I see this all over, and its just poor operating practice. Some guys will be 2 or even 3 KHz low, someone else might be 1 or 2 KHz high, some guys are overmodulating and/or have no restrictions on the high end of the audio, and the qso is 10 KHz wide, which is rude.
Not so important on an empty band, but still poor operating practice all around. I know its hard to keep some rigs on frequency, you need to zero beat often. When I had the drake R4C, sometimes I only heard one guy in a qso, the other guy was out of the passband! Brett N2DTS ----- Original Message ----- From: "Todd, KA1KAQ" <ka1...@gmail.com> To: "Discussion of AM Radio in the Amateur Service" <amradio@mailman.qth.net> Sent: Thursday, April 02, 2009 2:35 PM Subject: Re: [AMRadio] 7160 tonight: Suggestion On Thu, Apr 2, 2009 at 1:45 PM, D. Chester <k4...@charter.net> wrote: > One suggestion. We need to be more careful about zero beating each other > on > the 40m frequency. At times in the QSO, stations are so scattered out over > a 1-2 kHz range, that my sync detector won't stay locked when one station > turns it over to another. But the real problem is that this frequency > scattering is bound to be generating unnecessary hostility from the SSB > DX'ers, and will likely to result in deliberate QRM and other hostile > actions against the AM'ers. I have already heard the griping, and I'm > afraid > it's just starting. Last night someone tried to fire his ricebox up on AM, > and kept saying (with extreme distortion), "Why are you on AM down here? > Go > back to 7290". When has that ever bothered you before, Don? To borrow your own words on such matters, 'strap and ignore', 'turn up the wick' etc. I'd agree with you if folks were scattered out over 4-5 kcs or more, but 1-2 seems m ore related to sync detectors not locking up than to offending any SSB ops. After all, it's been one of the ways to discourage anti-AM SSB types from crowding in close to a QSO in progress. > Remember, we don't own 7160 kHz any more than slopbucketeers own any of > "their" frequencies. Excellent point, and all the more reason to use whatever frequency is open. Hopefully as activity grows, people will fan out and use more than one frequency to prevent the 3885 effect from taking place, with 20+ people in a roundtable or another AM QSO 4-5 kcs away. > Because of the limited spread of this "new" phone band, we need to operate > more like precision sharpshooters, than users of a sawed-off shotgun in > the > early evening. With the new situation on 40m, maybe it's time to seriously > consider a petition to the FCC to further expand the phone band, down to > 7100 or 7075. Much of the foreign DX is below 7125, and US amateurs are > about the only ones in the world who are not allowed to operate phone down > there (not sure about VK's and ZL's). I hear 7075-7125 filled with a LOT > more foreign SSB than CW. More space is always a good thing, but it might be hard to justify in the face of current activity levels(not that we should have to justify it, but it is the FCC). Think of the nights recently when you, 'HUZ and others have listened over the 40m band and found virtually no activity as your reports and charts indicated. With the bandwarming party on 80m, we saw an initial influx of activity both AM and SSB after the phone expansion, but very little was actually new users looking for space. More often than not, it was some group or net moving to a clearer area, which in turn opens up more space or at least, helps alleviate crowding by the lemmings in certain congested areas of the bands. 80m is finally showing several groups of regular AM activity below 3750 daily. It'll be interesting to see how activity on 40 plays out with the BC dwindling in the lower portion. Considering the overall lack of activity across the band, I doubt we need to be too concerned about anyone beyond the usual rabid anti-AM types giving us grief. Just hearing AM activity is bound to attract some nitwits, even if everyone is dead on frequency. Of course, good operating procedures should always be followed, regardless. :D Back out to get more done on the station... ~ Todd, KA1KAQ/4 ______________________________________________________________ Our Main Website: http://www.amfone.net AMRadio mailing list Searchable Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/amradio@mailman.qth.net/ List Rules (must read!): http://w5ami.net/amradiofaq.html List Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/amradio Post: AMRadio@mailman.qth.net To unsubscribe, send an email to amradio-requ...@mailman.qth.net with the word unsubscribe in the message body. 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