Ham Radio, GROL & Technobabble

[Arjan P]

@-mjk- Your connection of music and morse code reminded me of a great British detective show, Inspector Morse, that has very cleverly used morse code in the theme music. Check it out:

 

[skier]

That was interesting; thanks for sharing it!

 

[Phil Tipping]

Thanks for the memory Arjan; that was a very clever piece of music. I'd not seen any promos for the programme back when it was first screened, and watched the 1st episode with no expectations... so the morse code was a wtf moment
There was an article on the composer Barrington Pheloung (sadly no longer with us) in Sound On Sound magazine a long time ago... think there was a picture of him with a large Soundcraft Ghost mixer in his attic space (one for MJ!).

 

[-mjk-]

@-mjk- Your connection of music and morse code reminded me of a great British detective show, Inspector Morse, that has very cleverly used morse code in the theme music. Check it out:

Very cool @Arjan P. I've never heard of that show. I have to admit, I can copy a repeater ID at 30 wpm coming out of a handie-talkie hanging off the train conductor's belt, but I could not copy the musical code at all. But the word "Morse" was spelled out in dits and dahs at the beginning.

 

[skier]

@-mjk I’ve been meeting on line at one of the local 2m repeaters once a week for their “tips” net. It’s been fun to ask questions and make suggestions to help others. I’ve been doing this with Echolink, but have had some problems (I think with my headset/boom mic – ordered a new and better one last evening after the net). Regardless, I’m looking to buy a 2m/70cm rig that I’ll initially use in the shack, but may move occasionally or permanently to my vehicle to participate in fox hunts. I’m currently considering one of the top two Yaesu’s or Kenwood’s. Do you have any suggestions?

BTW, I also have a 2m/70cm Baofeng HT, but am not happy with it, so I’m thinking of also buying a better, well-known HT in the next few months, and perhaps that’ll become my mobile rig, because I’ll need it to radio-locate the fox as I get closer. And with the 70cm band, I can close in on the 3rd harmonic.

Anything you can offer from your own experience would be most appreciated – thanks!

 

[skier]

MJ, one other question: are you on the air these days? If so, what bands do you work, how far do you get, and what are you using for equipment?

 

[-mjk-]

Hi Jerry. I was going to suggest the Baofeng, lol. In Taiwan, all the "black taxis" use the ham bands because anyone can go into a store and buy any kind of radio they want. Sure, there are rules but none of them are enforced. The U/VHF bands are a mess here.

I have no idea what is available these days. I've only seen the Baofeng and some Taiwan brand HTs.

I am not on the air here. Taiwan is moving closer to reciprocity but it's not there yet. The best I could do is to get a 90 day "guest operator" license which may be useful for contesting with a local ham club. The licensing here is separated into "operator" and "station" so even if I had a reciprocal license as it stands now, my wife would have to get the station license. Many find this unfair for people like me who hold permanent residency. The situation is changing rapidly though. I haven't checked in awhile so maybe there has been some progress on the licensing issue. Perhaps I should contact the Ministry of Communications myself since I hold those licenses from the USA.

I did go down to Taichung for a ham radio club meeting once and those people were very cool. One thing that I like about ham radio clubs in the US is that they have them at a restaurant in a private room so afterwards we all get to eat!

 

[skier]

That is interesting how differently the laws are handled; it explains why the air waves could get messy.