top-fed SSB backstay antenna??

[Jack Painter]

1) Boaters checking in to MMSN with no traffic, every one of them, with
this simple contact have:

2) Checked equipment to make sure it's working properly...

3) Checked propagation at the time they are monitoring to see if the
ionosphere is still operational...

4) Helped the hams monitoring the net to check propagation between THEIR
station and a maritime area they had not heard from today, just in case
their services are needed during this net time...

5) Inadvertently said, "Thank you, guys" from the boaters the doggedly
loyal ham retirees on shore are trying to serve. All they ask is for a
little check-in "thanks".

Any boater-ham should always check-in for these purposes if no other. You
have no way of knowing until it's too late if the damned CG can hear you or
not and if anyone is REALLY listening out there. "Waste of Bandwidth" my
ass.....

Well I'm sure they enjoy that little camaraderie, but the vast majority of
pleasure boaters, fishermen and professional mariners are not amateur radio
operators. If they were, ham radio would be permanently assigned the status
of CB-world. Some of you actually work to prevent that from happening, so be
careful what you wish for, it could happen.

Jack Painter
Virginia Beach, Virginia

 

[Jack Painter]

You missed the point of the net, entirely. The net is a SERVICE net.
Traffic is passed or phone patches can be connected between ham boaters and
home. Ham radio is a HOBBY. No bandwidth has ever been "wasted".
Stations check into the net with no traffic TO LET NET CONTROL KNOW THEY
ARE THERE, ON FREQ, AND AVAILABLE TO RECEIVE TRAFFIC.....unlike you
Coasties who noone ever knows whether they are listening, HAVE PROPAGATION
TO LISTEN, or not!

No I didn't miss the point. I did mean to be more specific (and I was later)
that I meant checking in from the dock. That's not service, that's just
enjoying the use of a radio for enjoyment's sake. Fine but don't confuse it
with hailing and distress frequencies. Each has their purpose.

You boys have some fun with CG's wonderful communicators where you live.
Call 'em by their official call letters some day. See if they recognize
the call. Ours have no idea what CG Group Charleston's callsign is on HF
or VHF. Don't seem to be any RADIOMEN left.

That would be fun for you maybe, I just see it as lack of use = lack of
existence. Nobody calls them by those callsigns through a watchstanders
whole enlistment, and then you want to "test" him on it? I think I 've made
it clear that at least in Eastern US waters, which is what I observe, USCG
Groups answer distress calls on 2182 on a regular basis. The most tragic
marine diaster is recent US history (Bow Mariner) passed an alert via only
2187.5 khz DSC-GMDSS and 2182 khz, to which three USCG Groups immediately
responded and rescue aircraft and surface vessels were launched immediately,
and lives saved as a result of excellent watchstanding on 2182 khz. I backed
up a young operator on that case from the first message passed. I attended
the Church service for the deceased, and was thanked by the survivors. I
don't need your approval of procedures and policies, but I will try to help
you understand them, since you are a customer and may one day be a consumer
of USCG rescue services.

Now, let me polish this ax off a little more....

You mean grind, which is obviously the only reason for you being here.

I'm sure you've gotten a little flack from the Charleston "Morning Dew"
debacle. Remember the complete idiot with 3 boys aboard crashing into the
UNLIGHTED Charleston Jetties? Need I post the tape of the boys screaming
for help? Oh, I forgot, his "Radio Procedures" weren't "correct".

IF THOSE BOYS HAD SCREAMED FOR HELP ON ANY CHARLESTON SC HAM RADIO REPEATER
FREQUENCY.....THEY'D STILL BE ALIVE TODAY!! If I had heard them, I'd have
got the Goddamned BASE COMMANDER out of his rack!

You know I can't comment on that, and why.

Jack Painter
Virginia Beach, Virginia

 

[Jack Painter]

Not without a cooperating ionosphere, which hasn't been cooperating of
late.

What serious antenna farm have you been to? Their receiving antenna is a
whip! Their transmit antennas go from a whip to a conical monopole at the
10KW stations. Serious antenna farm!

Those silly hams are running 1.5KW PEP, when necessary, into an amazing
array of beam antennas both receiving and transmitting. The average Icom,
Yaesu or Kenwood receiver at any ham station has 2 or 3 HF SSB bandwidths
with digital signal processing of both IF and audio. CG had an old blue
display Commercial HF receiver, last time I went from base to base
calibrating their test equipment a few years back. What ultra-sensitive
receivers are they using today? Those ham rigs have 120 db crystal-sloped
IF skirts and .1 uV receivers. The receivers are so sensitive we have to
have an attenuator to protect them from atmospherics.

Back to the antenna problem.....

Let's say there's 50 hams in USA and Canada monitoring MMSN at noon,
tomorrow. The furthest East is in Nova Scotia. The furthest South is in
West Palm Beach. The furthest West is in Honolulu. The other 50 have
their sensitive little Yaesus listening every few hundred miles in between.
So, their "effective receiving antenna" is VERY well distributed across a
wide area of two countries, maybe even Europe and Asia at times.

CG has...well....8 to 10 whip antennas on each frequency....all right along
the COAST with nothing in between?

Which receiving system has a better chance of hearing out little backstay
transmitter, 180 miles off the Georgia coast??

PS - 22 hams KNOW they can hear me because they heard me and wrote down my
callsign on their desk pad when I did my useless chit-chat checkin.....(c;

Larry you are so far off base, did you even read any of the messages in this
thread???

HOW MANY of the 50 or so Hams you say might be listening to the MMSN are
listening to 2182 khz?

EVERY USCG Group is guarding ONLY that MF-Marine hailing and distress
frequency.

The Communications Area Master Stations are guarding 4125 khz, 6215 khz,
8291 khz and 12290 khz international maritime hailing and distress
frequencies. Unfortunately we cannot describe the antennas receivers and
transmitters doing this job, but you are sadly misguided is you think they
are inferior to anything. Nor does the cooperation of the ionosphere have
as much impact on the performance of this highly versatile system as you
imagine.

Jack Painter
Virginia Beach, Virginia

 

[Jack Painter]

The Coast Guard watchstander at Group Charleston thought the "Morning Dew"
distress call was a hoax. Obviously, if he'd had VHF-DF capabilities and
knew how to use it, he would have seen the display light up BRIGHTLY as the
sinking boat was only a mile and a little from Sullivan's Island Light and
3.5 miles from CG Base Charleston in the Ashley River.

Is this new stuff since Morning Dew's debacle?

Cannot comment on that case.

Jack

 

[Jetcap]

If we observe the two quiet periods for emergency traffic calls, wouldn't
it be better for everyone involved if you knew what boats/ships are also
your ears and eyes on the frequency, expanding your pitiful little
receiving antenna cross section by several thousand miles? "CG Net this is
WDB-6254, "Lionheart" at 32 24N, 75 12W checkin, no traffic monitoring 802
for next 2 hours." Aha! I can hear a 150W insulated backstay offshore of
Charleston on Channel 802 at this time. HE, on the other hand, will HELP
me monitor the frequency, relaying to areas I cannot hear because of
propagation, any calls that get no answers from me.

Larry, So what kind of license do you have to make that call on HF?

Neither you or "your captain" have a license according to the FCC. Tell
us all about your First Class Phone and your GROL and your GMDSS
Operator and Maintainer licenses again.

Bwahahahahahahaha ... old fraud.

Rick

 

[Jetcap]

I offered to bring an IFR over to CG Charleston and TURN UP THE DEVIATION
ON THEIR VHF RADIOS.....so we could HEAR what was being said. To hear
them, here, you must turn your VHF volume control to maximum, especially if
the engine is running! It's been like that for years.

That must have really impressed them a lot. Some old fart ham with no
license to touch any other radio offers to adjust a CG radio ...

And you wonder why they ignore you?

Rick

 

[Larry W4CSC]

That must have really impressed them a lot. Some old fart ham with no
license to touch any other radio offers to adjust a CG radio ...

And you wonder why they ignore you?

Rick

Geez, Rick. You're beginning to sound like some kind of broken record.

You can still kiss my ass, however. How's that?

 

[Jetcap]

Larry W4CSC wrote:

Geez, Rick. You're beginning to sound like some kind of broken record.

Tell us about all those licenses, Larry. Offering to adjust their radios
.... bwhahahahahahahah ... the CG in Charleston must laugh their butts
off at you.

Rick

 

[Jetcap]

You can still kiss my ass, however. How's that?

Sorry, Larry, I'm not into old farts with imaginary lives.


Your fantasy life is already well documented in this group, no need to
solicit my participation.

 

[Me]

Cannot comment on that case.

Jack

How can this be, Jack? You comment on everthing else........


Me

 

[Bruce in Alaska]

Larry, So what kind of license do you have to make that call on HF?

Neither you or "your captain" have a license according to the FCC. Tell
us all about your First Class Phone and your GROL and your GMDSS
Operator and Maintainer licenses again.

Bwahahahahahahaha ... old fraud.

Rick

ANY US citizen can apply for and receive, a Restricted Radio Operator
Permit (lifetime), that allows them to operate an Aircraft or Marine HF
Transceiver installed abaord any US Flagged Vessel or Aircraft in
noncommerical service, as well as commercial service on Uninspected
Vessels. These are not numbered, so they don't show up in the FCC's
Database of Licensed Persons.


Bruce in alaska

 

[Me]

you miss the point. there is a reason we ask the questions we do.
being both a ham who's handled distress calls, and a CG radio operator
at station sandy hook, the hostility to both camps is unwarranted.


i've heard the CG on 14.3 many times.

the CG handles many, many more distress calls than ham radio does. and
the difference is the CG is the ones to go get the folks.

finally a "Voice of Reason" to offset Jackieboy's Fanatical BS......


Me and thanks for your Service to the rest of US.....

 

[Bruce Gordon]

Channel 9.....

"Wappoo Cut Bridge, this is Lionheart, over?"

"Lionheart this is Wappoo Cut Bridge, go ahead?"

"Can you hear me ok, over?"

"Sure, Lionheart. Sounds great."

"Thank you for a great service to all of us. Lionheart out."

(She usually thanks you for saying something nice.)

Bridgetenders are great people. One of them made all the new cushions and
curtains in her home upholstery business for Lionheart! They don't mind
talking to you from their boring jobs, especially if it's not busy.

Too bad many are losing their jobs they've had for so many years....dumped
for the new high bridges.....

FCC Rules permit you to call your favorite bridgetenders on Channel 9
without the CG bitching you out.....(c;

Actually you have been able to contact Bridge Tenders on Channel 13
(the Navigation Channel) for MANY years, but a few years back, the FCC
and USCG decided to move those Comms to Channel 9, when they designated
that Channel as a Secondary Calling Channel in the Maritime Mobile Radio
Service. This was advised, so as to free up Channel 13 for strictly
Bridge to Bridge Radio Traffic.


Me

--
Bruce (semiretired powderman & exFCC Field Inspector for Southeastern Alaska)
add a <2> before @
Bruce Gordon * Debora Gordon R.N. Bruce's Trading Post
P.O. Box EXI Excursion Inlet South
Juneau, Alaska 99850 Excursion Inlet, Alaska 99850
www.btpost.net www.99850.net

 

[Doug Dotson]

(She usually thanks you for saying something nice.)

Bridgetenders are great people...

Interesting. Out of all the many bridges on the ICW, the Wapoo Creek
operators (one on the way down, another on the way up) were the only
ones that we had trouble with.

Doug
s/v Callista

 

[Jetcap]

ANY US citizen can apply for and receive, a Restricted Radio Operator
Permit (lifetime), that allows them to operate an Aircraft or Marine HF
Transceiver installed abaord any US Flagged Vessel or Aircraft in
noncommerical service, as well as commercial service on Uninspected
Vessels. These are not numbered, so they don't show up in the FCC's
Database of Licensed Persons.

Once again the FCC seems to believe otherwise. Check out:
http://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/UlsSearch/searchLicense.jsp
and enter Butler, Larry under the selection for Restricted Radio
Operators ... put in Smith and you will get a whole page of Restricted
Radio Operators with license numbers.


Face it, Larry is a fraud who doesn't hold any license other than his
ham ticket and has repeatedly trashed many here for not having the
licenses he claims to hold. He cannot sumbit a single license number to
prove otherwise. He was run off once already when he got caught in his
stupid tirade about GMDSS, which showed his ignorance so badly it was
obvious he didn't have any GMDSS training, certifications or commercial
marine qualifications whatsoever. Now the old goat rants because the CG
won't let him adjust their VHF radios ... what a loon. He is a fraud.

Rick

 

[Doug Dotson]

Sorry Rick. You'll have to do better than that. I looked up my
Restricted Permit and it doesn't come up. It was issued in 1970.
I looked up my wife's that was issued 4 years ago. It doesn't
show up either. Gotta love our government All my other
licenses are there.

Doug, k3qt

 

[Larry W4CSC]

===============================

Mine will be installed in a reasonably dry location inside the
flybridge console so hopefully I'll be able to duck some of those
issues.

Keep in mind the antenna actually begins at the high voltage connector on
the tuner and the unshielded wire to the actual antenna is also part of the
transmit antenna. RF inside a console full of electronics has dire
consequences as it induces big RF signals into every power cable,
unshielded NMEA stupid cable and those idiotic open connections. It can
scramble almost all the plastic-cased electronics, destroying them if it
gets strong enough.

The tuner is quite sealed, after you get rid of the cheap connectors
hanging out of it. Ours is as clean as the day I installed it on top of
the aft cabin house directly aft of the mizzenmast. Its connecting wire to
the 55' long backstay antenna is about 8" long for this reason. It still
causes the stupid, unshielded propane detector in the galley to go crazy by
inducing RF into its control wires back to the electric gas valve in the
stern. It beeps like crazy when transmitting on HF.

Oh, please don't let anyone use coax with the shield grounded between the
tuner and the antenna (whip I'd guess). Don't let them "neatly" tywrap it
to anything metal, running it through a grounded stuffing tube to go
outside, either. All this shunt capacitance to ground makes tuning tough
on the tuner and bleeds off your transmitted signal to the rigging, instead
of out on the air. I see so many tywrapped to the grounded part of rigging
on its way up to some elevated insulator, "to protect the passengers". How
silly, the RF is very strong in that insulated wire going up there.

I've never seen anyone killed by 150W from these little transmitters.
1.5KW from a ham rig is another matter...(c;

 

[Larry W4CSC]

Once again the FCC seems to believe otherwise. Check out:
http://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/UlsSearch/searchLicense.jsp
and enter Butler, Larry under the selection for Restricted Radio
Operators ... put in Smith and you will get a whole page of Restricted
Radio Operators with license numbers.


Face it, Larry is a fraud who doesn't hold any license other than his
ham ticket and has repeatedly trashed many here for not having the
licenses he claims to hold. He cannot sumbit a single license number to
prove otherwise. He was run off once already when he got caught in his
stupid tirade about GMDSS, which showed his ignorance so badly it was
obvious he didn't have any GMDSS training, certifications or commercial
marine qualifications whatsoever. Now the old goat rants because the CG
won't let him adjust their VHF radios ... what a loon. He is a fraud.

Rick

Wonder if they cancelled that one....20J0121 is stencilled into mine from
back in the 60's. It's probably not on the computer, either.

 

[krj]

4 MPGB069401 BUTLER, LARRY C CM Active 03/27/2005
5 PG198444 BUTLER, LARRY D CM Active
6 PGGB02150 BUTLER, LARRY W CM Active
7 W4CSC BUTLER, LARRY E 0003505047 HV Active 02/15/2010

 

[Larry W4CSC]

Back in the days of mandatory commercial Morse operators aboard
commercial high seas vessels, finding a non-ham radio officer was a
rarity. These guys stood their required watches professionally, and
enjoyed their avocation as ham hobbyist also. Why are we arguing here?
The old time real radio operators enjoyed the best of both worlds.
73
Doug, K7ABX; CG Auxiliary, Assistant District Staff
Officer-Communications (South), 13th District

For me, it would be the same reason I'm no longer in NAVMARS or CAP. The
politics, backstabbing and other nonsense got me out of those. "What rank
are you?", some CAP wannabee colonel would ask me in my Levis and T-shirt,
all setup in the pouring down rain to provide 4585 Khz and 148.15 comms in
my non-CAP-funded motorhome when some plane was down. "Corporal", I'd
always reply. "Who cares? We've been here for 3 hours. Why did it take
you Wing guys so long to get here?" The guy could have died while waiting
for them to put on their dress blues to look sharp for the TV cams.

I've had CGAUX inspection stickers on every boat I've owned, even the
jetskis, in the last 20 years. Noone in CG, County Gestapo, DNR Gestapo in
their flak jackets and camo gunboats...none of them...ever gave a damned
that I was in full compliance, not only with the minimum requirements, but
with the CGAUX's extra requirements for that sticker. They still had to
pull me over and upset my guests aboard to look at the damned fire
extinguishers to see if they were charged...negating any reason to go
through all the CGAUX inspections in the first place. I never figured out
why. I've been stopped for inspection 5 times in ONE DAY by THREE
different bureaucracies!

I joined SkyWarn and offered to help Charleston's weather bureaucrats set
up a fine VHF/HF ham radio station over at their headquarters, WX4CHS.
After getting the runaround for a few months, I found they weren't really
interested in having WX4CHS on the air. Some big bureaucrat was shoving it
down the little bureaucrats' throats as a "requirement". So, the station
has this little vertical antenna that's NOT going to survive ANY windstorm,
let alone Hurricane Hugo. It makes them happy. I left my gummit ID badge
on the desk on my way out.

If anyone needs emergency comms on any freq between 1.8 and 30.0 Mhz, I can
provide CW/AM/SSB/packet/AMTOR-SITOR/PSK16-31 and RTTY with 650 watts of HF
RF power to an omnidirectional large, erectable anywhere antenna with 3KW
of emergency AC power in my old Air Force stepvan any time it's needed.
The system can also provide VHF to VHF to HF packet gateway service as well
as dual-band APRS inband and crossband repeater service. I can provide
phone patch service if there's a live phone line available. If Knology
Cable is available, I can also provide gateway service to the internet.
Give me a couple hours notice and point me to the spot to set up. I'll be
there....just so long as I don't have to wear some silly wannabe uniform
and play soldier.