[CQ-Contest] Bashing?

[K9TM]

This discussion on "Clicks" seems to have taken on 3 main arguments: 1)
Technical  (2) Japan Radio Bashing (3) Non-Technical/emotional stuff,
usually tied to #2 or trying to figure out the technology.

I have to really laugh at number two.  Living in the rust belt, having a
father who retired from a big-3 automaker (and now being a big three
employee myself) and having driven a Japanese Vehicle during the eighties
gives me a different perspective.  I tend to do things because they make
sense for me at the time.  In the eighties, I needed a small, fuel
efficient, reliable, in-expensive automobile.  I settled on a Honda (IT WAS
AN EXCELLENT CHOICE).  Why, it met the objective criteria.  I had people who
would not talk to me because I drove a "rice burner", these were friends of
the family who knew me all my life.  "rice-burners" were vandalized regularly
by the "pro-american" movement.

My answer today is the same as it was back then... market the heck out of a
product and people will purchase it once, build a good product and people
will purchase it and keep coming back for more.

So, the Japanese radio bashers are probably looking at this and saying how
can you say your FT1000MP's, and Icom 756 are "good products", since we say
they "click".  Hmmm, well... no one has ever told me I have clicks.
Furthermore, I don't believe that a majority of any companies radios have
clicks (well at least the ones in question).  Nor do I believe that they
design them to "click".

So what's the point?  Well I was around in the Drake-Twin days.  All you
have to do is mention Drake-Twins and what is usually the first thing one
hears?  For me it is usually, "yeah with the shurewood mods, it was
killer"... or with some other mods it was even better.  So the point is,
these radios as stock were perhaps good radios but not as great as some
would make them out.  They needed post factory adjustments... and a lot of
TLC.  (Personally I liked my TS830 better).

Remember that we tend to always remember the good things and not the bad.
Since we live in a society where we are free to select whatever radio we
want... if Drake-Twins were truely that great, they would still be sold
today new and Drake would still be in business and we would all be using
them.  Obviously the radio community went elsewhere... there have to be
reasons.

So, if one wants an american rig these days (competition grade HF rig)... I
think the only choice is Ten-Tec.  I have only used one once and don't
really have much of an opinion on them other than I operate both modes (yes
the dreaded SSB) and while I agree that the Omni VI is a strong contender on
CW (although I would really like more time to play with one before making
that statement too strongly)... on voice it was not quite so appealing.
Also, it seems to be missing some of the bells and whistles of the MP's, D'
and so on for the price... plus it doesn't look sexy (so the masses aren't
going to go for it... therefore the quantities will stay low and the price
will stay high and so on).

So who wants to be imortalized like shurewood (sorry don't remember the
spelling) and have the "your name here" mods for the FT1000x radios?
Technical solutions are a whole lot better than some of the dribble on
bashing radios just because you don't like where they come from or the
company who makes them.

73 Tim K9TM

BTW, If I click... tell me and I will look into it at my earliest
convenience.


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>From Michael Tope" <W4EF at dellroy.com  Fri Mar  9 09:38:21 2001
From: Michael Tope" <W4EF at dellroy.com (Michael Tope)
Date: Fri, 9 Mar 2001 01:38:21 -0800
Subject: [CQ-Contest] The Value of Contesting in Everyday Life
Message-ID: <0c2101c0a87c$b1e8a9c0$6401a8c0 at neptune>


After spending the whole weekend locked in a small room yelling
"CQ contest" and "59 California", I spent some time thinking about
the value of contesting as manifested in my everyday life. Today
while talking to a colleague on the phone, I got my answer. During
our conversation, we were working on a test procedure that is of
interest to both of us. My colleague put me on speaker phone so
that he could get closer to his computer while talking to me. As he
moved farther away from the phone his voice started to develop
an echo. That coupled with his loud raspy voice made him sound
like an overprocessed UA9 coming over the pole on 20 meter SSB.
About this same time, my office mate started playing back a
message on his speaker phone. The volume on his phone was quite
high which made copy of the UA9 (oops I meant my colleague)
difficult. After my colleague finished dictating a correction to
me, part of which I repeated back to him phonetically while typing
it into my logging program (oops I meant my wordprocessor), I felt an
overwhelming urge to yell "QSL QRZ W6UE" back into the phone.

Maybe I've been working too hard.

73 de Mike, W4EF...........................


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