>On Sun, 3 Feb 2002 11:45:16 -0800, you wrote:
>
>>? A Dahl 46- pounder is suitable for an amplifier that will supply 8k pep
>>to the feedline in SSB mode. However, it is not ethical to transmit more
>>RF than is needed to communicate.
>
>It's poor amateur practice, too. And in the U.S. I believe it is
>illegal to run more than 1500W PEP output on the amateur bands, even
>if you claim you need the extra power. (Or were provoked by sociopaths
>:-) So seriously, Rich, given the statement you made above and the
>account on your web page of your use (on 40m) of a 20 dB amplifier
>(1200V peak), wouldn't one be led to believe that you are not an
>ethical person?
>
? As you may have guessed, I like to discuss unboring topics. Politics,
scams, religious cults, psychohistory, whatever. C. 1980, I was getting
jammed by various True Believers on the 40m daytime soap known as the
"Combat Zone" (7250 - 7260 KHz). Since the FCC apparently wasn't going
to do anything about what was undoubtedly the most entertaining daytime
variety show on 40m, I decided to build something that was a bit more
difficult to jam. I figured it would take about 10db more steam to
accomplish this than my 10db gain SB-220 provided. Coming up with a
suitable design for a 20db amplifier took a couple of months. This
involved discussing the project on the Combat Zone. Construction took
another few months. Debugging took c. another month. I quickly learned
that a 20db amplifier does not prevent sociopaths from jamming the people
one is trying to communicate with. Thus, the 20db amplifier (a.k.a., the
"Plywood Box) was not much more than a fun project.
- Years later I discovered that one of the employees at the FCC
monitoring station in Livermore wrote poetry about the shenanigans that
went on. A friend in the FCC sent me a copy. I still have it.
Curiously, the largest group of complainants about my 20db amplifier to
the FCC was contest stations who were rumoured to also run "tetrodes with
handles".
>I'm curious, since you appear to make statements about using more
>power than necessary fairly frequently.
? I used enough power to overcome the jammers when they were doing their
thing. When they were not jamming and the propagation was ok, I ran
140w-pep.
>Are such statements made tongue-in-cheek?
>
? No. The Plywood Box was sold after I had a brain glitch. During the
next DX contest, you might hear it.
cheers, Doug
- R. L. Measures, a.k.a. Rich..., 805.386.3734,AG6K,
www.vcnet.com/measures.
end
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