V(U)HF Channel numbers???

It's been a very long time since I used a channelised portion of any band and I now note that, allegedly, we have a new numbering convention.

The question is, what do you call 145.500? S20 or V40? Did this convention catch on, anybody know when it was introduced? Presumably it's a load of cobblers along with the 12.5KHz channel spacing. 2m was never that crowded on FM!

Don't forget it's also DV40.
(Digital Voice Simplex)

Depends on who you are talking to and at making sure you're at least communicating on the same wavelength. (Pun intended.  )

I'll say S whatever or V whatever but usually use a frequency, not that any bugger uses 2m much my way. (Wait for the screams of protest.) When I was first licenced I sat for days on 145.500 and heard not a soul.....

Bit different 'oop  north' with the websdr's showing VHF/UHF full of life, FM, DV and SSB! Only hear SSB this way on RSGB competition Tuesdays. (This is where someone tells me my antenna is garbage yet even on tropo lifts no buggers out there.)

My first tentative steps into DMR also has others telling me it's not 'proper' radio......


.....but then apparently my M7 also isn't a 'proper' licence.

Its true, my M5 isn't a proper licence either...

Neither was my M1, back in 2000 M series licence groups were only in existence a mere six years at the time, the new fangled M licences were regarded as not good progress.

So much so that the Introduction of the A/B Licence (M5) isn't even listed as it was only issued for one year Nov 2000/ Nov 2001, but the RSGB is quite happy to list its ending within BR68 in their potted history of Licensing, and merger into A Licence in 2003, at which point we all got a letter to try and get us all to accept a new M0, an attempt to erase M5 from existence.

I raised my finger and ignored the RA, as now I was rare call, and had my vanity callsign and car registration plate, also there were 'problems' in RAYNET too, caused by the RSGB hierarchy, so I stopped my subscription to the RSGB and sort of lost interest, finally not rebuilding my shack a year later after a 2004 house move, and stopping mobile and portable operations when I changed my car in 2011.

So there was animosity in 2001 when M3 were first issued after M5 were stopped being issued, I'm sure its been a bone of contention when they started M6, and now M7 calls, I thought that maybe it had all calmed down by now?

Victor wrote:

 apparently my M7 also isn't a 'proper' licence.

I've heard say "if it isn't G then it's CB", daft when you consider the first licences issued all begin with 2, there was no G to begin with

I have a G6+3 and an M0+3 call, just need a 2xxxx to complete the set.

Anyway, I bought a little 'boo-fung' that started this chain of thought and have rebelliously labelled the channels with old and new numbering. Not sure that I'll ever get used to the new ones if I am honest.

It's all flipping radio as far as I'm concerned Wayne and all a bit nonsensical.

Good on you for your Baofeng too Roger and I hope you enjoy it as much as I have mine.  

I have a mate that was a G1 but found himself assigned an M0 then took some flack for daring to use the hallowed grounds of HF. But on the whole it's only the odd 'bad egg' that spoils it all, rotten apples in the cart so to speak. My very first 80m net saw me being accused of using more than ten watts and even though I could go on to explain several technical methods for measuring my RF output it seems that unless I owned a 'Bird' watt meter I didn't know what I was on about. (?)

I will however always be grateful to those that did welcome me let alone the volunteers that invigilated online examinations as well as provided training. I'll always thank those that helped me along, donated equipment, time and support not to just 'fit' into their vision of Amateur Radio but to enjoy radio as a whole. Of course I'll always be grateful to Charlie Tango members that supported me on my return to radio and eventually to getting licensed let alone further adventures.


Yeah, I don't care what your call sign is or even if 145.500 is S20 or V40.....So long as we get on air and keep chatting to each other it's all good in my book.  

Same goes for all the 'unlicenced' bands, CB, PMR, whatever. At least you only had to figure out radio, not learn how far the ionosphere is up in kilometres or transmitting near Charing Cross.

I have lost sight of all this changes, must be getting to old.

BTW my G1 is a full licence, why did the G1 get issued an M0.

I like my callsign and wouldn't want to change it.

When I went to the Dayton Hamvention in 1997 a US ham was so pleased to meet
a G1 as he had never heard of one.

He let it lapse Mike, got reissued without a by your leave. Times that makes me feel lucky that I got to choose mine.

Ha, I heard exactly that phrase back then, I managed to forget it completely.

I found it nonsensical, then there was the Morse thing, an increasingly irrelevant mode that was claimed could get through when everything else couldn't, yet a computer sound card could hear signals deep inside the signal floor that a human ear could not hear.

I could understand how it was important in the past, just like it was the Law of the land that every man over 14 was required to practice longbow after church on a Sunday at one stage, but this was just one mode of operation on HF, with more and more modes invented or improved almost weekly.

Quite how it remained a barrier to operation below 30MHz for so long is almost incredible.

The animosity against B Licensees which undertook the same RAE as every other Full Licensee was also eye opening to say the least, when I took my test in a BA146 Aircraft at RAF Cosford Museum I managed 14wpm, and requested an M5 because the writing was on the wall for Morse, and I was more interested in a vanity call than 'joining a club' line of thought that kowtowed the 'if its not G then its CB' as lowly M0.  Basically allowed on HF due to jumping through hoops that were unnecessary.

Most of the operators couldn't determine whether they were listening to human or machine generated Morse, I proved this when I was complemented on my 'clear 20wpm Morse' using Windows XP, and no I didn't upset the operator the other end by embarrassing him, I just responded thanks using a keyboard and sent a QSL Card.

When I was on VHF Packet, you even got quite nasty responses on any BBS thread if you used anything other than plain text, and sending a picture attachment was a total no-no even in some really low resolution, this was at a time when the mode was in decline, and they were complaining you were hogging the bandwidth when there was less and less traffic.

It was like there were all these little kingdoms people had erected, and you had to do what they said because 'tradition'.

I'm really hoping that has changed when I get back on the air.

A lot has changed Wayne and I do think for the better but of course there'll always be those resistant to change.

If a lot more people treated Amateur Radio as an enjoyable 'hobby' rather than with almost religious zeal things would go better too. It would also go a long way to remember that behind every call sign there is a human being, a real live person with actual feelings, dreams, hopes and aspirations.

You keep going mate and get to enjoy what you're doing no matter your goals. 

If they happen to be different from anyone else's then so be it, there's no point in converting them to your way of thinking just as it's fruitless for them to reciprocate such processes.



Anyway, back to Roger's original posting.....

I'm with you on the naming 'conventions' with my radios programmed for both channel 'names' just to help me more than anything should someone use one description or the other. I still prefer to use a frequency designation but so long as we're on the same bit of electromagnetic space to communicate you can call it whatever you like. "Please QSY to Pink Fairy" works so long as I know what 'pink fairy' is.

The world has gone mad. You can't even whistle up a repeater these days.

Ah, but you'd whistle up GB3PI not realising there's a tropo lift on and suddenly GB3BC Pontypridd would kick in!

CTCSS ruined all the fun.

TrunkY wrote:

The world has gone mad. You can't even whistle up a repeater these days.

Too true, all my old handhelds are now useless when trying to open GB3LH, oh well

It's a shame CTCSS did that to a lot of older equipment Wayne.

I had built several analogue circuits to pop 77Hz out for my local repeaters and fitted them to my old FT290r as well as FT227 to get them back on air with success. Bit harder to squeeze the circuitry into my old Kenwood TR2500 handheld but worked OK hooked up as an external unit. (As a bonus I converted the FT290r toneburst or 'call' button to be a repeater input function to check whether I can hear an operator direct and go simplex.)

Radios such as the Baofengs are so cheap and readily available now though with all the local analogue functions built right in that it makes converting older equipment hardly worth it. (But I do love firing up a repeater on my 1970's FT227!  )


GB3LH is still marked as an Analogue and Fusion repeater but if it's anything like a local one to me marked as such the Analogue part don't work!?!