[HCARC] When People Ask A Question - Be Careful With The Answer

[Gary and Arlene Johnson]

We are blessed to have as much knowledge residing in the membership of the club as we have.  We also have a cadre of somewhat younger, but definitely less experienced amateurs who need to get some questions answered from time to time.  The problem is like one young member (Calvin Noble I think -- BIG TALL GUY who rides a motorcycle) had observed to several of us in the back of the room, that he had asked the same question about the lead line from the center of a G5RV antenna six times and got 6 different, but unuseable answers.  Much of what went on about antennas here on the reflector with myself, Gale and Kerry was in the same vane.  People who give advice need to realize who they are giving advice to and need to tailor the advice to the real question being asked.  BTW, sometimes, us newbies don't even know the right question to ask - Gale knows this for sure from a couple of Saturdays ago.  Barb Scheyler summed it up best while I was talking to her.  She said I probably asked a question at the level of "What Time Is It", and got answers as to how a clock is made, the theory behind making clocks, details about atomic clocks, and Big Bang Theory as it related to quantum Mechanics, but still never found out what time it was.  To a newbie, the answers you would share amongst you old timers who have been licensed 30 times the years some of us have been licensed, these esoteric answers may be useless.  The reasons younger Hams leave Amateur Radio are many, but one of them surely is the frustration of getting high dollar equipment to operate adequately and not being able to get help to make it happen.  In Calvin's case, I copied part of the antenna manual and will take it to him tommorow to hopefully answer his question.

Madam President, your idea of assigning Elmers is an excellent one.  Every time Dale gives a class, there is the opportunity to gather up numerous Newbies in the club, but they will only stay if they can get to a level where the hobby doesn't intimidate them into leaving.  I think they should be encouraged at every turn through opportunities to use HF to upgrade their license as soon as possible.  To me, Newbies concentrate on the FM side of UHF/VHF and aren't getting the chances to see what is happening in the HF world.  The majority of the presentations I have seen in the 6 months of being a member have been HF oriented.  Without HF experience, those talks go right over the Newbie using only UHF/VHF's head.  Add to this the significant expense for equipment coupled with frustration in getting answers in how to use it will drive them away for sure.  In my class with Dale, there were 7 students - to my knowledge 2 of us have joined the club and attend meetings.  I haven't a clue what happened to the other 5.

Is there any reason why we can't (or maybe we do) get permission to set up radio's at the local County Fairs, maybe with Dr Jim for an afternoon or a Saturday at the Pioneer Museum, or maybe at the Pacific War Museum??  Maybe a booth at the Saturday Flea Market at the courthouse.  I plan to run my radio (when I get it) off of Solar panels and batteries.  Set up a simple antenna for 20 meters or the beam on the clubs trailer and go for it.  The best advertising for Dale's class is some people who got a chance to operate and operational time is what Newbies need to get excited about upgrading to general class to utilize HF enough to make it worth it to get the radio.

Lastly I apologize to Kerry for being somewhat frustrated with him, or maybe better said, with the answers I received from him.  His answers were great and accurate I am sure - however I wanted What Time Is It answers and I got Quantum Mechanics Answers.  Again I apologize for being short in my greeting at the meeting.

73's

Gary Johnson
N5"BAA"