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Jonas I couldn't agree with you more. The only thing I can add is, when you're a new Ham, experienced operators are very excited for you and extremely willing to help with the learning curve.
If I were a government snoop-agency with such a plan, I'd write software to scan the internet chatter for phrases such as " government list" and log who said it and start collating any remotely associated data...
>>>>This would make a great discussion around a campfire with lots of rum! :P
It's probably gil ratting us all out anyway. Think about it. Lowercase "g", obvious alias. Posts at all hours of the day/night, there's probably 5-6 "gils"" monitoring the forum 24x7.
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Jonas I couldn't agree with you more. The only thing I can add is, when you're a new Ham, experienced operators are very excited for you and extremely willing to help with the learning curve.
Not me!
I have already built a solar powered water system, with wind backup, and a geny on the side if that all fails I have a bicycle crank.
rigged into my house plumbing so it keeps it pressurized, supplied from a deep well with 550g storage.
Produces over 2000g a day and has enough extra power to run an AC unit or heater, a hot plate, LED lighting, and my radio gear.
You obviously can't live like you do with utility power but we will survive.
TAPRN is a great resource. Thanks for the link. I didn't know about it. I like their <A HREF=\"http://www.catastrophenetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Standardized-Amateur-Radio-Prepper-Communications-Plan-10-2011.pdf\" target=_blank>Standardized Amateur Radio Prepper Communications Plan[/url], especially the 7,242kHz frequency suggestion. We might piggyback on that one.From this website, I came across this one: http://stores.tutorturtlepress.com/-strse-Survival-Communications/Categories.bok.
Gil.
As a challange...
Next Friday night, turn off your main circuit breaker, promptly at 6:00pm (1800 hours).
Don't use any tap water and see how well the toilet flushes.
And too, Power up your radio gear and make contact with other hams while you are on battery power. Those flashlight battries aren't dead, are they? Do you even know where there is a flashlight in your home?
Eat your meals witout the ais of your stove (electric or gas) and use some other means to heat what you eat.
Oh, and how wonderful you will feel taking that cold shower at six am in the morning! Oh, wait a minite... you don't have any running water!!!
A tip:
It was either at Lowes or Home Depot, they had some of those solar walk-way LED lights for sale for about $1.50 each. I bought a half dozen of them and they work wonderful as night lights. You don't need a lot of light to get from your bedroom to your bathroom at 3:00 am in the morning. I ended up returning and purchasing another dozento out up as a prepping item.
As a prepper who once thought about emergency radio in JUST the sort of way - under the radar and only after the SHTF. Later, as I did the mental calculations for what I thought would be needed, it became obvious that I would need a license...if for nothing else...to talk to people who had licenses!
The book arrived with the list of license holders in my state. Of the few in my neighboring towns, most are already deceased - years ago. Others have moved away. So far only one lady to have hopes to get in contact with. She is a little older than me and recently retired - young retired ( ::)
If you just want to be prepped, get the knowledge, and borrow a callsign once in a while for testing purposes imo.
If you just want to be prepped, get the knowledge, and borrow a callsign once in a while for testing purposes imo.
of course, they could just look for the tell-tale antenna sticking 40' into the air - so I guess it gets back to OPSEC - use the PO box AND hide the antenna!!
As I mentioned in the Welcome message in the General board, it is not all right to suggest illegal activities on this forum.
So, no, do not borrow a call sign! Or if you do, don't post it here, thank you.
Gil.
...btw Frosty...what'd you say your callsign was again?
...of course, they could just look for the tell-tale antenna sticking 40' into the air - so I guess it gets back to OPSEC - use the PO box AND hide the antenna!!
[/quote
Heck, my antenna is 60' up! ;)
Friends call me Ben btw.
From a "radio prepper" perspective, registering your home with the FCC/DHS as a radio communications facility, while hiding your antenna from your neighbors who could just look you up online if they wanted to know if your a ham, makes no sense to me.
In forty years of hammming and MORE in shortwave radio, I have not yet taken a direct hit from lightning. I did however, have nearby strikes cause damage to my mobile radio, likely because of the 16 foot military whip antenna...
As a precaution, I only have the antenna plugged in to the radio when I am operating. There is no need to have it IN when not operating, so why take the chance of damage froma bolt out of the blue? So far, no loss of a house hold radio. The direct strike is not the most likely cause of damage. Being in the area near a strike causes a 'surge' which a long antenna can pick-up and bring down ito your radio, damaging components. You won't know it, until you try to use the radio.
>RadioRay ..._ ._
As a prepper who once thought about emergency radio in JUST the sort of way - under the radar and only after the SHTF. Later, as I did the mental calculations for what I thought would be needed, it became obvious that I would need a license...if for nothing else...to talk to people who had licenses!
I remember quite recently stating that I didn't want to be on any more databases - especially since I had only recently popped up on one in particular - kept by my local guns store owner...
...but gaining knowledge by having discussions with some very intelligent hams - at least one of those conversations with a long-time ham who probably views government more dubiously than even I do - and I'm probably less concerned about showing up on yet another government database.
This is a very real fear - because I don't know if many of you noticed - but the government has been overreaching a LOT lately...and the problem is...when they do stuff it has a tendency to be long-lasting (if not permanent), and the innocent folks are the one that end up having to pick up the pieces, and clear their names and spend their own fotunes doing this.
What has pushed me into this isn't that I plan on doing something out of the ordinary. It is rather that I will be targeted for doing something perfectly legal - like having a prayer meeting in my house in Arizona for friends, family and neighbors. That guy is still in jail.
...for peaceful assembly, pursuing a natural right, the legality of which is acknowledged by our own constitution.
But as Gil may (or may not) have realized he alluded to...maybe staying OFF the radar is NOT the way? Maybe the best way is to establish a show of force - by illustrating JUST how many citizens are GOING to staying in contact with one another.
...so just this one, last, database...but after this one...no more!
I have to be brutally honest here.
I have been thrown off every Prepper board in existence for speaking my mind when it comes to amateur radio. The reason for the squabble is exactly the same reason described on this forum, many people thinks that there is no reason to get a license and that they can buy a couple of $40 walkie talkies and that they will be welcome to get on the repeater or the radio and just talk without any repercussions.
The truth to the matter is - they read the part in the Part 97 that says that anyone can use anything available to them to call for help, and they confuse the call for help with just a plain old emergency.
In an emergency, can I call for help on a police frequency - technicially NO, because it is not allowed, but honestly if you had a police vehicle in front of your house and the officer was shot and couldn't get to the radio - yes you could use his radio.. You just can't shoot him so you can use it.
ONCE your call for help is sent, you have to get off the radio.
This is where the confusion lie's.. These people thinks that because it is an emergency, all the rules of radio are dropped and it is a free for all.
Just today I was trying to work digital modes on 10 meters and on both 28.070 and 28.120 MHz USB - there were Spanish speaking people on the band. This tells me that they own either illegal CB radio equipment, judging by the rodger beeps - this leads me to believe it is true, along with others that probably bought legal ham radio equipment but does not know the rules or has a license.
I turned the transmit power up to 40 watts and started sending CW, followed by a couple of bursts of PSK 31..... Just enough to let them know that their free banding was neither wanted or allowed on our bands.
Do the Preppers get upset when I tell them that it is not legal to build illegal repeaters on the GMRS that are not coordinated and has no call sign? Of course they do, but the forum owner just lets them keep right on giving instructions on how to build them out of everything from legal ham radio equipment to just tying two Woxshun walkie talkies together and putting them on a tower 300' off the ground - connected to some type of antenna with a little gain.....
Is it illegal for them to use their Boefang walkie talkies on the two meters or the Marine band to talk between husband and wife and wife and kids like a telephone?
Yes, but no one likes being told that they are not allowed to do it...
It is the old CB radio mentality of there is going to be so many of us breaking the rules and since we are mobile and have no call sign, you don't have any way of catching us so blow your rules out your butt!
And that was what ruined CB radio in 1976.!
PS: Technically it is allowed to call for help on a police frequency in a true emergency. The odds that the circumstances exist which it would be allowed would be so obscure as to make it almost unrealistic, but technically, it is allowed.I think we need to note that it is not a violation of FCC rules, but it may well be a violation of state/local laws regarding interfering with police activity. There was a case where a passerby found an unconscious police officer and used the officer's vehicle radio to call for help. He was rewarded by being charged with interfering with police activity. I do not know the outcome of that incident; maybe the charges were dropped and maybe they weren't. I read about it some years ago. It did seem like reinforcement of the old rule that "No good deed goes unpunished."
There was a case where a passerby found an unconscious police officer and used the officer's vehicle radio to call for help. He was rewarded by being charged with interfering with police activity.
" One thought comes to mind, if a lightning bolt can travel a couple of miles through the sky, can't it travel a couple of inches or feet in the vehicle or the shack if left unterminated."
---
Yes , a direct lightning strike can easily span a few miles, thus easily span a few feet. However, you know from electrical laws that even for a direct strike, electrical current follows the path of least resistance. So if the ladder line is laying on the lawn rather than connected to the radio inside of my house, the energy should find that a very much more direct path to ground rather than than leaping off elsewhere - though the near field energy might cause damage.
However, the induced field from a near-by strike can and does dump a LOT of energy into surrounding conductors. By being disconnected from the rig by even inches, the induced current from a near-by, but not direct strike is far less likely to damage my radio gear and I can sit back and enjoy the SHOW!
(https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRRCSAAYZg2Uw8jdkuOiPJMAovo-gOBjI2TxSskZfFO6f9XIYNZ6w)
>de RadioRay ..._ ._
This is what you should be using at the top of the mast of your boat. - http://www.lbagroup.com/products/lightning-protection-masts-dissipators#tower (http://www.lbagroup.com/products/lightning-protection-masts-dissipators#tower)
I'm surprised that no one has told you this before.
http://www.jamestowndistributors.com/userportal/document.do?docId=995 (http://www.jamestowndistributors.com/userportal/document.do?docId=995)
When you are on the water, you are the highest thing in the neighborhood - hence your mast becomes a convenient lightning rod.
I have to be brutally honest here.I have been thrown off every Prepper board in existence for speaking my mind when it comes to amateur radio.
Fully aware that I'm inexperienced with the on-air protocols required to contact and interact with another HAM radio member. However seeing as I am going to be using my equipment for mostly local family-to-family or friend-to-friend contacts who make up a large part of my prepping team have no experience dealing with HAM operators so talking in Q-Codes to them wouldn't be very useful or helpful at all.
As some examples of what he's talking about, what band would probably be best suited to effectively communicate to one of your prepping team members 300 miles away at 1900 local time during the month of June? What mode would be best suited for that? How about the antenna type?
The knowledge to answer all these questions comes from years of experience that you gain from actual day to day on air operating
I could make up my own "Gil code" and send it in CW...I think you should do it. So what if you can't communicate with another living soul on the entire planet using Gil code because only you know it. ;D
And way ahead of you on learning morse. The hard way.
"If SHTF, I'll just go down to the XYZ store and steal everything I need! Like a Hummer H1!"
Don't worry about people who think they can do this with no training, no practice, and gear they've never used. It's highly unlikely you'd ever hear them on air at all.
But what about the ones who have spent countless hours playing Microsoft Flight Simulator? Or what is that other one X-Plane.
I agree. Looking at it in reverse, I have over 1,000 landings in small planes, but I always crash a flight simulator. And of course landing a plane isn't one of those thinghs where "if at first you don't succeed, try, try again." :oQuoteBut what about the ones who have spent countless hours playing Microsoft Flight Simulator? Or what is that other one X-Plane.
You could potentially learn to fly that way, but your first few flights would really be gambles. I'd give anyone trying it a 50-50% chance of survival.
Gil.
This applies too with radios, if I'm defending myself and others and my family don't want to go out and get a HAM licence then what am I supposed to do? The only logical thing, give them all CB Radios.
I'm afraid that your question KK0G can't be answered reasonably. There is no reasonable reason why you need an airplane. Rather, it must be answered medically. You see, like every other pilot out there you suffer from a psychoses. You have a disease of the brain. Unfortunately, this disease has no known cure. Like so many other incurable diseases you can treat the symptoms but once in the blood stream you can't get rid of it. Like a persistant cold score, you just never know when it will flair up again. You can put up a good front, a facad of normalcy but just under the surface you are raving loon. It also acts as an addiction, the more you feed the urge the more it controls you. You must always go higher, lower, faster, slower, further, shorter. Good enough is never good enough. This is why I am convinced that the airman medical examinations are a farce. The mere fact that you are a pilot should be more than enough proof for the medial examiner that you are not right in the head and in fact are unfit to touch the controls of an aircraft.
This thread will be pleased to know that I've just found a job.Hey Freax, CONGRATULATIONS! (http://i120.photobucket.com/albums/o170/cockpitbob/Emoticons/party_zps2d69794f.gif)