About two weeks ago, my new radio came in the mail. It was a dual band BaoFeng that works on two metres and 220 MHz (1.25M). Now, 220 MHz is pretty dead, and there aren't many repeaters for that band scattered around the country. But a BaoFeng is pretty cheap, so it's no big gamble to buy a radio for 220 MHz, especially since it can also work on two metres. Fortunately, we have cross-band operation here in the Twin Cities metro through the HandiHam network. By accessing the local 220 MHz repeater, you simultaneously are heard on 144 and 440 through the other four HandiHam machines. And also EchoLink. Yes, it is awesome.
A couple of days earlier, my 220 MHz mobile whip arrived. It didn't have a brand name on the housing, but I think it was a Jetstream antenna with a NMO mount. While I was able to hit the Arden Hills HandiHam repeater for 220 MHz with the "rubber duck", the repeater in Burnsville (run by TCRC) was just on the margin. So I wanted to see what a "real" antenna would do. I already had a disappointing experience with mobile operation, and I knew that the receiver was lousy. But I had read that one person had some luck using this model in "narrow" bandwidth, and I decided to give it another try.
Using narrow band actually helped with the reception when I was using the "rubber duck" (this is the short stock antenna that attaches to the radio for use as a walkie-talkie). I was listening to KA0PQW (Matt) on his repeater talking to someone, and he came in much better than he had before when I was using "wide" bandwidth. While these two were talking, I went out on my balcony and screwed in the mobile antenna. The signal was terrible again. I couldn't make out the conversation, even though I was using an exterior antenna about four times longer than the "rubber duck". When I unscrewed the antenna, they were still talking and the signal dramatically improved. Reception was actually better without an antenna at all; just the coaxial cable going to the empty NMO mount. It seemed pretty weird, but the BaoFengs have a strange "inductive loading" antenna match that is optimised for the "rubber duck". They almost always work better (in terms of reception) with the stock duck, but they will usually work well enough with another antenna to let you reach typical HT ranges.
The next morning, I got up early to try and get on the TCFMC UHF net and talk about my strange adventure with the new radio. As usual, it was really hard to get in. Not because it's crowded. It's because the "regulars" don't leave any space between each other for someone to jump in. They also are oblivious to "doubling" (someone else transmitting while another person is talking), which is usually a good indicator that someone is trying to break in.
But I did get in. I told the two guys there (KN0V? and K0BUD) about my strange adventure with the BaoFeng, as anyone else would share an unusual tale.
Immediately, I got a load of condescension. Somehow, these two got the idea that I was asking them for help, rather than sharing a story. "I don't know what to tell ya as far as helping ya fix that". I was told that radios work better if you don't use the rubber duck. Wow! I had no idea! What did these two geniuses think I had bought the mobile whip for? "I've never been a fan of rubber ducks". Sheesh. Want to tell me how to work the push-to-talk button, too? It's kinda confusing. Do I pull it? Because that isn't working and I'm out of solutions. Please help me.
Of course, I was also treated to snide remarks about BaoFengs in general. Yeah, they wouldn't use those, so they "didn't know what to tell me". Basically, the problem was that I had bought a cheap radio and I deserved what I got. I have no idea where the got the notion that I was asking for help, much less that I thought BaoFengs were quality radios. I guess that Grandpa has to share his "wisdom" somehow, even if it consists of stating the obvious, and even if nobody asked for his "wisdom" in the first place.
The ultimate stupidity and irony was yet to come. K0BUD told me, as if he was imparting some secret knowledge, "Around here, 220 is about as popular as snow in winter".
Again, thanks for the clue. I had no idea. Sheesh.
It's ironic in two ways. First, I really doubt that this "expert" knew about the cross-band HandiHam repeater operating on 220 MHz. That would have been helpful information, if he truly believed that I was as stupid as every condescending remark he made let on. Or about the repeater in Burnsville. Yep. Big expert, telling the poor newbie that he's screwed because he didn't do what Grandpa would have done.
Second, that's pretty much what people on two meters say about UHF: there's nobody on it. And it's true. Outside of the morning net, there's not much going on at the old "dot one". I throw out my sign every day on the way to work, as well as my return. Only very rarely does someone come back, and they usually express the "information" that nobody is on there very much and I should try elsewhere. We have some really good UHF repeaters in town with excellent coverage (.800, .425, .775, .500, .175 and the .950) but nobody is on them. The .425 at the University has a few people, mostly because of the EchoLink node. And, of course, the HandiHam .650 is cross-band, so it has activity from the other bands. But a guy on the only active UHF-only repeater at the time is telling me that 220 MHz is dead. It's us three on the entire UHF band, and he's talking about low activity on 220.
Obviously, what I should have done is dropped $300 for a quality radio operating on UHF -- like his, with the batteries always dying -- to get in on the "action" of a dying hobby. That way, we could talk about my neat $300 radio, and diss those low-life fools that spend $40 on a radio that won't last 30 years. Who even knows what ham radio will be like in 30 years? There could be some major technical innovation two years from now that makes his $300 radio obsolete. Or, more likely, there won't be anyone on the repeaters at all. I'll be out $40, but he'll be out $300. Hell, let's face it. He'll probably be dead, but his $300 radio will live on. Money well spent.
TCFMC isn't about the future. It's about the past, and snarling about how unfair it is that things change over the course of decades. We're talking about a club that hasn't had a working EchoLink node for over two months, because they can't reboot the laptop and log it on. Yeah, these are real experts. And, when you tell people about it, they say, "I don't really use it". In a really smug, dismissive tone, as if they are too good for that newfangled stuff. Here's a clue: EchoLink isn't for you, any more than your doorbell is, mister expert. It's for people outside of the repeater's range to use. If someone comes over and tells the owner that their doorbell isn't working, would you think the person who lives there was stupid if they chuckled at your naiveté and told you that, "I don't really use it much"? Of course you don't, because you live there! Connect the dots. Likewise with anything involving linking or cross-band. It would seem obvious that linking the two UHF repeaters would make them both more valuable. People in the south-east could talk with people in the north-east. Instead, nobody is on either of them, because there are so few people with UHF radios in either area. Cross-band is something that HandiHam would do -- insert derisive snort here -- much like EchoLink. Our repeaters might be dead, but we're old school about things at TCFMC. Cross-band would open up UHF to two-metre users, who aren't going to buy a new radio for the UHF band because they already spent $300 and this one will last them for thirty years. It's not as if the "dot one" has coverage comparable to the other UHF repeaters that I listed before. It's good in the western suburbs and into Minneapolis proper, but it can't reach St. Paul proper or out to Burnsville. The others can.
With fewer people on the air every year, the way forward is to bring those declining numbers together. EchoLink, linked repeaters, and cross-band repeaters do that. What doesn't work is smug condescension and an expectation that people are going to spend a lot of money to talk to the "elite" about nothing.
The way forward, as I see it, is for MARA to cross-link the UHF .800 and the VHF .850, and get three guys to make a habit of being on the air every morning at drive time. Everybody in the metro could get in on the "net" (really a "roundtable") and have someone to chat with both ways. Activity creates activity. People show up on W0EF because there are other people already there. If people were somewhere else, they would go there. There's already an informal net in the morning on the VHF .370, and it works really well. Waiting for more people to become hams isn't working, and we've got to make the best of what we have here. It's better than in a lot of areas, but it won't stay that way by following what worked thirty years ago.
