Curious I wonder how many sales of Ham equipment goes for Out of band use.

What I would like to figure out is when the last remaining ham who was NEVER on 11 meters finally becomes a silent key.

58 years ago there was near-universal resentment by hams that "their" 11-meter band that they never used had been turned over to CB channels.

Decade by decade, more active hams started out on CB or frequently on the 'HF' channels above 23 and later on, channel 40.

As the old guard fades away, a higher percentage of hams either started out or used CB at one or more times in their lives.

So, when will the last "non-CB ever" ham finally breathe his last breath?

Would be a milestone to note, if you could figure out how to tell.

73

nomadradio,
AMEN!!!!!

73's
David

P.S.
I have an active Amateur Radio License/Call and still use CB Radio. Just waiting to get sued or shunned or.....................................
73's
David

Oh Boy I am gonna get shuned!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

me also

I would have added "stoned" to the "sued or shunned" remark, but I had to consider that people could take that wrong.

(I meant stoned in the Biblical sense. And don't take that wrong either)

73's
David

"Stoned in the biblical sense"? As in "rocked to sleep"?

Beetle said:

"Stoned in the biblical sense"? As in "rocked to sleep"?

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Sure!

73's
David

Robb said:

Two years after I got my Ham ticket in '08, it was announced on national television that Ham radio as a whole had never had so many new licencees in its entire history. So, I think you might want to re-check your facts and sources again.

The reason that Ham radio equipment is expensive - IMO - is because Ham radio appeals to engineers, retirees, and hobbyists who have the expendable cash that don't want to buy a new Corvette.

Let me know when Ham Radio Outlet goes out of business . . .

Just about all Ham radios can be modded to go out of band, since MARS operator do so with gov't permission. But how many Amateurs do so for using it on CB is actually quite low. Many of them know how to modify their radios if it was deemed necessary to do so for emergency use.

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These newer High End rigs from the big 3 are expensive,however they all offer lower
priced models that are very good performers.
When the TS-520S was released in the mid 70's the street price was around $600.00.
The cw filter was extra cost. One vfo,had to buy the external one to work split.No display, buy the dg-5 for frequency readout only good to 100hz. Tuner extra.
Add up all the extras and you were right around $1000.00 for a radio with no am or fm
or any of the other features I mentioned that are pretty much in most modern radios
since the late 90's.
Just the basic radio for $600 in 1975 was a LOT of money for most people,look at what you get for $1000-1500 today. I would say that todays mid priced rigs are a bargain.
I still have my TS-520S,40 years old & it works as well as it did when new.
I have newer equipment but when the bands are reasonably quiet I prefer the old Kenwood for a good ragchew on 40 meters.
I wonder how many of these newer radios will still be in service in 40 years and not sitting in a landfill.
73, George

1975 Kenwood TS-520 = $600 USD
Same radio today adjusted for inflation = $2850
Appears price of Amateur Radio has went down it seems
All the Best
Gary

Even though inflation has made the dollar worth less some things have actually
become more affordable.
Example Icom 718 -about 7 years ago you could get one for around $500 new.
Two vfos.,100 memories. built in keyer, am, ssb cw, rtty,rated for continuous duty.
Dsp included free, was an option when first released.
Lot of radio for the money & still popular.
George

ButtFuzz said:

Most "ham" rigs, without a lot of trouble, just do not sound "good" on AM, IMHO.
SSB is another story.

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The problem here is most manufacturers have over complicated the AM side of their rigs. Treating the AM transmitter as if the only way to make AM is to throw a balanced modulator out of balance and put the carrier offset in the middle of the crystal filter bandwidth. Totally different than how it was done in older rigs that do sound good on AM like an FT-101.

Every all mode rig has a mic pre-amp and some form of a carrier or power control. The simplest way to get great AM audio out of these rigs is to abandon any attempt to improve the existing AM modulator. Don't even bother using it. Just take the audio directly off the mic pre-amp and couple it through a capacitor to the carrier or power control transistor. That's usually one of the gates to a dual gate FET and will turn this part into your new AM modulator.

The truth is it only takes four parts to convert many poor sounding AM rigs into respectable sounding AM that is actually modulating the RF stages rather than the IF stages. You need a relay to switch the line level audio from the mic pre-amp through an added cap, to the power control transistor gate in AM. Other modes use the relay to keep the audio feeding the original path. You use a switching transistor that only keys the relay in the AM mode. The last part is a resistor to feed the base of the switching transistor that will be driven off the 8 volt AM line.

Shockwave said:

The problem here is most manufacturers have over complicated the AM side of their rigs. Treating the AM transmitter as if the only way to make AM is to throw a balanced modulator out of balance and put the carrier offset in the middle of the crystal filter bandwidth. Totally different than how it was done in older rigs that do sound good on AM like an FT-101.

Every all mode rig has a mic pre-amp and some form of a carrier or power control. The simplest way to get great AM audio out of these rigs is to abandon any attempt to improve the existing AM modulator. Don't even bother using it. Just take the audio directly off the mic pre-amp and couple it through a capacitor to the carrier or power control transistor. That's usually one of the gates to a dual gate FET and will turn this part into your new AM modulator.

The truth is it only takes four parts to convert many poor sounding AM rigs into respectable sounding AM that is actually modulating the RF stages rather than the IF stages. You need a relay to switch the line level audio from the mic pre-amp through an added cap, to the power control transistor gate in AM. Other modes use the relay to keep the audio feeding the original path. You use a switching transistor that only keys the relay in the AM mode. The last part is a resistor to feed the base of the switching transistor that will be driven off the 8 volt AM line.

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So it would be like direct injecting audio from studio mic gear but using the existing mic preamp inside the radio instead? Now you got me thinking.

Shadetree Mechanic said:

So it would be like direct injecting audio from studio mic gear but using the existing mic preamp inside the radio instead? Now you got me thinking.

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The key to success here has less to do with the audio source (internal versus external) and everything to do with the circuit where the audio is injected into the RF chain. The circuit the radio already uses to adjust its carrier level on AM is an ideal place to inject modulation through a coupling cap. I was surprised to learn that just about everything you need is already in most HF rigs. It's just that the designers decided to treat AM more like SSB than needed. If you're looking for broadcast fidelity, the mic pre-amp sections would need additional modification or be fed with external studio gear but punchy "Cobra type" audio is readily obtainable with the existing mic pre-amp stages.

There are a few radios like the TS-940S that have issues using a coupling cap to inject the audio. In this radio once you get a cap value large enough to pass good bass response, the cap also has a slow charge time and will hold the carrier high for a second as it charges. That's a problem when driving an amplifier since the spike during the charge time may over drive the amp. To get around this problem I used a 1:1 audio isolation transformer as the audio coupling component in the 940.

Shockwave said:

That's a problem when driving an amplifier since the spike during the charge time may over drive the amp

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yuup!

jdobbs2001 said:

With less people getting into Ham radio (New generation more interested in social media and video games) every sale counts. I wonder how much equipment sold is really for out of band use.

I have seen plenty of Amateur radio equipment doing duty as Marine HF, LMR(ie contractors,NGO firms) in places like Africa etc.. and of course 11 meter operators.

The reason for this is companies like Codan for example want to charge an arm and a leg for commercial HF transcievers and not everyone needs ALE. (There are work arounds to do ALE on non ALE capable radios anyhow)

even vendors offer up the mod as an option. (Dont remember that being the case 15 years ago) Honestly I think its silly to even TX lock the radios to begin with, if your licensed you know the band plans, and if new frequency ranges are opened you should not be stuck with what the radio shipped with (ie 60M band introduced in 2002)

SGC used to sell Transceivers fully capable of transmitting on the whole HF band to Ham radio operators.

what is your guess?

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IMHO they'll never admit it but there's a statistically significant amount of equipment that gets unlocked and used on 11M and elsewhere (mars, etc?) the moment it hits someone's shack. Part of the reason the FT-920 for example, was a huge
turd was the fact that, when it was released, a large portion of people ended up bricking their radios trying to perform the unlock on that thing, and at the time it was pretty horrendous.

Of course when I say statistically significant, think like 10-20% or so, maybe
more. Back when I used to buy more estate gear there was a literal 50/50 chance that the owner had already unlocked it. It's hilarious though how many hams are 110% pole-in-butt about having an unlocked radio, they act like its going to trigger sireens and that the radio police are going to come out of the bushes and arrest them or something. I personally won't own anything if it can't be unlocked, unless its an inherent design limitation of the radio electronically for the purpose of better performance and not just done by the manufacturer to be an asshole. (for example, Elecraft intentionally nerfs one of their radios on 11M and I will never buy their gear because of it, because basically they just did it to be douchebags). It's so dumb I'm surprised they didn't block out 26-28 mhz entirely even after mars unlock. Years ago I had a Kenwood TM-255A 2M monobander and that was strictly 144 to 148, but it had a great reason for being like that- because it was hard core dedicated radio for that band, no compromises, no intermod, not even a peep, etc. (miss that radio but that's another story).