Car CB radio question

Wow, this takes me back! Are there still many preople using them?

I had a couple of rigs about 20 years ago. Range of about 10 miles when it was busy, but getting up early on a Sunday morning to "DX" you could get 50 or so miles.
 
I think we should maybe post our terrible handles (callsigns for those who don't know the term). I was the yellow goblin!

Nowadays in NI it is only the lorry guys that use them and a few of us still use them when we go to spectate at car rallys. Good craic between a convoy of cars.

The lorry guys will be on CH19 AM - most other contacts I have made are on CH14 UK FM. I haven't had a radio now in a few years but I don't imagine things have changed.

Edit: By the way you NEED a booster (linear amp) - these really do wonders for getting good range! I had one of the models at the link below. I think it was the £50 version.

http://www.truck-king.co.uk/store/home.php?cat=50
 
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How do you know how far you're getting, just when some answers and says where they are?

What else would you talk about other than locations? How would you know what channels to use?
 
CB is hardly VHF.

The Es season is nicely in swing at the moment and we're heading upwards in the sunspot cycle. Even 4 watts to a DV27 is going to work well when conditions are good and things are only going to get better over the next few years.

Over the last week I've worked Romania, Spain, Portugal, Estonia, Iceland, Russia, Hungary, Slovenia, Switzerland, Croatia and Norway on 28MHz SSB with cracking strong signals each way. That's using 100w to a 5/8 wave vertical but I could probably have worked the same stations with significantly less power and a smaller aerial, that's the beauty of sporadic E propagation. Last night I could hear a couple of Americans on the east coast but there were pileups trying to work them.

You won't get quite that on 27MHz FM yet but it won't be long before it all gets a lot better.
 
The Mad Rapper said:
CB is VHF, so direct line of sight. If you are on higher ground then you'll be able to broadcast further. The choice of antenna is important, but not more so than broadcast location.

You can get 'burners', or amplifiers to give the signal more kick.
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Vhf? maybe the ill fated 934 stuff but cb was 27mhz so hf .

Range was easily 15-25 miles and with sporadic e the world is your oyster . even 4w on Fm you could get most of the uk .

Nope. I had a Modified Midland 4001(still one of the best cb's ever made IMO) which was converted to 80 channels and sideband which I picked up for £50 in the late nineties.
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Sure 80 channels np .. even 8w with a bigger output tranny but ssb? i dont think so .. i think in all those years yer imagination has got the better of you .

Cb is dead now .. i somtimes take a flick up and have a listen but there is very little about . few old codgers miles away having a chat, but dead otherwise .

Check yer local bootsales.. should get a rig and extras for a few quid . Although they go for a fair bit more on ebay (dunno why ) .

Persil
 
Yes, it's 11 year cycles, have a look here.

We weren't expecting conditions to start improving for another couple of years but it's all picked up very rapidly this year, especially considering last year was so flat.

For Es you're normally looking at the beginning of the summer for peak conditions but it really does vary from day to day. 28MHz was steaming last night but it's absolutely flat right now. I keep a check on the maximum usable frequency here. Yesterday evening most of Europe was showing green and that reached the east coast of the USA as well. I like it when that map glows red as it means there's likely to be sporadic E up to 144MHz and working Spain, Italy and Portugal on 144MHz (which really is VHF) is incredible :) (but I'm drifting OT).
 
Persil said:
Sure 80 channels np .. even 8w with a bigger output tranny but ssb? i dont think so .. i think in all those years yer imagination has got the better of you .


Persil
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And why pray tell? It was a heavily modified cb and did indeed have ssb. The guy had modified some of the switches for it.

There were some electronic geeks around then. ;)
 
On the side?

10-15 miles range in your car? Not on a gutter mount whip @ 4 watts you won't!

We had a 16ft aerial mounted to the side of our house for a good few years.. transmitting at the legal 4 watts on 'the muppets'. We often got a range of around 25miles depending on channel congestion, sometimes got skip from France.

Many had RF amplifiers - back in the day they were called burners :D would chat on their to local people who would bleed over 3 channels with 100watt RF amps.

Even at 4 watts we had to install filters to our neighbours TVs as the interference was terrible, christ knows what 100watts of RF did to their neighbours TVs

Side slide ;)
 
Feek said:
Yes, it's 11 year cycles, have a look here.

We weren't expecting conditions to start improving for another couple of years but it's all picked up very rapidly this year, especially considering last year was so flat.

For Es you're normally looking at the beginning of the summer for peak conditions but it really does vary from day to day. 28MHz was steaming last night but it's absolutely flat right now. I keep a check on the maximum usable frequency here. Yesterday evening most of Europe was showing green and that reached the east coast of the USA as well. I like it when that map glows red as it means there's likely to be sporadic E up to 144MHz and working Spain, Italy and Portugal on 144MHz (which really is VHF) is incredible :) (but I'm drifting OT).
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I wish I still had my 2m rig still although the 10W for the amateur licence isn't great. I take it listening out on HF is really good at the moment too?

I used to listen to Shanwick, Gander etc but haven't even an HF box anymore.
 
i remember the good old cb days.

i used to be able to talk to people in America on the low channels with my heavily modded cb and boot's.

i had a cobra radio had a mike that stood on its own like the one's they had in the 60's with also a echo chamber.

my rig was the best there was for 100 miles back in the day.
 
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Greebo said:
And why pray tell? It was a heavily modified cb and did indeed have ssb. The guy had modified some of the switches for it.

There were some electronic geeks around then. ;)
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And i was one of those geeks :P but there is no way you got ssb into a 4001 . there were a few versions of midlands . the original am one then the newer fm one . and adding channels/roger bleeps and all sorts of mods but there was never a add on board or mod you could do to make a straigh fm or am rig have ssb . sorry

There was a midland 79-290 that had ssb ( new didgital radio ) . the old school 885 home base midland with ssb . But it just want really possible to fit ssb to any degree into a 4001 .

Persil
 
Persil said:
And i was one of those geeks :P but there is no way you got ssb into a 4001 . there were a few versions of midlands . the original am one then the newer fm one . and adding channels/roger bleeps and all sorts of mods but there was never a add on board or mod you could do to make a straigh fm or am rig have ssb . sorry

There was a midland 79-290 that had ssb ( new didgital radio ) . the old school 885 home base midland with ssb . But it just want really possible to fit ssb to any degree into a 4001 .

Persil
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I take on board what you say and I wasn't or still am a geek so had no idea how it was done, however my Midland did indeed have ssb as well as being upped to 8W.
 
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