IMO, a better way to provide the service would be to just turn a couple of LORAN-C stations back on.
But that would be a tacit admission of another stupid government screwup. This WWVB scheme can possibly be spun as an 'improvement'- hence politically less distasteful, even if more expensive for the users. YMMV. , -John ================ > To be very clear here. > There is not a box coming from NIST. > They do not want the responsibility to maintain what ever it would be. > > The reason to make the change to the format is for better frequency and > time distribution by this channel. > It seeks to improve overall system gain and attempts to negate > interference from MSF at least in regions of the east. > > Whats very interesting is that the silicon would in some way recover a > carrier to recover the data. If that carrier happened to be on a pin of > the chip then you might take advantage of this new method and it could > then be used perhaps to drive the old equipment. I certainly have no > problem with such an approach. > > But suspect the rcvr will be multi-$$$$ and have to saythats not in the > ole budget. > > Further > wwvb has not been a great way to distribute frequency for 20 years. > We time-nuts all have done far better with GPS. Granted no way to check > it against anything else. > So I simply do not understand the why of all of this. Not throwing > stones here. > Its just thats one big electric bill every month and there has to be a > bit more clever alternate national freq dist method that would be far > more economical and deliver better coverage and interference rejection. > Think about it, this new modulation method with say 5 transmitters at > lower power. Central site to control stability though at that point lots > of other approaches come into play. Oh thats LORAN C sorry. > > Just very curious as to why the two approaches, especially since we also > know eloran is also being explored. > > All of this is getting wayyyy off topic. > Regards > Paul > > > On 7/8/2012 6:50 AM, Bob Camp wrote: >> Hi >> >> >> On Jul 8, 2012, at 1:17 AM, David J Taylor wrote: >> >>> As an observer from across the pond: >>> >>> - presumably, the vast majority of users would not be affected. >> Yes, the wall clock and wrist watch people (I use both) would not be >> impacted according to NIST. I have seen no reports of, and not observed >> any impact on my stuff. >> >>> - is there a technical solution which would be compatible with both old >>> and new methods? Some alternative modulation scheme? >> The whole format of the change has been under the guise of a government >> investment in a technology company. That's taken the whole debate about >> modulation formats out of the public eye. The goals of the new >> modulation scheme are a bit unclear, so it's difficult to evaluate >> alternatives. One would *assume* that the cost of silicon to demodulate >> the new format is a major part of the decision on the new approach. That >> said, yes there has to be another way to do this that does not nuke the >> old gear. >> >>> - is there not a testing period, where results can be fed back as to >>> the compatibility or otherwise of the new scheme? >> There have been tests. There is no official / formal feedback mechanism >> for the tests. It's not totally clear what any of the testing results >> are. One would *guess* that they are testing a silicon implementation of >> their receiver in the field. One would also *guess* that nothing >> "important" is impacted by the modulation. >> >>> - has there been any official response to your comments that the new >>> scheme stops existing equipment working properly? >> The response has been: Yes we know this breaks your stuff. They have put >> that in writing. There is a somewhat vague promise that a box that >> "translates" the new format to one the old gear can use could / would / >> might be developed. No idea at all what such a box would look like or >> cost. Also no idea how well it would perform. >> >>> - can you involve your members of the legislature, or would the be >>> either inappropriate or a waste of time? >> Based on past experience - waste of time, even in an election year. The >> subject is to hard to understand and not enough voters are impacted. >> >>> Cheers, >>> David >>> -- >>> SatSignal Software - Quality software written to your requirements >>> Web: http://www.satsignal.eu >>> Email: david-tay...@blueyonder.co.uk >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com >>> To unsubscribe, go to >>> https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts >>> and follow the instructions there. >> >> _______________________________________________ >> time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com >> To unsubscribe, go to >> https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts >> and follow the instructions there. > > > > _______________________________________________ > time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com > To unsubscribe, go to > https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts > and follow the instructions there. > > _______________________________________________ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.