Leagally Trashing The Bands; The New CB'ers

[koØm]

As I sat there on 7.163 MHz listening to a station employing "Wide-Band /Hi-Fi" SSB who was there assisting a normal SSB'er with his audio, I could not help but to think about Cee-Bee. The "Big Gun" whose signal occupied at least 3 Kc with a bass response probably down to 20 cps sounded like "WLW - The Big One"; "Clear Channel AUDIO" but, the adjacent frequencies were unusable because of his (for lack of a better term) "Bleed-over". Either you listened and hopefully talked to him or, you had two choices; QSY to a different frequency or sit there watching your radio like you watch TV.

So, I asked myself, "What's the real difference between the Citizens Band Service and the Amateur Radio Service?" They both resemble each other quite closely.

The entry point for one service is very low in dollars while, the other service involves jumping through a lot of hoops and spending a goo-gob of money (compared to CB) just to say "CQ". Here, is where the differences become clearer; While there are (comparatively) only a few Big Gun CB operators left on 11 meters, there are many-many Amateur operators who have invested multiple "Beau-Greena" into Wide Side Bands", California Kilowatts" and, Stacked Arrays who just 'Heterodyne' the bands. They (along with the OO's and wanna-be'er) are always there to tell you how to run your radio station according to the FCC Level Ground rules. "This frequency is in use"......., "W-blank-blank-blank for I.D. on the 10's" ......., "CQ Contest-DX"......etc; Radio with a stick stuck up their backsides!

"Cee-Bee" is radio with personality; you can be yourself, speak in any manner natural to you (Hi-Hi) without being ostracized, and rag chew as long as you can hold the frequency. You can key on your friend and pass "Bogus Fives" and make people laugh from here to "Skipland"......"Is the frequency in use........?" "Damn right the "Frequency" is in use while I use my "Lip Cutter" on that Mudduck.....!

Well, I will turn my receive down on my 'Propagation Monitor" and go back to 20 or 40 meters and humor myself with 20 watts on PSK (canned transmissions or multiple mistyped words). Has anyone figured out have to convert speech to text in a PSK environment......Wishful thinking

......"Tell him I keyed on him, I been there and gone". "Leave that Cotton-chopper slobbering in his mic; talk to who you hear, not who you kinow!"

Dee-Eee, "Knock-Out-Zero-Mike for I.D. on the ten."

.

[PA5COR]

With my FT 2000 D i can listen up to 4 KHz wide.
Our novices that have 7050 to 7100 are doing lots of audio things as well, mostly if i hear one with lots of lows i ask him why? wasting precious power of his max 25 watts in the frequncy band it is useless?
I use the EQplus for the 2000 most under 200 Hz is filtered out, mid/high emphasized for my low voice.
One call is mostly enough to break a pile up getting unsollicitated good audio reports clear, loud and no distortion.
Normal qso's 100-2900 Hz setting dx always 300-2700 Hz settings.

I tell our novices to put as much effort into building and understanding antenna's as they now do with their audio settings equalisers etc.
Now there is some serious gain to be made.
I'm not a BBC news reader, i do in communication as effective and as clean can.
C.B. here is almost dead, most die hards went for the novice license.
The rest just died out.

[KJ3N]

:sleep: :sleep:

[N8YX]

:sleep: :sleep:

Pretty much.

As far as that Cee Bee thing, the CP2000 I tout so regularly needs no audio modifications to make it sound good, and the receiver has one of the highest (if not THE highest) 10KHz-spacing rejection figures of anything in the Class D market - past or present. Let the boys splatter - this thing doesn't give a sh!t. It's the Honey Badger of 11M gear. What's it spend its life doing? Eating Cobras... :rofl:

[WX7P]

Pretty much.

Let the boys splatter - this thing doesn't give a sh!t. It's the Honey Badger of 11M gear. What's it spend its life doing? Eating Cobras... :rofl:

Cute. But I like it!

[KG4CGC]

If you're not splattering across 40 plus channels then you're not doing it right, was the mantra of the 80s and 90s. I couldn't stand it. Used to hear one guy back in the day even after I disconnected my antenna.
His reasoning? "I paid mah taxes!"

[kb2vxa]

"If you're not splattering across 40 plus channels then you're not doing it right, was the mantra of the 80s and 90s. I couldn't stand it."

That reminds me of one such case back in my CB daze. I was hearing splatter across the band and beyond (my receiver was a Heathkit RX-1 Mohawk) and I never experienced receiver front end overload so I decided to look for the operating channel. After much aggravating tuning around I found this pipsqueak signal with horribly distorted audio which led me to wonder if he was using a cheese grater for a mic with a meat grinder for a non linear linear. Amazing, wasting all that power over a considerable frequency spread as a piss weaker when if it were concentrated where it belonged he would have had an S9 signal. Now for some TV and music ripoffs, Splatter, what's the matter with you? (Chatter was a monkey.) When you think over modulation equals loud audio your signal becomes a Puddle Of Mudd.

Maybe I'm the one
Maybe I'm the one who is the schizophrenic psycho (yeah)
Maybe I'm the one
Maybe I'm the one who is the paranoid flake-o

"Used to hear one guy back in the day even after I disconnected my antenna."

The classic case of front end overload, it may have been a clean signal but being CB I tend to doubt it. (;->) That reminds me of the locals "down the shore" trying to locate The Crusher on Thunder Base, the most powerful station in Ocean County. The antenna was hidden in a tree and whenever they got into Beachwood, a little postage stamp town like this one their receivers would overload and the S meters would read backward. They were quite jealous because Crusher attracted the crowds with his funny antics and High Pockets in particular because his stacked 3s on a 60' tower fed by a 100W amp couldn't compete with Thunder Base rather appropriately named. The really funny part is not a one ever thought of disconnecting the antenna... DUH?

As an aside, I tracked down a number of pirate radio stations back in the heyday by listening on the car radio (not easy with AGC on AM and IF limiters on FM) and disconnecting the antenna when I got in close. Being a pirate myself at the time the guys were quite friendly and each one when found became a sister station in our underground network but now I'm rambling like Ramblin' Jack on Thunder Base.

I leave you with this thought. Splattering across the band gives you a distinct advantage, unlike the others you don't have to change channels when you're on ALL channels.

[NY4Q]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gI5eT4UmyFY

[AE1PT]

Has anyone figured out have to convert speech to text in a PSK environment......Wishful thinking

I been doing it for years--but cannot attest it will work with PSK programs other than DM780.

You must first buy Nuance 'Dragon' Naturally Speaking and install it on your station computer. I have found to avoid lots of conflict and line issues it's best to use a USB sound device for your microphone. For my shack I have used a Microsoft Lifechat headset--and am currently using a Plantronics UC+ Pro bluetooth headset.

Train the application to recognize your voice. Takes about 15 minutes at the start, and then spend about an hour reading out of a Reader's Digest or something. Make yourself a list in a word processing program of special words used in ham radio. Abbreviations one has to get a bit creative with--as you must train the NS engine to recognize the word or abbreviation. You can also phonetically spell out any abbreviations. Use the 'scan documents' feature to build your vocabulary from the list.

Customize a couple macros to begin and end sections of the qso. One jumps in with voice recognition after the opening macro, and has a couple others to close out and stop transmitting.

Also, make sure that the shack box has balls enough to run DM780 and Naturally Speaking. An old Celeron with 1 gig is not going to get it... :lol:

[NQ6U]

Does anyone else see the irony in using a speech-to-text app to work PSK-31?

[KC2UGV]

Does anyone else see the irony in using a speech-to-text app to work PSK-31?

Not anymore than using a data mode to transmit voice :lol:

[KJ3N]

Does anyone else see the irony in using a speech-to-text app to work PSK-31?

Not particularly.

However, given Patrick's description on the hoops you have to go through to make it work, I'd rather poke my own eye out with a stick. :roll:

[AE1PT]

I promise you the process of setting it up is a lot more pleasant that jamming a stick in your eye...

Knowing what works in advance takes a lot of frustration out of the deal. When I first began doing it years ago with two sound cards (one for PSK, one for inbound audio) things could be a pain in the ass to set up--and go south for no observable reason at all. USB makes it more better. The process works great for RTTY or any other "keyboard" mode.

There is nothing strange to me about voice to text modes. I spend all day parked in front of a keyboard, typing shit. PSK gets me all over the world. I only use the NS when determining if the OP on the other end is a call collector or likes to RC a bit. That's where it comes in to be useful. No more strange that taking words and transforming them into a series of dots and dashes...

[WØTKX]

Used voice to text apps for years in CAD applications, very useful for huge digitizers and mapping.

[KG4CGC]

I just realized that I still have a couple of mobile units put away somewhere. Should I park it on the Super Bowel?

[K7SGJ]

I just realized that I still have a couple of mobile units put away somewhere. Should I park it on the Super Bowel?


You look a little flushed, perhaps the toliet bowl would be a better choice, eh?

[WØTKX]

I am SOOOOO tempted to call CQ Super Bowl on 14.313. :lol:

[K7SGJ]

Do it. I triple dog dare ya......................

[WØTKX]

Sure. Let's do a sched. :lol:

[VE7DCW]

I am SOOOOO tempted to call CQ Super Bowl on 14.313. :lol:

Sorry Dave....... someone has already beat you to it! .......I was listening to 313 a couple of weeks ago and one of the jammers on there was already making like the stupidity on the CB "super bowl" style .......Rog-eee!!... :spin:

[n2ize]

As I sat there on 7.163 MHz listening to a station employing "Wide-Band /Hi-Fi" SSB who was there assisting a normal SSB'er with his audio, I could not help but to think about Cee-Bee. The "Big Gun" whose signal occupied at least 3 Kc with a bass response probably down to 20 cps sounded like "WLW - The Big One"; "Clear Channel AUDIO" but, the adjacent frequencies were unusable because of his (for lack of a better term) "Bleed-over". Either you listened and hopefully talked to him or, you had two choices; QSY to a different frequency or sit there watching your radio like you watch TV.

So, I asked myself, "What's the real difference between the Citizens Band Service and the Amateur Radio Service?" They both resemble each other quite closely.

The entry point for one service is very low in dollars while, the other service involves jumping through a lot of hoops and spending a goo-gob of money (compared to CB) just to say "CQ". Here, is where the differences become clearer; While there are (comparatively) only a few Big Gun CB operators left on 11 meters, there are many-many Amateur operators who have invested multiple "Beau-Greena" into Wide Side Bands", California Kilowatts" and, Stacked Arrays who just 'Heterodyne' the bands. They (along with the OO's and wanna-be'er) are always there to tell you how to run your radio station according to the FCC Level Ground rules. "This frequency is in use"......., "W-blank-blank-blank for I.D. on the 10's" ......., "CQ Contest-DX"......etc; Radio with a stick stuck up their backsides!

"Cee-Bee" is radio with personality; you can be yourself, speak in any manner natural to you (Hi-Hi) without being ostracized, and rag chew as long as you can hold the frequency. You can key on your friend and pass "Bogus Fives" and make people laugh from here to "Skipland"......"Is the frequency in use........?" "Damn right the "Frequency" is in use while I use my "Lip Cutter" on that Mudduck.....!

Well, I will turn my receive down on my 'Propagation Monitor" and go back to 20 or 40 meters and humor myself with 20 watts on PSK (canned transmissions or multiple mistyped words). Has anyone figured out have to convert speech to text in a PSK environment......Wishful thinking

......"Tell him I keyed on him, I been there and gone". "Leave that Cotton-chopper slobbering in his mic; talk to who you hear, not who you kinow!"

Dee-Eee, "Knock-Out-Zero-Mike for I.D. on the ten."

.

Hi-Fi audio is just another phase of experimentation. Nothing inherently wrong with it. Of course it helps if the stations you are working are set up to handle a wider frequency response. Done properly good fidelity can be produced without being excessively wide or causing splatter.

[VE7DCW]

Hi-Fi audio is just another phase of experimentation. Nothing inherently wrong with it. Of course it helps if the stations you are working are set up to handle a wider frequency response. Done properly good fidelity can be produced without being excessively wide or causing splatter.

You just have to remember the CB'ers creed: ....... "Rog-eeeee,Rog-oooooo..... don't ya see and don't ya know...."

......it sort of gets ya right there...... :mrgreen:

[K7SGJ]

You just have to remember the CB'ers creed: ....... "Rog-eeeee,Rog-oooooo..... don't ya see and don't ya know...."

......it sort of gets ya right there...... :mrgreen:

Brings a tear to my eye.

[kb2vxa]

Brings vomit to my mouth.

[AE1PT]

Brings vomit to my mouth.

Keep it to yourself... :vomit:

[kb2vxa]

Droll, very droll. (;->)

[N8OBM]

So, I asked myself, "What's the real difference between the Citizens Band Service and the Amateur Radio Service?" They both resemble each other quite closely.

The entry point for one service is very low in dollars while, the other service involves jumping through a lot of hoops and spending a goo-gob of money (compared to CB) just to say "CQ". Here, is where the differences become clearer; While there are (comparatively) only a few Big Gun CB operators left on 11 meters, there are many-many Amateur operators who have invested multiple "Beau-Greena" into Wide Side Bands", California Kilowatts" and, Stacked Arrays who just 'Heterodyne' the bands. They (along with the OO's and wanna-be'er) are always there to tell you how to run your radio station according to the FCC Level Ground rules. "This frequency is in use"......., "W-blank-blank-blank for I.D. on the 10's" ......., "CQ Contest-DX"......etc; Radio with a stick stuck up their backsides!

"Cee-Bee" is radio with personality; you can be yourself, speak in any manner natural to you (Hi-Hi) without being ostracized, and rag chew as long as you can hold the frequency. You can key on your friend and pass "Bogus Fives" and make people laugh from here to "Skipland"......"Is the frequency in use........?" "Damn right the "Frequency" is in use while I use my "Lip Cutter" on that Mudduck.....!


Many years ago it was Cb that got me into radio. I quickly got interested in SSB and what I could do with it. And maybe, just maybe, I got interested in how PLL's worked and explored the range from 27.405 to 27.505. Just maybe, that is. I read the ARRL handbook and learned much about radio's and how they worked long before I went for my license. My Elmer and I had a deal going. He taught me proper procedure and the band plan and I taught him how the radios work.

In the town that I lived there were a number of CB clubs and we had many hours of plain old rag chew. There were a number of hams that were out there as well. Made a number of friends from those days. The next town to the east was where the problem children lived. The local channel for them was 17 and you would just hear a roar of "You can't hear him.", "Smack!", "Smack back", and all those keying over people games. With our group we used to organize picnics and other fun stuff. There was a great sense of community. We also had fun pranking each other. I pulled a great one with the help of a friend across town. We set up a crude phone patch and I was talking to another station that was near my friends place. I told the station ( I forget her name) that I had invented a new type of linear called a proximity linear. When I said it was off I would transmit from my radio. When I said it was on Tom would key his radio connected to the phone patch. All perfectly legal but, we had her going. She kept asking me to build one for her. I don't think I ever let on what we did. Big Fun.

When I got my license I was mostly on VHF as we were still living in apartments and didn't have the option of setting up bigger antennas. If you like a nice friendly rag chew, I seem to have my best luck on 2 meters. Even out here in upstate NY. There are a few towns nearby the have active CBers out here but they are a mess. They use a 100 watts to talk 1 mile because of the power wars. Nasty business. I would not at all be surprised to see an FCC enforcement sweep over there. You can hear the radio roar for more than 50 miles.

Vhf also gives you a nice inexpensive way to get on the air. The antenna are small so they are less expensive, easy to conceal if you need to, and easy to home brew. You should be able to get a serviceable VHF rig for less than $100. That puts the cost of admission in the same area as CB. Still it remains the same in that the more you know the cheaper you can put together a station. Isn't it also part of an elmers job is to help the grasshopper put together a first station?

If it's washin' it's workin' Ye Ha!

Archie N8OBM