[NLRS] use of 144.200 in contests
tosca005 at umn.edu
tosca005 at umn.edu
Mon Jan 20 19:43:10 EST 2014
Sorry, John. I may have confused you. What I meant was that Ron clicked on
Reply All, so you got the reply, but so did everyone on the NLRS mailing
list, and so I could not tell WHICH JOHN Ron was replying to. I was not
trying to be critical of your use of Reply instead of Reply-All, just
saying that the list participants got Ron's reply but didn't know to whom
he was responding. Not a big deal, and I would not have mentioned it if my
own name wasn't John, which might have made it look like I was the person
he was conversing with.
The mumblings mentioned by Paul occurred over the air during a PRIOR
contest when 144.200 was being overly monopolized, preventing other
operators from using it for long periods of time. Paul and I were two of
the grumblers, but there were others as well. Naturally, the calling
frequency is just that, a place to make a call, and if no one uses it,
there may be a case of everyone listening and no one calling. So it SHOULD
be used. It's just that some people justify calling on that frequency a
whole lot to the exclusion of other operators who wish to use it.
One operator calling almost continuously has the supposed benefit of
scaring up some contacts who are doing a lot of listening but not
themselves doing much calling, but it only benefits the monopolizer unless
(s)he allows other folks to "tail end" when a new contact arrives. The
problem with even that justification is that the monopolizing operator is
probably slowly spinning his/her beam and at the time that a contact is
"woken up", it may be from a direction in which other operators are not
pointing (or the responder's beam may be pointed near to the caller but no
one else who is waiting to use the calling frequency) and therefore the
other operators are unable to hear and therefore unable to try to "tail
end". So it ends up that the one operator is effectively the only one who
can use the calling frequency. Better practice would be to call for only
SHORT periods of time on the calling frequency, and when a contact is
raised, quickly MOVE that contact up or down to an unused frequency to
actually complete the contact. If other operators ARE able to hear the
responder, they can likewise move their VFO and attempt to "tail end", but
if they are unable to hear the responder, they are then free to make a few
calls on the calling frequency. If the caller is running high power, (s)he
should probably move the responder 20 or 30 KHz away from the calling
frequency to be sure that they don't still interfere with other stations'
use of it. I suppose if the caller is in a very remote location (no other
operators nearby to be interfered with) a smaller frequency offset may be
enough. But the further the better to completely avoid interference.
73 de W0JT/5
EN34js June-September
EL09ro October-May
On Jan 20 2014, John tf wrote:
>I may have clicked on the individual reply , so I will try again , didn't
>intend to limit who I was emailing :)
>I wasn't working the airwaves , I was busy doing other stuff .
>I did not catch the on air stuff .
>My reply to Ron
> " Ron ,
>What are your mumblings ?
>My chart shows
>144.10 - 144.20 EME and weak-signal SSB
>144.200 National calling freq.
>144.200 - 144.275 General SSB
>
>John
>KD0CAC
>
>
>On Mon, Jan 20, 2014 at 4:45 PM, <tosca005 at umn.edu> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> Ron:
>>
>> I am not sure what John you are referring to, since you didn't quote his
reply at all nor did you address a reply to him directly, only via the
NLRS
maillist. But it was obvious (to me or to other operators named John)
that
>> it wasn't me.
>>
>> The grumbling that Paul mentioned was made on the radio rather than on
>> email. Imagine that, hams talking to one another using "the ether" (radio
>> waves) instead of Ethernet.
>>
>> Since I was a thousand miles (give or take) from the NLRS area during the
>> January contest I can't comment on any improvement in the use of the
calling frequency, but I am glad to hear from other maillist postings
that
>> there was at least some improvement.
>>
>> Down here in Texas, K0MHC made a big pitch for people to get off of
144.200, and publicized the fact that we ("the Hill Country Rovers")
would
be listening on 144.210 MHz. Much to my surprise, folks down here took
that
>> to heart, and there was more activity on 144.210 than there was on the
>> 144.200 MHz calling frequency. I guess that was a good thing, since
>> activity levels down here were so light that we were happy to be able to
>> find people listening to our chosen frequency.
>>
>> (Separate travelogue on my Texas-to-Oklahoma-and-back rove to follow in a
>> while.)
>>
>> 73 de W0JT/R
>>
>>
>> On Jan 20 2014, Ronald Bergantzel wrote:
>>
>>
>>>
>>> He'll John !! Thanks , I was referring to the "mumbling and
>> grumbling" that Paul was mentioning....... the national calling freq
>> has been used as such here. Say , John , I didn't hear you during the
>> contest , just wondering if you were busy then ??? ( Or using a different
call) As always , I am open to any civil discussions regarding calling
freq
>> operations . 73!! Ron KA0RYT EN35
>>
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