[Elecraft] OT 4M

[James Duffey]

I would like to see 4M released for ham use, not necessarily for repeaters, but rather for weak signal use. There are many times when the MUF goes above 50 MHz, but doesn’t reach 2M. 70 MHz would be very useful for sporadic E. Meteor scatter would still be good there, not as good as 50 MHz, but much better than 144 MHz. EME, with WSJT, should be significantly easier than 50 MHz. With a limited number of 144MHz and up ops here, 70 MHz would really help the VHF/UHF contest scores in this area. The whole state of NM has a 50W limitation on 432MHz, so we are limited as to contacts on that band.

Amateur use of 70 MHz should be able to coexist on a sharing basis with current users, with perhaps some limitations near critical users, if there are any. It is an issue that is pretty far down the priority list for the FCC or the ARRL though, so it will be a while. - DUffey KK6MC
--
KK6MC
James Duffey
Cedar Crest NM