Freebanding. Is there any activity between 25.615 & 26.955?

Yeah I will have to have a sort out of old AM days stuff like I've got somewhere in the house if it's still here my Mrs always has a clear out now and then if I dont hide anything good enough it goes mate LOL

Ha, Ha!
Yeah, know what you mean Martin, I can't put nothing down for five minutes before the missus has 'tidied' it away!
Was good to have a bit of a reminisce though.

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Mark - What a precious memory you have there mate!
I almost forget what it was like to tentatively turn on that illegal/pirate radio called 'CB' for the first time.

@Markone lol I can remember when eldest kid my daughter when she was about 12 she saw my old Cobra 148 and asked what it was so I siad we will set it up over the weekend and I'll show ,anyway we got it set up and she listen to it and siad "Oh it's like my mobile dad but not as quick" ,but she did have a go on it on SSB I told how to call out and she used my call sighn and she got more QSOs than me I think it was unusual for to hear a girls voice so they all call back to her she did get a QSL card from a French station set to my old P.O.Box which pleased her,now she is grown up with her own kids and they like to listen to grandads radio sometimes my other two grown up sons think I'm old fashioned and  laugh (Jokingly) but one of my sons kid my grandaughter likes the radio too so theres hope yet to convert the youngsters lol

As said "Freebanding" new one to me when i returned to radio.
"Pirate" well that was what i did 30+ years ago but on the HF bands lol.

hi victor,52 years old ,still makes me smile and still find myself looking at the magic power meter as if its a tv lol

NUBSTER wrote:

If you was on the oil rigs at that time I mentioned wonder if it was you who I spoke to once , if it was it's small world mate

No it wouldn't be me as I daren't take my radio out there as there were customs searches, so only listened on the rig radio. Radio op was always saying how bad it was if he got caught off the marine band, mind you now I think about it he was always there after work.
Odd that, wonder if he ever said  "My QTH is 300m NW of the Shetlands"

Wonder what antenna they had on the rig that covered such a wide range.

Great to hear all these old memories.

When the skip was running, I always remember people on the UK40 complaining about interference from people using ssb further up high band, where the two bands crossed over. They used to complain and call us the "rubber banders." Lol.

Ha, Ha!

I remember the 'rubber banders' terminology John. Most SSB operators would keep around the 555 hardly affecting the UK frequencies but our Continental cousins would splatter all of the first 26 UK channels almost rendering it useless!

Anyone remember The Olga's , Eastern European female radio operators who alegerlly where Eastern European taxi controllers who transmitted just off the UKFM frequency and was running so much power it block out the whole of the band some days ,they even use to block out the Mid channels sometimes ,the strange thing was when we heard these women we knew the conditions would be good on the T5 and higher bands for some reason ,mind you back then when this was happening we was also getting weird conditions on UKFM too ie: picking up U.S. stations who where actually illegally pirating our UK40(as FM is illegal in the US to use on CB)and some making contacts with us , all of the UK was even copying each other too real long distance copies plus many other strange not normal contact around was made this was around 2006/2008 if I remember right ,then suddenly it all just went and then nothing.

KP441 wrote:

NUBSTER wrote:

If you was on the oil rigs at that time I mentioned wonder if it was you who I spoke to once , if it was it's small world mate

No it wouldn't be me as I daren't take my radio out there as there were customs searches, so only listened on the rig radio. Radio op was always saying how bad it was if he got caught off the marine band, mind you now I think about it he was always there after work.
Odd that, wonder if he ever said  "My QTH is 300m NW of the Shetlands"

If I remember I think he use to say something like that

Yep, remember the Cyrillic shrills and shrieks Martin.

I thought it was during the sunspot lift in the 90's because that's when I last came back to CB for a bit. Maybe happend on the next cycle too. As you say the moment you heard the 'Olgas' you knew the DX was in and you could no longer hear your mate up the road but a Scottish breaker or something bending your needle!

We had a local around here back then buying up every UK CB he could find at car boots to sell across the pond. Suppose the yanks knew the skip was coming and stood a better chance of an English speaking DX with a UK rig.


Let's hope the next lift is as good, we are still about to enjoy it and we do our best to welcome in the next generation of CBers with their easily programmed CB's.

Actually Victor it may have been mid 90s early 2000's I can't remember sometimes lol , but I can recall Stateside was actually DX calling on the 19 UKFM and naturally we thought wind up but it was actually happening once there was a Australian station calling in on the 19 and all in London was going mad to get him but it was never proven if it was true and not a wind up ,unlike the U.S hearing us and us hearing them was proved because there was operators we heard about from both sides of the pond getting in contact via other means to see if it was true
I dont know if that will happen ever again but if it did it would be great but as you said It cause tons of problems for just normal local chit chat.

The 1970 Bakers Street Lloyds bank robbery was solved thanks to someone listening in to  CB frequencies on his SW RX. As he was listening to see if he could hear a friend, Australian friend, I believe.  Instead he heard the robbers radio traffic & informed the Police. And it's said the GPO tried to prosecute him for listening to bands he should not have been listening too, as a result of him helping.

edited to add. 

shadyoldlady.com/location/1217

Quote :

An amateur radio 'ham', Robert Rowland, alerted Scotland Yard that he had overheard a robbery in progress somewhere within a 10-mile radius of Central London. Rowland, who lived in Wimpole Street, had been tuned in to the 27.15 megacycles radio frequency at 11.00pm on Saturday, 11th September 1971, trying to contact a fellow 'ham' in Australia. He picked up a conversation between what sounded like a team of bank raiders and their lookout on a nearby rooftop. He began to tape the radio exchanges, while trying to communicate his suspicions to the police. 

Victor wrote:

Ha, Ha!

I remember the 'rubber banders' terminology John. Most SSB operators would keep around the 555 hardly affecting the UK frequencies but our Continental cousins would splatter all of the first 26 UK channels almost rendering it useless!

That is right, Victor. Mainly French stations and to a lesser extent Italian. Even to this day French stations work very close to 28 mhz on ssb. 

When CT regularly used ch34 on the UK40 at the height of the last cycle you would get quite a few stations from 14 div coming in.

NUBSTER wrote:

Anyone remember The Olga's , Eastern European female radio operators who alegerlly where Eastern European taxi controllers who transmitted just off the UKFM frequency and was running so much power it block out the whole of the band some days ,they even use to block out the Mid channels sometimes ,the strange thing was when we heard these women we knew the conditions would be good on the T5 and higher bands for some reason ,mind you back then when this was happening we was also getting weird conditions on UKFM too ie: picking up U.S. stations who where actually illegally pirating our UK40(as FM is illegal in the US to use on CB)and some making contacts with us , all of the UK was even copying each other too real long distance copies plus many other strange not normal contact around was made this was around 2006/2008 if I remember right ,then suddenly it all just went and then nothing.

I remember Olga too, Martin. They could be heard all the way from 26 mhz and well into the 10m band too. Must have been running big power. Mode of transmission was FM if I remember rightly. Lots of splatter.

Yep John ,pain is the arse mate they was , as I said though when we heard them we all knew we was going to get some good conditions on the skip but that's all they was good for lol.

OFF TOPIC 
This is slightly off topic as such , I heard some sad news the founder of the Alpha Tango Group Italia (1AT001 Mr Aldo) has passed away this week ,the group that gave us the 555 as we know it today and also the country division numbers , RIP Mr Aldo .

Sad new indeed, Martin.

I remember Olga being around in 2013 which was a good year for dx with many of my best contacts made.26.285 usb got a lot of use and I started speaking with the Canadian outlaws on 26.420 usb daily.
After many chats I got my callsign from them and was passed around the various Canadian and stateside operators wasting many a afternoon.
I still call down on .285 and have had some nice chats with tenerife,greece,usa,Indonesia and make a point of using 26mhz when possible.Great to hear the stories gents...

Those was the good times of radio Sam, getting the great contacts

NUBSTER wrote:

Those was the good times of radio Sam, getting the great contacts

It sure was matey,had to edit the date as I had a look thru my log and 2013 was the year.

27.200mhz FM is a Russian call freq and I often hear them but not the taxi operators so perhaps they have moved on to equipment away from 27 mhz.

be nice when those days return

I don't often get a good reception now like I use to back then ,a lot of new  scrutures have gone up in the last few years which seem to be blocking signal to me especially for groundwave 
plus the QRM problem has trebled around our area to point of sometimes 20+ db of noise or it goes the opposite deadly quite and nobody on LOL

It has been interesting hearing stories of contacts being made as pirates while out of band.

Can anybody add to the following pirate\non UK calling frequencies?

26.285 USB International
26.575 FM (Germany calling frequency)
27.200 FM (Russian calling frequency) Thank you for the info Cozzmik
27.555 UBS International

Razz229 wrote:

It has been interesting hearing stories of contacts being made as pirates while out of band.

Can anybody add to the following pirate\non UK calling frequencies?

26.285 USB International
26.575 FM (Germany calling frequency)
27.200 FM (Russian calling frequency) Thank you for the info Cozzmik
27.555 UBS International

27.515 lsb Caribbean call freq
27.495 usb Oscar Papa call freq
27.385 lsb usa call freq
27.025 am usa superbowl big gun call channel

I hear the super bowl from time to time very faint when beaming towards them and the noise level is zero