[AMRadio] Usages of AM in the amateur context

[Rob Atkinson]

re the power, well last night on 3880 I had pretty good copy on Bill WA3QGD
in Washington State (about 2000 miles away from my Chicago area QTH) and he
was working Brent W1IA in N.H. with 100 watts.   I bet not that many SSBers
work transcontinental ragchew QSOs this time of year with solid state
transceivers.  Most seem to run 1.5 KW amps to work guys 200 miles away.
Earlier in the afternoon on 75 I was talking to a nearby friend and for that
I was only putting out about 20 w. to the dipole but unbeknownst to me, a
friend of mine 200 miles away in Indianapolis heard me and sent me a few mp3
files of me blathering, and considering the distance and power, it wasn't
that bad (the signal that is, not the blathering).  Not full quieting by a
long shot, but perfectly readable.

I think some of that has to do with how AM is more unforgiving of poor rx
and tx antennas.  We are motivated to work at trying to get the best
possible antennas so when the ham with the Ranger shows up we can at least
get most of his transmission and get out when we transmit.  The compromise
antennas that might be okay for SSB often don't cut it on AM but the payoff
is when we can hear weak signals from guys running surprisingly low power.

73

Rob
K5UJ