[Elecraft] Ham radio as a side dish

[Chuck Chandler]

Not me, a friend of mine...

Who is a pilot.  Not just a pilot, but certified by the FAA to give check
rides for small airplanes.  I don't know the specifics, but he does
aerobatics and all that.

Anyways, he's a contester and DX'er as well.

But, even though I'm sure he's a really good pilot, even he had to have a
check ride.  He was up near New York City, having a check ride and
apparently there is a flight area along the Hudson River that is really,
really tricky.  Has to be flown just about perfect, so that was his check
ride area.  His instructor, who apparently was at an even higher level,
told him to request the clearance for that corridor and ATC gave it to him
immediately.  His instructor wasn't expecting that and told him words to
the effect of "Be careful.  You talk better than you fly."

Apparently ATC tends to be hesitant to clear private pilots into that
corridor, but years of DX and Contest operations gave him the, shall we
say, savoir faire to be cleared without hesitation.  His request was
apparently crisp, clear, unequivocal and brief.

For my part, having been a cop since 1980 I've usually been the guy folks
go to for technical stuff.  Beyond radios, even.  Somehow I am expected to
know about cameras, computers, networking... and I've even picked up quite
a bit of it on the way.

73 de Chuck, WS1L

On Sat, May 26, 2018 at 11:27 AM, Martin Sole <hs0zed at gmail.com> wrote:

> I can really relate to these two.
>
> As a kid I played drums. My father taught and played pretty much all his
> life until his hearing gave out. Though my CW has never been more than
> remedial mostly the sense of rhythm and timing is mostly excellent and I
> attribute it to those early years. When I took the then GPO 12wpm UK Morse
> test the coastguard guy did comment on my good fist.
>
> On the navaids ID I have a good one. Just recently I commissioned 2 ILS's
> out in the Middle East, though primarily for the US Air Forces use. I had a
> good raport with the tower guys and would often spend time up in the tower.
> Having just programmed the ILS idents I asked a controller to have one of
> the approaching aircraft take a listen and report the code back to be sure
> it was keying okay. It seems this, to me, simple request caught this
> particular KC135 crew off guard. "Wait one", came back the response, a
> couple of minutes later, somewhat confused sounding they came back with a
> "er, well, its kinda dee dee doh, doh dee doh, dee dee". Took me a second
> or two to figure they had actually got it right just with no spacing. I
> guess they don't teach pilots code now either.
>
> Though I've never worked on navaids in the US, only in Asia and EU, I've
> never done one with a voice ident, only ever CW.
>
> Martin, HS0ZED
>
>
> On 26/05/2018 19:56, Dave Sublette wrote:
>
>>
>>   Music: I play trumpet in a couple of bands. My experience with Morse
>> Code
>> has helped me (my opinion) be more precise with timing or rhythms.  I also
>> believe, although I'm not sure studies have proven, that ability to learn
>> and use Morse Code is highly correlated with musical ability.
>>
>> Flying: I hold Commercial, Multiiengine and Intrument ratings.  When I was
>> taking lessons, flying cross country using VORs (before GPS), I would tune
>> to the next VOR, I.D.it by hearing the Morse identifier, and turn the
>> volume down.  My instructor would then lecture me on the need for properly
>> I.D.ing the station before turning down the volume.  I had a hard time
>> making him understand that those dits and dahs were telling me the same
>> thing the voice would have.
>>
>>
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-- 


===================
Chuck Chandler
chandlerusm at gmail.com
===================