Leaderboard

https://www.arrl.org/news/fcc-proposes-record-34-000-fine-for-alleged-interference-and-unauthorized-transmissions-during-idaho Idaho man being fined $34k for transmitting on Rescue and Fire emergency freqs during an actual emergency. Don't be that guy, stick to your approved, licensed frequencies, and definitely don't transmit on unauthorized frequencies during a friggin emergency.

He transmitted five times on the frequency they used to direct aircraft the first day, “thwarting” their ability to effectively respond (according the the public statement). He transmitted three times on the second day. At some point during the second day a supervisor dropped what he/she was doing to tell him to knock it off, in spite of the characterization of the fire incident being described as an “all hands on deck” event. I could understand someone making an emergency transmission on an unauthorized band once, but eight times? The guy was trying to make himself more important than he is.

I don’t know. In a ham group someone said that he did continue even after a personal visit, but I have no specific knowledge besides the article I quoted. But eight times he transmitted on their frequency with his ham radio handheld while they were trying to direct aircraft. I’m not full of sympathy for him. I’m surprised there aren’t criminal charges.

I purchased my first VHS VCR in 1979 for $1,000 One year later, they came out with a new model that had a long cord that plugged into the back and you could hit a button to pause the commercials; for $1,000. One year later, they came out with a new model that had a wireless remote; for $1,000. Now do you think the idea of a wireless remote was too advanced for their engineers in 1979? I think marketing just said: release a new "cool" feature every year so we can sell new models to existing owners! Just a brief note of history...

I had a 275 for years, and now I own two 575s. The 575 covers all the gaps for me that I felt were missing in the 275. I know some are not fans. But for me, they are great. I have mine mounted under the truck seat with a RJ45 cable up to my dash, and plug the 575 mic in there. Clean. Simple. Does everything I want it to, and it doesn't do the things I don't need. I understand that others have different needs and are fans of other radios. I like the extra power, wide band, and split tones on repeaters. I am not a HAM and don't need to monitor stations I am not planning to participate on. Simplex or Duplex, I have been impressed so far. I have them paired with the 6db gain Midland antenna, and am more than pleased with the performance.

I updated the last modified time for the repeater so that it shows as fresh again. Eventually there will be a better method for reporting dead or working repeaters so we don't rely on when the repeater was last updated to determine if it's stale or not.

I just ordered a 40m Pixie 1-watt CW radio (already assembled) with rockbound frequency of 7.023 MHz; I should get it within 2 weeks. Yes I know not to expect very much considering the peashooter signal and such, but I wanted to play with it especially since I have gotten heavy into QRP (and even QRPp) thanks to a very good ham friend of mine from Houston. Oh and it was cheap, too. Have any of you guys used the Pixie and what did you think of it? Warren, WQ1C / WRPC505

Nothing wrong with honest debate. ?

I would be shocked to learn that Idaho doesn't have statutes addressing this. I know for certain that California does. It's not a rule, or guideline. It's a law - if you interfere with public safety (broadly defined to include police, fire, ems, and possibly refuse collection), you have committed a criminal act. The penalty is upto a year in jail and $4k in fines per offense.

Prosecution on multiple fronts happens frequently. Agencies will band together to throw everything they can at a person, and jurors, hearing of the long list of charges will frequently vote guilty on something because if a person has been charged with that many offenses he must have done something wrong. im not saying that’s the case here. In this case I believe that the clear cut violation is to the fcc regulations. The forest service could also charge him with some type of interference, but they may want to wait and see how the fcc case proceeds.

He would have to have been violating a regulation that a state or other federal agency had on their books for them to take action. Forestry can't enforce FAA regulations unless they have a similar regulation within their rules. Without specific regulations against causing interference or impeding radio communications they have to defer to the FCC as the agency with the jurisdiction to take action.

Go to http://Nggmrs.org

More "Freebanders" than hams. And more than likely, Freebanders misidentified as hams.

BTW, you're not likely to get 1W with the CCTs (Cheap Chinese Transistors) it comes with (more like 200-300mW). If you search around the web, there are a couple of articles on replacement transistors that will give at least 1W if not a bit more.

The Pixie is OK, but you really need to be a seasoned operator to have any success with it. It is what it is (not intended as a disparaging remark) and can be a lot of fun. I think the biggest problem the Pixie has is that too many beginners get one (for the price) thinking they're going to be working DX and find they can't even work the neighborhood! I have a couple of them I built years ago, laying around the shack (somewhere) LOL! ?

While I agree with most of what you said in reference to the interference/jammers, what is your beef with Amateur Radio? Hams (the vast majority anyway) do not think they can talk on any channel they want. Where you getting that from??? Indeed, one can find such imbeciles (who think they can transmit anywhere, anytime) pretty much in any radio service/hobby. Such stupidity by a couple of miscreants isn't exclusive to people who also happen to have a 'Ham' license. In any event, if there is one thing in this forum that gets to me from time to time, it is this constant ideology by a few that 'Hams' are somehow 'bad people', idiots, 'snobs', whatever (take your pick). I would also point out that there is a large percentage of GMRS users on this forum who are also 'hams'. I guess I just don't understand this constant condemning of that segment of the radio hobby? ?

This fascinates me, so I read that whole thread. One statement stood out for me: "in fact, they were trying to manipulate the emergency response to save some of their own equipment" Assuming this poster knows what they're talking about, I feel like "interfering with the intent to prioritize personal interests" would be a lot more scandalous than just "trying to help, but being a nuisance"...

That will always be an issue with crowd sourced information. As ham and GMRS repeaters aren't licensed and funded there is no guarantee they will be live from one day to the next.

Yup, making the plug is fully seated is the only fix. A lot of times it's the boot around the plug that's the problem.

OK, so a final update on the path I went.... I did have some 3 dB high power directional couplers that were in band for GMRS frequencies. I connected the dual isolators to that 3 dB coupler and terminated one of the coupler outputs to a 100 watt 50 ohm load. The other output was then connected to the can in the combiner. Effectively I built a hybrid combiner. Tuning it is a bit sketch as I have to tune it between the two frequencies. But I am getting 3 times to power out of it I was before. Mind you that's only 12 watts per frequency, but it's progress. I am gonna check to see what the repeaters are set to power wise and if they are under 50 watts, I will be turning them up to that level. I expect a minimum of 3 dB of loss in this configuration but that's WAY better than 10 or 20 dB that I was seeing. I have the new antenna in the air and the cables in the building. I need to finish terminating the lines in the building and land them on the PolyPhasers. Then cut and run new lines to the combiners from there. Have the materials, just need the time to get it done. Planning on flying a DB420 to replace the DB-408 receive antenna as well. Once that is all complete I will be working on redoing the interface for the 600 repeater to the Midwest link. I have been having audio issues on the transmit site, but i think that was more a subscriber issue.... will know more once I get the repeater on the other combiner and into an antenna. Once all that is done, I will be spinning up a ham repeater on one of the combiners. Should be analog at first. May look at doing a P25 mixed mode with it.

Ahh, yeah, that's worse. I didn't see the separate days part...lacking a context, it seemed like it was the 8 times all together as part of one incident. Sympathy status off.

Yeah, that would make a lot more sense if there's more than is being reported. Given that comment you found, that does also support there's more there than Is being covered. Maybe what we're seeing is all they have him dead to rights on Not exactly sympathetic either...seemed big for what was presented, but makes a lot more sense if it was the tip of the iceberg of his activities and just what they could actually nail him with...ala al Capone.

I never did find something that clearly states he transmitted after the personal warning, but I had to chuckle at this post: walrus01 16 hours ago | next [–] Oh wow I literally know this guy. Jason Frawley. He's a big part of a very vocal group of rural, deep red state WISP operators who think they're god's own gift to network engineering, and mostly worship at the altar of one specific political figure. Watching their antics has been an endless source of amusement. If I had a dollar for every time I've seen Jason and his cohort shoot themselves in the foot with some ill-advised network architecture, rf engineering or network engineering design choice... That he's out there interfering with licensed bands and emergency services is totally unsurprising. That's only the tip of an iceberg of weirdness. There are very, very few FCC enforcement bureau staff members in WA, ID, OR. You have to do something really egregious to get on their radar screen. Every time the FCC fines someone $10k+ it goes in their public daily digest emails as a "notice of apparent liability" and is quite a rare event in the Pacific Northwest. It is not at all as if the FCC has vans full of guys with spectrum analyzers and such driving around the area trying to hunt down and fine people for petty reasons. To get fined by them you really have to go far outside the accepted norms for two way radio or wisp operations in the area. He has network equipment and repeaters at the mentioned elk butte site and probably thought he was doing something to protect his gear. His FCC licensed part 101 fdd band plan ptp microwave links are all part of the public record as part of the FCC ULS public data for the curious.

Nah... I think it's appropriate difference. One is merely messing with the Shopping Mall, another is stomping on communications during a real fire. Also, consider that $24K in 2009 and $35K today are probably not that far apart.

There is no such thing as privacy on any GMRS channel. They are all open frequencies free for any licensed user to transmit and/or receive. Just ask @OffRoaderX and he will tell you about all the "privacy" you get on GMRS.

That depends on how you define "better".. The 905G is a superheterodyne radio and the UV-9G is an SOC, so the 905G is better. The UV-9G costs around $45 and the 905G is over $100, so the UV-9G is better The 905G has a larger battery that will last longer than the UV-9G, so the 905G is better. The UV-9G has a smaller battery and is lighter than the 905G so the UV-9G is better. The UV-9G is waterproof, the 905G isnt, so the UV-9G is better.

Well, at the end of the day its just a low bit-rate voice codec, so its never going to sound as good as analog signal in a high SNR scenario. The strong point for digital is error correction, which usually can translate into increased useful range... although a case for WFM can be made as well, or SSB... but that requires a lot of ear training to pick the nuances of weak signals... etc. That is part of the reason why digital would be appealing to implement, so you can avoid getting hammered by interference, regardless of the source. I think the biggest issue doesn't come from "freebanders" these days, like it did in the 70s/80s. It now comes from a new enemy: the myriad of cheap electronics that spew RFI like its going out of style... the reason why the VHF band noise floor is high (and range is low) is not b/c some freebander dude running 1kW DMR while ragchewing, or a couple of CCRs pumping 50W, etc (I know, letting some of that vitriol out here... LOL), or someone running a 2kW VHF pirate station, etc, its b/c every darn LED fixture nearby pollutes the RF spectrum a tiny bit, then things like traffic light intersections emit RF noise through the roof, or every solar panel installation pollutes the RF spectrum 10-20 dB at a time as well... So, when you add all that noise to your TX signal then you get a super-duper salad of IM (intermodulation) which further screws everything up. And the issue is only getting worse for all bands, too, including the UHF band as well. Soon the noise floor with be so high that you might not be able to use a radio at all. That is one of the reason why a lot of users have migrated from VHF to 900Mhz, to move away from the substantial increase in noise floor. Now, you can still make it work, but you need very high quality equipment, lots of filtering and potentially some sort of active noise phasing to get around the noise floor issue. Its just a matter of $$$$. At this point, like I've discussed with some people, there is no way to put the genie back in the bottle, not unless the FCC starts strictly enforcing all aspects of RF, which starts by strictly enforcing cheap electronics RFI levels, things like LED fixtures and the like, which pollute the RF spectrum like crazy. Ideally, GMRS should've been implemented like the DTR radios in the 900mhz spectrum, as a frequency hopping service so there would've been a lot more "room" in the limited UHF spectrum. But then again, even a FHSS scheme would've caused issues for the FM purists... In the end, there is no way to please everybody, somewhere, somehow, someone will not agree with what they see, and will be very vocal about it. G.

Yeah, DMR does sounds good, but a bit funky. My issue is with those who know better but run digital voice anyway simply because they can and screw the rules. They set a bad example for everyone. Most people honestly want to follow the rules. The few who have the “don’t give a sh*t” mindset, believing the FCC will never enforce the rules, harbor a very narcissistic view where their wants are more important and don’t care who else has to put up with the mess their actions cause. That’s what ruined 11M through the 70’s and 80’s, linear amplifiers, free-banding etc. as an example. Now some of those idiots have discovered GMRS.

but... but... but... it's the internet. I'm pretty sure its mandatory. LOL

OK Randy, just for you, I'll say this. I agree that the FCC probably has never revoked specifically a GMRS license in the history of GMRS licenses, (which I never said they did, and I you know that because you just re-read my post to try and nail me) and by the FCC even hinting at it, it's largely an empty threat. But the FCC can and does levy penalties, including monetary penalties and revoking of licenses across the spectrum, for misuse of the airwaves. You know this. I know this. We all know this. I have no idea if the FCC has ever revoked a GMRS license like they occasionally do with ham licenses, but I do know that they can, and folks have been fined for misuse of all manner of radio services, including GMRS radios. My point, and I know you get it, because from what I've seen, you're a smart man, is that by having a license, whether it's GMRS or any other, you become accountable for your behavior, and if a bunch of licensed idiots is running around on any radio service feeding the monkeys, it makes a mess of the airwaves for the rest of us.

Don't worry about it. Switch to another repeater or use the VFO to find somebody else to talk to. The crappy attitude was at its height around the time the FCC dropped the CW requirement for all license classes. There were endless debates, some still going on, about the merits of dropping or not dropping the CW requirements. Some of the old timers hated that change, and likely will never get over it. I guess they though of it as a some kind of exclusive club. If that was what they valued most then they got into Ham radio for the wrong reason. Go out, make contacts and have fun.

"Amateur Radio and GMRS can coexist"