Hi Don, I agree that is not completely clear from reading the rules, but maybe one could interpret them to mean that you can transmit a beacon if you are the control operator. The main point is that you definitely can not do this if you operate automatically on the bands below 28 MHz.
I contacted ARRL several months ago and did receive a response from Paul Rinaldo, W4RI, on some of these issues. At the time I was mostly concerned about clarification on what text data refers to vs. image/fax and whether or not we could consider documents (.doc, .xls, .pdf, etc.) to be fax, that sort of thing. Also, the issues about baud rate in the voice/image portions of the bands. I believe that I published his response on the HFDEC yahoogroup, maybe on this group as well?. He had some clear answers to some questions but on some he felt that the issues were yet to be determined. About that time, additional issues came up and as I sent an e-mail to ARRL's Dan Henderson, N1ND, on 10/1/07, mentioning that I had contacted Paul about some of the issues. He indicated he would defer the questions to Paul and I waited about a month and contacted him to find out how things were going and he indicated that he did not plan to do anything further as he assumed somehow that Paul had already answered the questions. It was a bit bizarre to say the least as I thought I explained that only some of the questions had been dealt with, but he had no further response. I then asked this group to respond and make recommendations to my draft questions I was planning to forward to the FCC. I believe that Andy, K3UK, had any suggestions. Some hams publicly and privately appreciated that someone was at least going to ask these questions. At least one ham, was over the top with a personal attack but I guess that you have to expect this behavior these days. I took Andy's suggestions, and modified the questions and sent them to the attention of Mr. Hollingsworth, on 12/11/07. I have not heard anything back at this time. I agree with you completely on this issue and I take issue with those who do not want a response from the FCC. It is simply not reasonable for so many hams to not clearly understand what a given rule does or does not mean. We should all be pleased that someone is finally asking for some assistance in interpreting some of these rules. If the FCC does respond in a way that some feel is not a proper interpretation, or they are opposed to the rule, they can then petition the government for a change. That is the democratic process and it should be strongly supported by hams who want to do the right thing. 73, Rick, KV9U Don wrote: > Hi Rick KV9U, > > I know we have had a few email exchanges on this and I really > appreciate you and many other digital ops here in this group and on > the bands. I will not get into this too much but agree it must be > attended while in the shack and as you know I'm also a user and > supporter of PropNet until or if the FCC otherwise states that the > operation of PropNet on 30m is not with in the rules (also, I think > Ev W2EV from PropNet doesn't call PropNet operators 'beacons' but > PropNet stations). If the FCC does comment on this one way or the > other then we will of course do as directed and follow any rules as > they interpret them. I know you where going to email/write/contact > the ARRL and the FCC on the PropNet issues below 28mhz and wonder if > you ever got a response yet? I would be very interested in the > repsonses because we can talk about what we think the rules say or > try our best to interpret them for what PropNet is doing but the FCC > really has the final word and say if what they have is unclear or > operations are not within the rules. Thanks for all you do Rick and > others digital ops here for Ham Radio digi ops. > > BTW, we are planning another 30m PropNet in March 2008 and hope we > have others participate if they are around in the Shack to operate > and participate...those that must leave the shack or can't attend due > to other events can always participate anyway while using the > PropNet 'lurk' mode where you can still be a rcvr and report PropNet > signals but just not participate in the transmit part of the event. > > Thanks for letting me post here in this group. > > de kb9umt Don EN50dp > http://www.30meterdigital.org > > >
