> Andy K3UK wrote: > Wow! Is it only me and Demetre that have noticed this > ????????????????
Andy, I've noticed they are trying to give the appearance that they have moved to bandwidth-based bandplanning, but they still adhere to mode descriptions and categorization. Sadly, they simply copied the IARU Region 1 bandplan, along with many of the poorly-planned parts of it. It is out of place in Region 2. International normalization is good in some cases, but not when it happens in a negative direction. :) The use of 200Hz limit bandwidth is totally unrealistic for anything except PSK31... and if you notice, they did not apply 200Hz to the worldwide PSK31 window at 14070-14073 kHz! CW operators normally do not operate within 200Hz of each other, except for CW contests. They copied Region 1's limit of 2700Hz bandwidth. It is rather unrealistic, considering that many SSB voice tranceivers have 2.8 or 3.1kHz filters. Oh, and did you notice the wacky "AM exception"? The 80m, 40m, and 30m bands in the plan are vastly out of touch with the reality in Region 2. In fact, they are in direct contradiction to USA's FCC rules. They somehow missed the fact that USA operators are 95% or more of the operators in Region 2. Didn't any of the bandplanners notice the elephant in the room? Perhaps they need input by more active digi operators over the next few years when they get around to making a new bandplan. It looks like they totally ignored the input they received over the past year. In the mean time, they missed the digitization trend on the air, and the way that the bands are being used by operators on the ground. By being out of touch with "ground truth", we can expect that large parts of the Region 2 plan are going to be widely disregarded by operators in North America. In fact, they must be disregarded in some cases if operators follow their own country's ham regulations. This is a tragedy, because this sort of "head in the clouds" bandplanning breeds overall contempt by the rank and file for bandplans. As usual, the various world bandplans, including the new IARU Region 2 bandplan are on the HFLINK.COM bandplan site: http://hflink.com/bandplans 73 Bonnie KQ6XA
