Roger Beep

[hfd376]

43 minutes ago, TrikeRadio said:

Thanks for the reply. Yeah I am with you... I was just wondering, did the roger beep originate in the CB world or Ham world? And was it just a gimmick or was there some real reason for it when it came about. I remember back in the early 80s was the first time I heard them in CB transmissions. Only a few radios seemed to have them. (I don't know if that is when they came about or if it was before that, just when I first noticed them) .. .at the time it seemed like it was a "cool" thing that some people had on their radios, but I guess they jsut got on everyone's nerves eventually.

The roger beep originated with the U S Space Program in the 1960's. There were no radio services that I'm aware of. Sometime in the early 1980's, someone came up with device be installed in CB radios. The rest is history,

[TrikeRadio]

4 hours ago, hfd376 said:

The roger beep originated with the U S Space Program in the 1960's. There were no radio services that I'm aware of. Sometime in the early 1980's, someone came up with device be installed in CB radios. The rest is history,

AH! Why didn't I think of that! yeah the old NASA transmissions to the astronauts all had the beep!
Funny that today the beep is considered "not professional sounding" when the origin of it was very much professional with NASA!

[WRYZ926]

I occasionally turn the Roger Beep on just to aggravate my friends and fellow club members that get bothered by hearing it. Otherwise I couldn't care less. 

Some will give you trouble for using a Roger Beep on any of our repeaters but we also do not ban the use of a Roger Beep.

[Hoppyjr]

My Roger beep identifies as Susan, so I don’t turn it on.

[nokones]

17 hours ago, WSFL951 said:

 

 to those who are new to this MDC is NOT BEEP is an ID.

It is a squawk, not a beep. Let the squawks begin.

Some repeater owners are using MDC-1200 signalling as a requirement for accessing their repeaters. Besides the voice modulation you hear on the radio, it is normal for the radio to emit various types of noises, like static, intermod, MDC squawks, hetrodyne of multiple transmissions, squelch tails, and simulcast overlaps. If you don't like the various noises, turn off the radio and go turn on your computer and communicate with VOIP.

[WSFL951]

7 hours ago, Hoppyjr said:

My Roger beep identifies as Susan, so I don’t turn it on.

"Ha, that sounds fun! Do you have a Baofeng or a Motorola radio?"

[WSFL951]

2 hours ago, nokones said:

It is a squawk, not a beep. Let the squawks begin.

Some repeater owners are using MDC-1200 signalling as a requirement for accessing their repeaters. Besides the voice modulation you hear on the radio, it is normal for the radio to emit various types of noises, like static, intermod, MDC squawks, hetrodyne of multiple transmissions, squelch tails, and simulcast overlaps. If you don't like the various noises, turn off the radio and go turn on your computer and communicate with VOIP.

Yes, I heard that some QUANSHENG can use MDC-1200!

[SteveShannon]

7 hours ago, Hoppyjr said:

My Roger beep identifies as Susan, so I don’t turn it on.

Would you rather turn it on if it identified as Roger?  Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

We have a member whose bypass switch was stuck open on the external microphone jack on his handheld, disconnecting the internal microphone.  He didn’t know that.  We discovered the problem when he tried to check in on our Net. The call went out for check-ins and we heard a full quiet dead silence followed by a beep. Because he was the only one of us who used a Roger beep we had some idea who it might be so one of our senior members called out to him by name with some suggestions.  It turned out that by plugging in the external mike we were able to hear his voice.  A week or so later he brought his radio to my house and I soldered a bridge across the stuck-open switch. 
If it hadn’t been for the Roger beep we wouldn’t have known who it was. So maybe we out to require that each radio include a unique Roger or Susan beep.  My Alinco (Anytone inside) has the ability to customize the Roger beep with up to four separate tones. This could be fun.

[amaff]

I like having some audible indication that the transmission has stopped, but I also find the roger beeps on my radios pretty unpleasant.

What I've done on my gear is disabled the Squelch Tail Elimination option (tho it goes by a couple names...repeater tail elimination...even tho it works on simplex channels), which lets through a really brief burst (really, just a click) of static after the transmitter comes off the button, on the receiving radio.

So, just another option that you can control on the receiving end, if you want that feedback, without adding a bunch of noise to your transmissions to those who might not want it.

[TrikeRadio]

Personally I find the squelch tail burst of static almost more "unpleasant" than a beep... but I'm so used to either of them that it really does not phase me or matter to me anymore. It's just part of using two way radios at this point.

[Hoppyjr]

Would you rather turn it on if it identified as Roger?  Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
We have a member whose bypass switch was stuck open on the external microphone jack on his handheld, disconnecting the internal microphone.  He didn’t know that.  We discovered the problem when he tried to check in on our Net. The call went out for check-ins and we heard a full quiet dead silence followed by a beep. Because he was the only one of us who used a Roger beep we had some idea who it might be so one of our senior members called out to him by name with some suggestions.  It turned out that by plugging in the external mike we were able to hear his voice.  A week or so later he brought his radio to my house and I soldered a bridge across the stuck-open switch. 
If it hadn’t been for the Roger beep we wouldn’t have known who it was. So maybe we out to require that each radio include a unique Roger or Susan beep.  My Alinco (Anytone inside) has the ability to customize the Roger beep with up to four separate tones. This could be fun.

I don’t turn on Roger or Susan, I find they/them annoying.

[nokones]

9 hours ago, WSFL951 said:

Yes, I heard that some QUANSHENG can use MDC-1200!

Oh no. There goes the neighborhood.

[WSFL951]

14 minutes ago, nokones said:

Oh no. There goes the neighborhood.

Oh man, you don't know what they can do; they just go to GitHub and download their new version!

 

[amaff]

7 hours ago, TrikeRadio said:

Personally I find the squelch tail burst of static almost more "unpleasant" than a beep... but I'm so used to either of them that it really does not phase me or matter to me anymore. It's just part of using two way radios at this point.

That's the beauty of it. I hear it. No one else has to.

[TrikeRadio]

3 hours ago, amaff said:

That's the beauty of it. I hear it. No one else has to.

Fair enough.

[FishinGary]

Strangest roger beep I've ever heard was during this one exchange, sounded like two guys at some business using FRS, and one of them produced this fast "bonk-bonk" sound every time he keyed off. It it sounded like a notification sound you could select on a cell phone or something. The other one had a "normal" sounding beep.

[Reloader762]

Most all the 70 cm and 2M hams repeaters around here use a courtesy tone. The GMRS guys frown on roger beeps, but on most all the nets and multiple individual conversations, they are constantly doubling on top of each other.  It doesn't bother me one way or the other if an individual uses it, and none of the local GMRS repeater that I'm aware of use any kind of courtesy tone. Personally I think it helps with communication, but I respect the wishes of the repeater owner, but on simplex between family and friends I'll use it.

[TerriKennedy]

On 1/18/2023 at 10:07 AM, Lscott said:

I find they are irritating but they do serve a purpose. Using a repeater with a long hang time and several participating in a round table discussion the Roger Beep lets everyone know the repeater is available for the next guy to key up to use. Some repeaters use a "courtesy tone" for this but many don't. I've stepped on others and had the same happen to me, you're not sure the other guy is finished talking or just pausing for a few seconds before continuing. 

On my repeater-in-training* (The New JC 700) roger beeps are discouraged. The repeater sends a courtesy tone once it's done handling your traffic. It then sits for 30 seconds to see if anyone else keys it up. If not, it auto-IDs itself with my call sign. If someone else keys it up before the time-out and it doesn't get a chance to ID after 14.5 minutes of repeater duty, it will cut in and ID itself every 15 minutes until traffic stops. That seems like the best of all worlds, so it isn't pumping out its ID 24/7, but only IDs while it is passing traffic or after traffic stops. The repeater has one input tone, a different output tone, and sends Morse IDs with no tone.

Right now the NMO-HDG antenna is using my chain link fence as a counterpoise. Once it gets warmer, I'll be running 7/8" Heliax up to the roof with a Commscope DB408-B on an additional 20' mast. That's as high as I can go without permitting and warning lights (approach corridor for Newark Airport). As I'm already up on the Kennedy Blvd. ridge in a 3.5 story building I should have pretty good coverage. I also need to pound a field of ground rods into the ground once it thaws for lightning protector earthing.