Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

OFCOM will allow you a temporary licence to change your callsign to commemorate the Royal Wedding.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today...00/9465997.stm

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

It is though on request only so it might be a bit late for those wanting to use GR, MR or 2R prefixes

---------- Post added at 12:44 ---------- Previous post was at 12:42 ----------

My mistake, Ofcom have finally done us proud and done a web application page :D

http://www.etcc.rsgb.org/RoyalWedding/rw_app.htm

They're looking at a 72 hour turn around time for sending you a link to your NoV

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Can somebody please explain what this means in english, to us non radio hams.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

It's just altering a hams callsign in honour of the royal wedding. So instead of the current G,M or 2E callsigns prefixes for a limited time they can use GR, MR or 2R..

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

What is the relevance of the prefix?

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Did you apply for your NOV Kymmy? Put my application in this morning.

The relevance is that R is for "Royal", other than that nothing really, it will attract a bit of activity in that some Hams treat callsigns the same way trainspotters collect numbers. It's one way for the UK ham community to celebrate the occasion.

EDIT:

Hom3r, every Ham worldwide has a callsign unique to them issued by whatever regulatory body looks after the RF spectrum in that country. Callsigns generally follow the format of a country prefix, a number/numbers, and three letters, for example my callsign starts with M1, M being one of the designated identification letters for the UK(the others being G and 2), with the Royal wedding prefix added, the start of my callsign will become MR1.

EDIT 2:

Kymmy, I saw/heard that news article today, the sound quality is awful, not to mention that on the first bit of SSB featured, either the Ham involved couldn't tune a SSB signal, or the BBC didn't give them time to tune it in. Not sure it was the best PR in the world for us.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

:rofl:

Yep the quality was comical.

I applied once I saw Stuarts thread so that means if it goes through in time I can be a GR7 (and no I don't mean the aircraft :rolleyes: )

Homer, to expand on Jon's reference.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_sign

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Judging by the operating in that BBC clip they sound like the types who end up 5MHz wide with an amp that's no longer linear.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

I was emailed my NOV this morning, just need to make a QSL card for my "MR" callsign tonight/tomorrow!

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Got mine through at midday :tu:

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

So I could be called MR1 Joe 90?

One Nine MR1 Joe 90, come in buddy..

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Will you be QRV anywhere Friday then?

We're off into yonder hills for some portable shenanigans.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

On a CB, which you appear to be referring to, you can be anything you want to be.

On the Amateur bands you identify yourself with your station's allocated callsign, not one you've made up yourself.

---------- Post added at 18:01 ---------- Previous post was at 17:57 ----------

I should think so, probably only HF, I can do PSK, SSTV or voice, anywhere from 40M up. I can do VHF/UHF as well but only FM.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Doesn't Radio Ham law state you have to snort audibly and point your nose in the air while saying that? :D

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Not to my knowledge :D

Certain preconceptions exist on the CB, Ham, and the totally radio disinterested side of things. Most of the time it's pure ignorance, or perhaps a bad experience/encounter with one of the other groups.

Live and let live, if it floats you boat, then do it, just don't shove it down other's throats, or frown on a similar activity because you think yours is better.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

In my experience of being CB user there was always an air of superiority from Hams. Granted there were a lot more muppets on 27/81 but I never spoke to a Ham who failed to tell me how much better Amateur Radio was etc.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

True for so many things in life....:D

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Ham radio is more restricted than CB in what you can and can not say.. I the 90's there was also a habit of hams being snobs towards CB users because they had to pass a test.

Personally I started on CB in the mid 80's and passed my ham test in '91.. Never though left CB behind and used to enjoy both.. CB for the social side and ham for the technical side including packet radio.

Russ as for extreme snobbery you should have heard it on ham radio when the novice licence came out.. The full licence holders (especially the then A class) were extremely disgusting to listen to when talking down to some novice licence holders

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Just jumping in if you don't mind a quick question...

How do you HAM radio people use your radios? I mean do you just scan the airwaves and wait to hear someone and then talk to them or is there another way?
Is the point of it to meet new people and talk to them?

Thanks.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

That's one area of the hobby, yes.

Although it's a whole plethora of different things to different poeple. Hams can legally use home built transmitters/amplifiers etc. Some "stations" don't have a single piece of commercially made kit in them. Some are into "DX Chasing", contacting distant places. Some transmit TV pictures, others use their PC's to transmit digitally......and so much more that to mention it all would take all night.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Interesting.

are there any good urls that you'd recommend for further research.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

www.rsgb.org.uk

Pehaps the best place to go from the above link is http://www.rsgb.org/newcomers/, although to be honest it doesn't even scratch the surface.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

I remember one local Ham who spent thousands on kit and never managed to get any good dx-ing but with my Cobra 148, Antron 99, 50w burner and Astatic Teardrop Mic I could regularly get over to Europe as I simply knew how to ride the skip better than he could. He didn't like me very much :D

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Ah mainly 50/144ssb here although it's become very quiet over the past few years certainly on 144 other than when the UK activity contest nights are on which is a shame really because you can still have a good UK-wide net even on a flat band. Still speak to the big guns over in Ireland quite regularly and Bryn over in the Lincolnshire Wolds..then again if you can't hear him it means your radio isn't switched on!

Will probably head down into Shropshire on Friday and do Stiperstones and the Clee Hills, time permitting that is. Might pop onto 2 FM for a little while so have a listen out for the pile-up ;)

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Where my HF kit and antenna set me back a grand total of £150 : FT80c (commencial version of the FT747GX) going through a half size G5RV and a MFJ versa tuner II. That's got me contacts in Australia, Japan, South America and South Africa.

You don't need to spend a lot to enjoy the hobby.

Russ it might be of interest to you that there is also a QRP side to ham radio which followers use minimal power to get all over the world.. The limits can be 5w for morse and 10w for SSB and equipment is more often than not little home made kits capable of a only a single band.

http://www.gqrp.com/about.htm

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

500mW WSJT/WSPR into Australia - Sandpiper MV10 short vertical at the end of the garden.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

My entire set-up cost me £90 back in 1992.

That's where Ham Radio doesn't interest me - I only used CB as a cheap and easy way of staying in touch with my mates pre-mobile phones. When the skip was active I'd chat to whoever was passing by but speaking to people in other countries was a novelty that quickly wore off. If I feel the need to speak to people around the world I'll use the internet. If I want to stay in touch with mates I'll use my phone. The whole CB/Ham Radio thing just does nothing for me anymore. I still have my set-up in my parents' attic, I wanted to keep it there incase an emergency hits the country and all mobile communication goes down - yeah I'm ready for the Apocalypse ;) - but past that.....I've long since moved on.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

You can do what you want to do and spend as little or as much as you're willing to pay on shiny, black boxes, whatever floats your boat. Ultimately you get out what you put in and take whatever satisfaction from what you've achieved whether it's bashing the contacts flat on your key to break a pile-up with one watt or scaling Croagh Padraig with a bergen full of batteries and radio gear just to say you're up there ;)

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Last time I was camping in North Anglesey I was chatting to friends in Manchester, some people on the Isle of Man and some people in Ireland.. It's not all about worldwide communication but also about other things..

Packet radio was a great tool before the internet became popular a few years later being able to send emails to other hams all over the world in the early '90's. Today I like messing around with APRS and real time tracking via a GPS attached to the radio which sends bursts of telemetry at the end of speech. People still use forms of data communications long since dead to the outside world as they do work great on HF. Others do slow scan or fast scan TV.. They might point an antenna array to the moon and use that to bounce a signal off (or even one of the many ham radio satellites in orbit) and will speak using VHF/UHF (normally restricted to 20-60 miles) to talk to peopple all over the planet. There's even a ham radio set on the ISS that's regularly in use.

It's not just about how far you can get.. Instead its all the different things you can do with a radio ;)

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

I live up north, not really interested in the royal's.

Re: Good news for Hams who want to celebrate the Royal Wedding..
 

Getting back to the NoV, just noticed that the secondary country locator is to be dropped if you use the R.. (to the layperson normally the secondary prefix is used if you are outside of England (for example W in wales, M in Scotland, J in Jersey. Sofor example a callsign of M1AAA in Wales would use MW1AAA, where under this NoV even in Wales they would use MR1AAA)

I know they've done this before with GB stations but quite surprised they've done this with standard NoV's