[CW] FCC Releases 71 page NPRM

Tue, 20 Apr 2004 06:22:26 -0700 (PDT)

--- "Pedro J. Santa" <[email protected]> wrote:
> In the meantime, let's dust off
> those straight keys (so that
> we do not get impatient with our own sending speeds)
> and let's lie low,
> waiting for those abundant QRS QSOs with the hording
> swarms of Novices, Tech
> Pluses and Technicians that will surely flood the CW
> bands with venturesome
> CQs addressed to all listening CW ops, should this
> brilliant FCC proposal
> comes to pass...

i agree with pedro. my guess is that most anyone 
still  holding a novice license isn't active, and 
has possibly never made an amateur radio contact, or
has totally lost interest. most of the contacts i 
make in the novice bands (and i do make a few) are
generals or higher who are self-identifying cw
beginners using  the novice band as a place to brush 
up on their cw skills. some of them are 5wpm extra
class licensees who already have privileges to 
operate anywhere, but who voluntarily choose to 
operate in the novice band to stay out of the way
of the higher speed activity further down that 
they are unable to copy.

the major effect of the nprm is to extend the phone
band 25 khz lower. for the most part, cw ops are
not using those segments of the bands anyway; most
of the novice band activity tends to hug the lower
band edges (7100 khz). and i never hear extra class
licensees using their 3725-3775 khz cw allocation 
either. there are some slow nets in the 3700-3725 
range (i actively participate in the texas slow net 
at 3719), so these won't be impacted by the nprm.

most the of cw activity, by far, is lower in the 
band. i was pleased that the arrl proposed the more
cautious reallocation; extending the extra class
phone band down to 3725 rather than to 3700 khz (as
some had wished), and the arrl's proposal is 
reflected in the nprm.

an added benefit of the nprm is that any novice and
tech pluses will be able to build and use some of 
the crystal controlled (or vxo) qrp rigs, such as 
the small wonder labs rockmite. currently, they have
to re-crystal them for 7110 khz. they will also be 
able to build homebrew qrp rigs using the tv 
colorburst crystal at 3579.545 khz. though as i
mentioned, i don't believe there are many of these
licensees who are hf active.

73,
scott nj0e

=====
Scott McMullen, NJ0E
http://www.geocities.com/scottamcmullen
[email protected]
Dripping Springs, Texas

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