL cards, only did it once, and it was not really enjoyable. It was just hard work.

When I did a special event in the UK, did not get that many in 24 hours. Never did HF as a VR2, so don't know what that was like.

 

[SUNRAY]

I doubt if the occasional sending of a DTMF tone over the air is going to cause any issues, not that there is anyone that will do anything about it even if it was not within the rules.

Yes I agree as long as it is occasional but not if it's beginning (and possibly end) of every over by a couple having a ragchew

 

[JohnW2]

Most of the people on the radio were female, did not talk to many males as a VP8.

Interesting. As I wrote, the situation was very different from that in the UK in the 1960s!

 

[JohnW2]

that amazes me. I thought the F course was pitched high, personally. especially the non pictorial stuff, like the legislation and ohms law/power law. I was surprised at the somewhat high level of numeracy and comprehension required, if the aim was to get schoolkids in.

You'd also be amazed and/or surprised at how 'advanced' some kids get. I have a grandson who turned 7 just a couple of weeks ago, and for quite a while I've been amazed by his level of numeracy, literacy, comprehension and reasoning ability etc.

He recently asked me how it was that his dad could lift a heavy car with a hydraulic jack even though he was not strong enough to lift it without the jack. He appeared to completely understand my explanation, including the arithmetic of some of force/distance examples. He initially did not understand why there was no backflow of the hydraulic fluid, until I explained to him about valves.

I realise the 13 is very different from 8 (let alone 7), but I'm nevertheless reasonably impressed by the fact that I seemingly had no problem passing (in 1963, at age 13) the RAE I recently posted in another thread, and now repeat here ..

Kind Regards, John

 

[SparkyTris]

The first licence was for the radio, the second was for the person.

When I said of Falkalnds that "they use the 2m radio in exactly this way", I guess that I meant more that nobody in FI got precious about who was using a repeater so long as somebody associated with the radio had a license; children, wives, sisters, brothers, visiting sheep shearers, boatmen, pilots etc.
I cant remember how the farms now communicated with the islander aeroplanes but pretty sure that was 2m also (??). HF was ubiquitious too and certainly in practice the callsign went with the site rather than the operator. I guess it was just practically and necessarily anarchic. (emphasis on the practical). Now that I think of it Im pretty sure you needed HF to ask the plane to pick you up.

Im sure that there was bureaucratic licensing condx in black and white, probably just not enough people to police something that didnt seem to need policing. They (government house) got their knickers in a twist about VP8ADE being "unlicensable" a few years back after some piffling change in bureacracy, but happily nobody was able to do anything about it.

Chile & argentina certainly had enough police to enforce law, impose fines (and physical violence) on the spot. but my point is that the 2m "resource" was used for practical, domestic & logistical communications (as opposed to purely radio-hobby related chat but that was definitely in there too) Im sure that ALL operators had to have licenses there. and woe betide anyone who was found not to have their papers.

 

[ericmark]

Yes, there were reserved frequencies, 145.550 was for medical. When I was there, there were only 2 repeaters, and really these were to teach children with, and not for general use, but outside 9–4 Monday to Friday others could use them.

The old telephone system ran through a minefield, so did not connect to Stanley, so had been replaced with a HF radio, but this was slowly being replaced with a microwave telephone system.

The islander aircraft had replaced the beavers, but there was a problem that not all farms had a landing strip which complied, and there were problems while I was there about the state of some landing strips, I never did travel with fixed wing aircraft, all my trips were Land Rover, motorbike, or rotating wing aircraft, wokers and erics.

There was a small problem with the licence call signs, two and three letters starting with X were HF call signs, only the four letter like my VP8XBHZ was special 2 meter, and the HF call sign took presidents, so if I was in a Land Rover which a radio with call sign VP8XBYY and I heard it being called, I should answer with my call sign VP8BKM which caused some confusion.

I did have the call sign list, as I ran the QSL bureau, which was a mistake, it was not started by me, and the guy who started it left, we would get 100's of cards for people who had left the Falklands years ago, 10-year-old QSL cards, I will guess it stopped when I left?

There was a combined radio club, military and civilian, seem to remember two call-signs VP8FIR and VP8RAF, a civilian was always the named runner of the club, so they could not be out ranked.

But 2 meter was more like the local telephone service. Instead of QSL they would say "that's all right then" it did not seem to matter what had been said, so Johnny fell off a ladder would get a reply starting with "that's all right then"? And for 2 meter, the VP8 was normally dropped.

Since I would request crossing the runway using my FT290R I would have thought one could contact the islander aircraft with 2 meter. Local radio would say who was travailing anyway, even included the cat. In some islands, cats were banned. Everyone knew what everyone else was doing, which likely was the reason for the largest divorce rate per head of population in the world.

But in the main, radio wise VP8's were well-behaved. It was Hong Kong when one had to join HARTS to use the repeaters, where there was a problem with IQ zeros. The instructions were, ignore them, if I answered an IQ zero I risked loosing my access to the repeater, it could only be opened by a HARTS member, but once open, anyone could join in. Seem to remember having to fit an extra bit to the radio to open the repeater, think this was the tone card. That radio was given to my son, I got a new FT50R before leaving, but 70 cm was not permitted in Hong Kong, and one could to an extent select the call-sign you wanted. As long as no one else had it. So I was VR2ZEP could not alter the Z, but EP were my initials.

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

Have the rules changed, I am sure my son had to wait until 14 to get his licence? I know he got his call sign at 14 years old, and I used to talk to him using packet radio, which back then worked due to the number of repeaters, does packet radio still exist?

Last I heard, it moved to the internet, after which, who knows.. The packet radio was my main reason for doing the RAE.

I think the 14 limit went many years ago.

 

[mattylad]

There is no minimum age to obtain a license now, it just requires a parent or guardian to be present when they take the exam.

I too was very active on packet, co sysop of a local station. (I cant remember what its called, was it a BBS?)

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

I too was very active on packet, co sysop of a local station. (I cant remember what its called, was it a BBS?)

Yep, a BBS (Bulletin Board Service). They often carried/stored a range of amateur software, a callsign lookup, carried GB2RS news, relayed both personal messages, and 'public' messages and discussions. They required you to register with a local BBS, so the pm's would know where to find you. There would also be a routing system.

I tried to get sysops, to consider adapting wifi equipment, to setup an high speed network, as competition to the www. I even carried out a few local experiments, as proof of concept.