Deathwish is a twunt CB radio

[MrSlack]

Nice to see some old CB users in the UK. Are these things legal without a license? Never worked that out.

I used to troll truckers in the early 90's on the M11 with my car boot sale Midland 77 and pole antenna I found in a skip. Learned all about RF, transmission lines and SWR. Unfortunately it got used like an immature 14 year old: Breaker breaker one niner, pigs at Duxford Northbound (even though there weren't any). Still in the attic at my dad's house somewhere.

Currently lurking (listening only) on 40M CW and worrying the neighbours by slinging bits of wire up into trees out the back. Will do the RSGB test when the toddler grows up a bit and I can retain some brain contents for more than a few minutes

[G7PSK]

If you have an amateurs licence you can repair radios here in the UK including CB's and PMR's, otherwise you need a trade certificate for radio repairs having an Msc in electrical or electronic engineering wont do, but if you have one of those I guess the rest is a doddle.
The RSGB dose home testing and tutoring for those who cant get out for whatever reason unless the reason is a cell door.

[MrSlack]

Can you get a foundation license just by doing the test at all? I did the practice exams and know where to poke a PL259, how not to poke an electrocuted HAM and how to pacify the angry guy next door who's TV stops working every time I transmit

EE degree as well but...

[Howardlong]

Can you get a foundation license just by doing the test at all? I did the practice exams and know where to poke a PL259, how not to poke an electrocuted HAM and how to pacify the angry guy next door who's TV stops working every time I transmit

EE degree as well but...

It's been a very long time since I took my ticket, but I always think if a half witted 16 yo like I was can pass what is now the Advanced Test in the UK, then the Foundation must be really easy.

By far the most difficult thing for a techie will be polishing up on the regulatory bits which is largely rote learning I'm afraid, the engineering and maths aspects are schoolboy stuff. Despite hating learning those regs, I did become a bit of a nerd in them once I'd passed my test.

[MrSlack]

Enough said.

[Deathwish]

Enough said.

You mean there is no Black red and green anymore ?

[SeanB]

If it was made on the cheap none of the above apply.

[Negative-Bias]

Google it , then fix it, you'll learn loads concentrate on one bit at a time, and don't run around like a headless chicken inside it slowly and carefully, writing down all the voltages you find the fault.

[Flump]

I didnt see there was an audioline included , thats cool
I have the small 340 same as that and a mint 341.
Lots and lots of info on the web about audiolines.

The very first thing you should do if you have not already is get
some kind of antenna for 27mhz otherwise you have no way of testing them.

Sure you can use a watt mtr + dummy load to see if you have any rf comming out of them
but that wont show up a tx modulation fault, best way to test them is talk to people.

[VK3DRB]

A large number of American hams started out in CB radio.  I started in the 70's when you still had to pay $5 for a FCC license, my call sign was KND3913.... I now hold an Amateur Extra class with the call sign of NW0LF. 

I was also a CB'er and have had a ham license since 1982. But before that I was a keen HF DX'er. Radio was magic to me and it still is.

Your call sign was cheap at $5. The Australian federal government imposed very high CB radio license fees in the late 70's. If I recall was it cost roughly $140 per year in today's dollars. The government abandoned CB licensing as soon as they realised it was costing more to police than the money they were making. Increasing the price would have driven more CB'ers into piracy. The federal government's CB licensing extortion racket went bankrupt .

Today, CB (both 27MHz HF and 477MHz UHF) in Australia is the wild west. No policing, no licensing, no nothing. No-one cares, least of all our government. I know a bloke who wanted to run a UHF CB repeater that covers about 5000 square km in the country 20 years ago. He enquired to the government about setting up the repeater legally but the government was totally unresponsive. He said they had no idea how to handle the request, so he has been successfully running the pirate repeater on a hill on his farm for 20 years and has never had a knock at his door.

I ran a pirate station in 1977, but eventually became legal in 1978 because the government ran a fear campaign threatening pirates with a fine, confiscation of equipment and a criminal record unless they get a license. Plus it felt good to have a license over some pirate call sign. My CB was a Roberts 23 channel CB designed and made in Japan, which I of course hacked. Had a lot of fun with it, especially considering it had LEDs for the S-meter and TX power. The clever design could get you 20 S-meter levels out of 5 monochrome LEDs (ie: the last LED's intensity gave you 4 discernible levels; so 5 x 4 = 20).

Today, in the urban areas, CB is as dead as a doornail. In Melbourne the last repeater was switched off after one user of the repeater murdered another user. CB is dead. Mobile phones also killed the CB radio star.

[DimitriP]

Death is sometimes relative
Just like the command prompt (c:\> ) was declared "dead" in 1995, it   will be around as long as there are keyboards in one form or another,
CB will be around for as long there are 18wheelers on the road.

[Deathwish]

I would rather use it than a mobile phone, it costs me nothing in call charges.

[SeanB]

It is a good phone alternative, so long as you are happy with all in range being able to hear. 2 friends have some semi private comms using simplex operation on 2 different rigs, running on 2 wildly different frequencies and different modes at low power so they barely reach each other enough to open a squelch on the receiver. Otherwise they do not care about you hearing the queries, and often you can have a nice 3 way chat.

[G7PSK]

Around here the CB is all talking turnips, The tractor drivers all have a CB in the cab alongside PMR's in many cases. All you here is I'm down the bottom end of the 50 acres a drilling beet, or something along those lines, no one else to talk to on CB.
I got my licence back in 93-94. just one test to get full ticket plus another for Morse, never took Morse as I am tone deaf or something and could never distinguish between the long and the short. The test was a walk over, we worked out at the time that if the class had been all chimps 25% would likely have passed just by random ticking of the multi choice boxes, 4 boxes per question some of the questions did not have any of the right answers any way, but I knew what ones they were looking for so ticked those anyway.   

[SeanB]

Did not set a record in my test, but was finished 20 minuted in and left and waited for the rest to file out after the 2 hours...... Record was another who got 100% and finished in something like 8 minutes. Think he memorised the question and answer set, as the self test set in the downloaded book is a superset of the exam question pool.

[VK3DRB]

Death is sometimes relative
Just like the command prompt (c:\> ) was declared "dead" in 1995, it   will be around as long as there are keyboards in one form or another,
CB will be around for as long there are 18wheelers on the road.

Maybe in the USA but not here in Australia where CB is dead. The truckies UHF CB channel is dead no matter where you go. It has been like that for 20 years. In the cities it is dead. No anybody copy, not YL's, no 10-4 good buddies, no eyeballs, no 10-20's, no 10-9's, no breakers, no go-the-breaker, no nothing.

What a most people don't know is it is permissible to encrypt speech on UHF CB; but illegal to do so on ham radio. Let's just say I know someone who ran a private mobile telephone service on UHF CB in country Victoria in the 1990's . Philips FM320's with some added, er, shall we say "enhancements". Coincidentally, there was no mobile phone bill shock.

[Zad]

twunt

I suspect you have spent some time on Pistonheads then

Don't worry about the service manual. Open it up, check the fuses, check for 12/13.8V or so. Look and smell for burnt PCB or components. Most CBs are (or were) very very similar in design, so once you get used to the general architecture you can find your way around most of them.

[vk6zgo]

Death is sometimes relative
Just like the command prompt (c:\> ) was declared "dead" in 1995, it   will be around as long as there are keyboards in one form or another,
CB will be around for as long there are 18wheelers on the road.

Maybe in the USA but not here in Australia where CB is dead. The truckies UHF CB channel is dead no matter where you go. It has been like that for 20 years. In the cities it is dead. No anybody copy, not YL's, no 10-4 good buddies, no eyeballs, no 10-20's, no 10-9's, no breakers, no go-the-breaker, no nothing.

What a most people don't know is it is permissible to encrypt speech on UHF CB; but illegal to do so on ham radio. Let's just say I know someone who ran a private mobile telephone service on UHF CB in country Victoria in the 1990's . Philips FM320's with some added, er, shall we say "enhancements". Coincidentally, there was no mobile phone bill shock.

I think there is a bit of usage of UHF CB in Norwest WA by some truckies & also by the "Grey Nomads" back & forth between their campervans.

Listening to the Perth CB Repeaters,& simplex channels on my handheld scanner,mostly all I hear is a few foul mouthed Yahoos---there would only be a handful of any kind of users.

Interestingly,there seems to be a bit of a Renaissance on 27MHz after dead silence for,as you say,20 years.

Early last year,I spent quite a bit of time playing around on 10metres using an Icom IC575a.
This radio receives down to 26MHz,& whilst poking about,I heard quite a few CBers on Ch 35 LSB & a few other frequencies.
Interestingly,they were mainly in Victoria.

If I could hear them,I had a good chance of hitting VK3RHF 10m FM repeater,which I did quite regularly last Autumn.

There were a few WA CBers on too,which interested me enough to try to unearth the old Electrophone SSB rig,but it looks like I may have chucked it out.

[DimitriP]

I was in Radio Shack tonight and two guys walked in and asked if they carry CBs.

[VK3DRB]

I think there is a bit of usage of UHF CB in Norwest WA by some truckies & also by the "Grey Nomads" back & forth between their campervans.

Listening to the Perth CB Repeaters,& simplex channels on my handheld scanner,mostly all I hear is a few foul mouthed Yahoos---there would only be a handful of any kind of users.

Interestingly,there seems to be a bit of a Renaissance on 27MHz after dead silence for,as you say,20 years.

Early last year,I spent quite a bit of time playing around on 10metres using an Icom IC575a.
This radio receives down to 26MHz,& whilst poking about,I heard quite a few CBers on Ch 35 LSB & a few other frequencies.
Interestingly,they were mainly in Victoria.

If I could hear them,I had a good chance of hitting VK3RHF 10m FM repeater,which I did quite regularly last Autumn.

There were a few WA CBers on too,which interested me enough to try to unearth the old Electrophone SSB rig,but it looks like I may have chucked it out.

When RHF opens, I'll listen out for you. Its a very good repeater, but does not get much use. I am aware there are some grey nomads using CB on remote areas. Some of them run illegal power (hacked FM91's rigs) but they are not hurting anyone. Least of all does the ACMA care. Radio inspectors are a thing of the past.

One thing we will never find on CB's in VK land: YL's on channel calling CQ looking for an eyeball.

[Macbeth]

twunt

I suspect you have spent some time on Pistonheads then

You wouldn't be that well 'ard company director throwing cans of red bull up the oxo tower by any chance? 

[tautech]

Calling Deathwish.....

Have you left us for some CB crowd? 

Last post 6th Jan
Last active 11th Jan

You all right Garry?

[vk6zgo]

Calling Deathwish.....

Have you left us for some CB crowd? 

Last post 6th Jan
Last active 11th Jan

You all right Garry?

"This here's the Daddy Duck a-lookin' for the,Deathwish,Got yer ears on,good buddy?,Come on!"

[KJDS]

twunt

I suspect you have spent some time on Pistonheads then

You wouldn't be that well 'ard company director throwing cans of red bull up the oxo tower by any chance? 

I've met the bloke who threw the can of red bull. A more passive employee you'd struggle to find.

and is anyone near enough to Deathwish to pop round and check he's ok?

[Macbeth]

Oh no... Don't tell me he's gone and done a Rod Hull & Emu with his new outside HAM radio antenna?