Great colleen, nice to meet another NTS operator.  Have been involved in
traffic handling since the 60's and handled all sorts of health and welfare
traffic for various floods throughout the world including the Mexican
Earthquake, the Johnstown flood in PA etc.  Remember the good old days in
traffic handling when there was a lot of it. 73,  


Barb K1EIR

-----Original Message-----
From: For blind ham radio operators [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of COLLEEN ROTH
Sent: Monday, August 20, 2012 2:31 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: diversity of ham radio as a hobby

Hi,
I would probably be called an Appliance Operator. I don't build things, I
don't figure out antenna formulas, I don't do any soldering. I do not do
contesting, and I don't use Echolink. I do encourage NTS Traffic Handling, I
do participate in Emergency Communications including Skywarn, Amateur Radio
Drills and am also a Member of Navy Marine Corps Mars. I am a Net Control
for the OHIO Single Sideband Net, I am also Net Manager for our local Ares
Traffic and Training Net in Northwest Ohio.
I know enough to know if I need to get someone to help when equipment is
functioning well.
We each have our niche.
Colleen Roth, N8TNV;



----- Original Message -----
From: Ronald E. Milliman <[log in to unmask]>
To:  [log in to unmask]
Date: Sunday, Aug 19, 2012 02:36:20 PM
Subject: diversity of ham radio as a hobby

>
>
> One of the really great things about ham radio as a hobby is its
diversity.
>  That is, there is something in it for everyone.  Over my 55 years in 
> ham radio, I have enjoyed at different times about every aspect of the 
> hobby, from Rag chewing on the 75 meter phone band, initially using a 
> DX-40 on A-M, to stepping up to SSB using a Central Labs 10A barefoot, 
> to chasing DX on all bands running QRP up to 1500 PEP with an Alpha 
> linear, from HF to VHF and operating field day and contests, Working 
> All States and then, earning the DXCC.  I have built several pieces of 
> gear from scratch using my own design to building kits from Heath Kit 
> and Globe when they were still in business marketing ham gear.  I 
> especially enjoyed designing and building all types of antennas.  It 
> has been fun meeting people at hamfests that you have QSO's with for a 
> long time but never met in person.  I've burned my fingers lots of 
> times using the soldering gun while building equipment, and you learn 
> really fast that you can never have too much saliva on your fingers 
> when soldering connections.  I've had my share of failures, burned up 
> rigs, and antennas that I could never make resonate for some reason.  
> Speaking of math, I've found it necessary to use lots of math when 
> designing gear, figuring out the right values of parts that were 
> needed for specific tasks, and I have often used the Pythagorean 
> Theorem to compute how high my tower or the center of my antenna 
> needed to be.  So, my point is that there is something in it for 
> everyone, and over time, you will probably do like I have done and find
different aspects of the hobby appealing to you at different times of your
life.
> 
> My newest adventure is to figure out how to use Echolink and play 
> around with it.  Why?  Simply because it is just another aspect of the 
> hobby to check out.  No, it isn't ham radio in the traditional sense, 
> but then, using repeaters was very controversial when hams first 
> started using them too believe it or not.  When SideBand first showed 
> up on the ham bands in the form of double sideband, it was so 
> controversial that it put the hobby into a war, literally, a war between
the comAM'ers and the sidebanders.
> Double sideband didn't last very long because developers quickly 
> figured out how to filter out and suppress the unwanted sideband, 
> either the upper sideband or the lower sideband, depending on which 
> band you were on.  There has always been some sort of controversy; 
> perhaps the most recent is the debate over dropping the code 
> requirements and in some ham's views, dummying down the ham exams.  
> I'll have to admit to you that it was much more challenging for me to 
> take the General license exam back in 1958 when I had to draw out all 
> of the diagrams and schematics.  Since I couldn't see well enough to 
> draw them myself, it was even more challenging to try to describe them 
> to someone and have them draw them well enough so the FCC Examiner 
> could understand it.  To be perfectly honest with you, the Extra Class 
> exam that I took at the end of the 1990's was actually easier in many
respects than the General Class exam I took in 1958.
> 
> I'm sharing all of this with you to encourage all of us to respect all 
> the different aspects of ham radio and the hams that enjoy all of 
> these various parts of the hobby.  I've heard some hams called 
> "appliance operators," and admittedly, I've used the term at times in 
> the past, but some people just don't have the interest in being ham 
> techno-geeks like some of the rest of us might be.  So, there is a place
for all of us.
> 
> Ron, AC4HM
>   
> 
>