Model Boat Mayhem
Mess Deck: General Section => Other Hobbies and Interests => Topic started by: johnboscoirl on September 17, 2011, 07:31:41 pm
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Completed my class B licence in the UK in 1989, with the callsign G1UDR. I operated on the 2 metre band/144Mhz for about a year and then didnt renew my licence. As i am now coming up for early retirement, i fancied updating my licence. To my surprise, i am now classed as an advanced amateur, with an A class licence which permits me to operate across all modes of communication as defined in the rules. This is due to morse code no longer being mandatory to obtain the A licence as it was in 1989. There is now no annual licence and you only need to notify relevant licence authority every 5 years to inform them you still have a pulse. I have however purchased the three exam books for novice, intermediate and advanced, as it has changed so much, i felt a bit fraudelant having got my A licence through the back door. My theory was still fine, just needed updating on procedure and the use of the computer in Amateur Radio, which wasnt really around then. For those of us brought up on valve theory, ex Royal Navy. I purchased a boat through fleabay and had to collect it. The seller tells me that the Chinese who are now producing replica valve radio for export, but the valves they make are rubbish, so my seller goes to all the car boot sales, buys up all the valves, tests them and then sells them on fleabay, most of them going to China.
Re Archery. I shoot recurve, the one you see in the Olympics and more recently longbow. Brilliant sport, our Archers go from 7 to 70+in age range. We are AC Delco Bowmen and we are based opposite the Concorde club in Eastleigh Hampshire. We are having a 24 hour marathon shoot at the St Georges school in Bassett Southampton on October 21. 2011 We have linked in with the local scouts who are having free "have a go" sessions to encourage people of all ages, and in particuliar people with disabilities to have a go. enjoy the read :-)
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Don't feel too bad about the CW. While I know there are hams out there who take pride in their skills in this area, it was a just 'necessary evil' for me. Having worked hard at it, I was suprised to go up to North Foreland Radio and have the guy transmit to me about 4 - 6 wpm maximum and then ask me to send him the same text. Talk about falling off a log! :-))
I'm not on the air currently but am still a member of our local group down here at Newhaven Fort - GB2NFM is the station callsign. When (if ever!) my son leaves home, I get my shack back and the gear will come out of the loft.
Andy G0CCX
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From G1UDR, nice to hear from you Andy, im sure there are more of us on the forum
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Heavens above Andy if you are ex-RN 4- 6 w.p.m. would be really easy - if I remember rightly fleet speed was 22 w.p.m.
even signalmen had to qualify at 11 w.p.m. by light. Wish I had the room and time to get involved in radio work again.
Geoff
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I had a crack at learning the code a good while ago and for the life of me couldn't get to grips.
A mate who I do a lot of activations with and special event stations is great on the paddle
and gave me all sorts of tuition files and learning methods but alas, its just not something I can get to grips with.
I'm only a lowly foundation class user at the moment and have been for a while, other commitments get in the way all the time.
I've not got any HF kit left at the moment, but hopefully, get christmas out of the way and get something back for HF.
Still got a cobwebb up for 20/17/15/12/10, di-pole for 40m and PSU, so its only the radio I need to get.
Would be good to get a sked going on 40 with any others that are licensed on here and have a good waffle.
Martin.
M3POG.
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As someone who has an A license and spent 6 months learning Morse and hated every min of it but I wanted to proceed in the hobby. I thought it was wrong to remove another level to move up to, if Morse was out dated a higher skills level on the theory side would have been an idea I believe it was removed to bring us in line with , yes the EU
Peter
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I had the callsign G6RNK in the early eighties and dabbled in microwave and Amateur TV
I'm now looking into coming back into the hobby now I have retired.
Ned
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I was an 11metre SSB user...26 Delta International 22 was my call sign, then progressed to using 6.6mHz SSB.
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Archery is good, I have a Takedown Recurve Bow.
very satisfying,
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I couldn't hit a barn door if I was sitting on the handle...
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There was an archery exhibition/demo at a summer fete earlier in the summer that I was watching
and these folks had serious skill! I know very little about it, but the distance they were from the target
was a lot further than I would of imagined. And as John mentioned, the ages that were doing the show
ranged from teenagers to people well into their 70's. I was tempted to have a go when they offered,
but was dragged away by my 3yr old so he could get his face painted :}
From what I can gather, the morse requirement was dropped because back when it was a necessity,
the services that we shared our bands with still used morse, so it was needed so we could hear them
telling us to get lost and we could reply that we understood what had been asked of us. Mainly shipping.
Now that the majority of services that used morse use other digital modes or have left HF altogether,
the morse requirement was dropped. Though some countries still keep this as a requirement for a license.
Funnily enough, the amount of people wanting to learn the code now because they want to, has risen!
Probably, because as its no longer a legal requirement, the pressure is off and it can be done because you want to.
I still hear and know people who work far far more stations using morse than voice as regardless of how old it is,
it works when most other modes fail. A simple on and off is a lot easier to de-cypher when the bands are noisy.
I do agree with Peter though, that it should have been/will be replaced with something similar.
Maybe a segment on PSK,RTTY,SSTV or other data modes. Ones that effectively took their place.
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QRZ de G0CLR, occasionally QRV SSTV,SSB,PSK,RTTY, when not teaching new licencees!
RAF trained ,yes valves again, but gert big QRO jobs!
:-))
Rex
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Been a radio Ham for very many years ,I got interested in Radio while building my first single valve R/C set for my sea hornet back in the early 60's I still have the Elmic escapments in my junk box also bits of my old galloping ghost system. It helped working next to and having access to one of the best Marine radio/radar research labs in the country.
My ham radio nowdays is data modes on 30 metre's also club nets on 2 + 4 metre's mostly Yaesu Gear but still have some of my homebrew gear.The Club I belong to helps run the radio shack on HMS Belfast.
keith (G1HEQ)
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I used to shoot a Border black douglas until recently 65lb@28" shooting instinctivley and only field shoots i've never shot a target comp or with sights we traveled to plenty of shoots including the scotish and english champs but it all got to serious and expensive though it was a good feeling to get a single arrow kill on a 100yd deer when sighted archers used 3 for a wound
I then moved to longbow shooting 80lb @28" field shoots and medievil living history demo shoots 12 arrows in a minute, rapid fire against arbalast and black powder weapons etc. great fun but again lots of traveling just recently sold my armour and gear
but kept my salet and sword in case the call to arms comes
Dave
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Been into radio 20 year or so now only as a SWL tho, Big fan of icom rigs and currently have a icom 7400 with the tx disabled and a pcr-1500 for the vhf and higher stuff
I dabbled in archery a few year back due to a duff shoulder i cant use a bow anymore but i have taken up 177 air rifle target shooting what i will get back into when it warms up a tad
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I used to be in archery years ago, had a hunting bow with 100lb@29inch pull hunting bow, I can not remember its name. I used to buy the parts and make my own arrows, I used to do a lot of my shooting at Gilwell Park Chingford.
I am not sure I could now hold a bow with that pull long enough to actually hit the target, let alone get a decent score, ah well
Brian
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Sorry Brian just cant resist this comment.....Allways Knew YOU was an indian at heart lol
Dave.......now defo running dodging those arrows
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Hello lads, I am GW7DLD, not been active for many years.
Tried archery, enjoyed this sport for awhile, then retired and took up model boats,
and motorbikes.
Sold my bikes.....after a few problems.
Now settled on boats and 1/6 model tanks, more relaxing hobby.
Best wishes....Mick.
(http://s18.postimage.org/6epikos51/024.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/6epikos51/)