[chirp_users] Concurrance

Tue Jan 9 15:31:39 PST 2018

It's so true, George.  I appreciate both your comments.  I'm one who is not
as knowledgeable as most on this thread, so I'm grateful for all the
experience that has been imparted to myself on this thread.

As to your comment, here is a case in point that is kind of sobering.  I
loved the Alinco DJ-G29, which is a 220/900 MHz radio.  Diamond even
created an antenna, specifically for this radio, SRH229, which was only for
the two bands.  I figured it must have been popular, as my radio was
back-ordered 4 months at AES.  I talked to many people on our 33 CM
repeater here in Salt Lake City.  Everyone I talked to had had their radio
on backorder for a long time, too.

Then suddenly -- poof!  It disappeared from the market.  The only place
I've been able to find it is at a little shop in S. California, which had a
supply of them before they quit and still have them.

Sorry if I'm drawing it out.  The point is this.  I called Alinco and
talked to a guy there about the DJ-G29.  I asked him why such a popular
radio had just disappeared right after coming on the market.  His answer
was simple and a bit startling to me.  I felt a bit ashamed for some in our
hobby.  He said that Alinco had ceased making them after a huge amount of
pressure came on them of 33 CM hams all around.  Some had even said they
would boycott Alinco.  The attitude, he said, was that there was so much
opposition against it because those on 33 CM had to specially mod radios
and do all kinds of specialized things to the radios to make them work.
They didn't want any "greenie hams" taking over "their" band.  In fact, he
said, the opposition was so loud against providing these "easy" to use
radios, especially for greenies, that Alinco just dropped it.  Shame
shame!  Don't we always say about our bands and radios:  "if you don't use
it, we'll lose it".

I should know it takes a little work.  I had a Motorola Spectra modded by a
wonderful guy in Vegas.  I didn't even have the equipment to do such a
thing.  He reported to me that he couldn't use a new computer to program
it, but rather an IBM 8086 with DOS to program frequencies, etc., if my
memory doesn't fail me.  He replaced all my caps for free, another good
idea with these older radios.  And I have a "problem".  All the frequencies
are hard coded into the radio; I can't change them.  If a new repeater
comes online, I can't use it with this radio.  If I have a DJ-G29, however,
i can simply flip to the new frequency, program it, and use it.  It only
runs on one or two watts on that band, but it's enough for around here.

I do like my Motorola, but you have to consider what it takes to get it
running.  I had to order a Spectra from Ebay within a certain number range
on the back of the radio, which indicates the frequency  range, among other
things.  You can't get the wrong one or you're up a creek, and they can
sometimes be hard to differentiate from each other, especially with just
the Ebay info.  Then you have to run it through some processes, such as
changing the caps, programming the radio with ancient hard to find
equipment.  I paid someone to do all this because I either didn't want to
do it or didn't know how/didn't have the resources, etc.  In order to have
a decent signal, I also chose a Spectra that would do 35 W.  I bought some
LMR-900 -- hard line -- expensive -- even a short 20 foot run cost over
$600 -- the coax company charged $60 apiece for special N connectors which
would fit the hardline, a special "cutting fee" because no one uses
LMR-900, and the expensive x dollars per feet for the coax.  Yes, I know
there is heliax and other types of hardline.  I like the fact that the LMR
has a DB type cable.  Had to buy a mast for the antenna, buy an antenna, a
small yagi, with 17 dBi, etc. etc.

Now I know I'm being verbose.  Forgive me.  I'm just trying to make a point
that a 33 CM radio can sometimes be expensive and hard to set up to get
what you want.  You may need experts to help you.  With the DJ-G29 it was
possible to plug in a frequency and a CTCSS tone and just talk.

What a waste!  What a shame!  What an "un-ham" attitude.

Forgive me if there are mistakes here;; this is what I remember.

73 de Shon K6QT

Shon R. Edwards, MA, AG (Czech Republic)
Amateur call:  K6QT
1039 N 2575 W
Layton, UT, 84041-7709
USA
Home phone:  (801) 444-3445
E-mail:  sre.1966 at gmail.com

or

Shon Edwards
715 Strawberry Creek Private Rd.
Bedford, WY 83112
Cell:  (307) 248-2104

On Tue, Jan 9, 2018 at 2:50 PM, George Hale Jr. <ghalejr at gmail.com> wrote:

> Like my Mother always said, "If you do not have anything nice to say, do
> not talk at all". I'm astonished on how bad some forums treat newbees. Yes,
> it gets old sometimes answering the same basic question many times, But
> giving a rude answer will only keep others from seeking help. Do we want
> the hobby to grow. or wither away as we all get old?
>
> On Tue, Jan 9, 2018 at 2:31 PM, Al Jones <al at aljones.us> wrote:
>
>> I like the give and take from all the people here *except* that there are
>> times when it's not helpful at all.
>>
>> We get a new member who doesn't know what he's doing, thinks he's read
>> everything and is still missing "something" --- and one of our beneficent
>> members replies "RTFM!"  or someone else chimes in with "get the right
>> cable!" or better yet "That won't work!"
>>
>> Those one line zingers are not only NO help, they're probably going to
>> turn
>> off some guy who might eventually be the one to help someone else, down
>> the
>> line.
>>
>> I have a friend who had a Linux problem and the response he got here was -
>> "It works fine with *my* Ubuntu!"  Sometimes confirmation that something
>> works is a big help, it just means that we're not looking in the right
>> place.  When I phrased his question differently I got some great
>> assistance
>> ... there are some good guys here and to them I say "Thanks!"
>>
>> << tripping off my soapbox, sorry >>
>>
>>
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>>
>
>
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