Dial Dancing

DIAL DANCING

TALES OF THE FASCINATING, FABULOUS, FREQUENCY-HOPPING, WAVELENGTH-WALKING, POWER PUNCHING, IONOSPHERE-SCORCHING, DITTING AND DAHING, DIGITAL DABBLING AND GLORIOUS GLOBE-SPANNING WIDE AND WONDERFUL WORLD OF AMATEUR RADIO

BY DON KEITH N4KC

EP

ERIN PRESS

INDIAN SPRINGS VILLAGE, ALABAMA

© 2017 by Don Keith

All rights reserved. Other than brief excerpts for review purposes, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the express written consent of the copyright holder.

The author enthusiastically encourages amateur radio clubs to request permission to reprint articles from this book or others written by the author in club newsletters or on club web sites. Permission is willingly granted when requested via the email address below.

For re-print permission, interview or review copy requests, comments, questions, subsidiary rights inquiries, or other correspondence, please contact the author via email at [email protected]

Contact the publisher at:

ERIN PRESS

40 Red Stick Road

Indian Springs Village, AL 35124

Other books by Don Keith

The Forever Season

Wizard of the Wind

The Rolling Thunder Stockcar Racing Series (with Kent Wright)

Final Bearing (with George Wallace)

Gallant Lady (with Ken Henry)

In the Course of Duty

The Bear: The Legendary Life of Coach Paul Bear Bryant

Final Patrol

The Ice Diaries (with Captain William R. Anderson)

War Beneath the Waves

We Be Big (with Rick Burgess and Bill Bubba Bussey)

Undersea Warrior

Firing Point (with George Wallace)

The Spin

On the Road to Kingdom Come

Riding the Shortwaves: Exploring the Magic of Amateur Radio

Dangerous Grounds (with George Wallace)

Get on the Air…Now!

Writing to be Read

Untold Millions

The Amateur Radio Dictionary

The Ship that Wouldn’t Die

Mattie C.’s Boy: The Shelley Stewart Story

Dream On: A Journey to Deliverance (with Steve Skipper)

The Indestructible Man (with David Rocco)

Writing with Edie Hand:

The Last Christmas Ride

The Soldier’s Ride

A Christmas Ride: The Miracle of the Lights

Visit www.donkeith.com or www.N4KC.com

CONTENTS

What this Book is…and Ain’t

Someday

The Amazing Disappearing Antenna

The Antenna Party

The Boneyard

Using 3000-year-old Oriental Concepts to Enhance Your Station’s Performance

The SOS Trail

The One-hundred-country Challenge

A Dark and Stormy Night

You Don’t Look Like You are Supposed to Look

The Roundtable

About the Author

WHAT THIS BOOK IS…AND AIN’T

Amateur radio is now a hobby more than one-hundred years old. But believe me when I assure you that it is just as vibrant, just as educational, just as ground-breaking and, yes, just as much fun as it ever has been. Do not listen to what your friends say. The smart phone and social media have NOT rendered ham radio passé or outdated. The hobby is NOT your funny uncle with his dusty radio gear in the basement messing up the TVs for blocks around.

No, it is far more, and that is one aim of this book, to show you some of the ways the hobby has evolved.

In its very early days, it was the wild, wild west. Anyone with the desire could begin sending a radio signal out using a crudely built and, honestly, very dangerous device called a spark gap transmitter. The signal that thing emitted sounded like a cat working hard at its scratching post or someone trying to demolish a piece of sandpaper.

But it was fun. And actually completing communications employing such a rudimentary bit of technology created a tremendous sense of accomplishment for its operator, as well as those who received and understood his transmissions at some distant point. Maybe even several miles away!

It was magic!

It still is!

Never mind that those early radio nuts were the inventors and developers of something vitally important, something we all take for granted today. That includes things you may have heard of like broadcasting, communications satellites, television, cellular telephones, WIFI, Bluetooth or other current technology that uses radio frequencies to work. And the technology that those spark-riding, skywave-bouncing cowboys invented on the fly in their basements and barns across the world is what makes our lives better and more interesting today.

When the Titanic encountered that unfortunate iceberg in April of 1912, and when the mess that was the radio spectrum possibly prevented earlier rescue assistance to the doomed vessel and her passengers, the world’s governments realized it was time to do some regulation of electromagnetic emissions. Thankfully for those of us who love the hobby, amateur radio was allowed to continue to exist, still allowing hobbyists and experimenters access to a part of that precious spectrum.

Oh, that portion of the radio frequencies to which those early hams were relegated was considered by most scientists, engineers and regulators to be worthless real estate. Wavelengths where any sort of communications would be so very limited that those spark-brained yahoo hams could do no real damage. Yes, even though hams were responsible for the development of radio in the first place, those early experimenters were promptly and unceremoniously exiled to emit and capture radio energy only above 200 meters, where most communications were impossible. Or so they thought.

You see, today that hopeless range of spectrum with which we ended up includes allocations for FM radio, television, your smart phone, and just about every other type of modern wireless communications. Once again, it was the ham radio operators who showed the world that this swath of frequencies was not only worthwhile but offered all sorts of possibilities for expansion of services and technology.

Once again, there is good news for us, though. Even after we showed the early regulators that we could make all that spectrum valuable, we hams still managed to hang onto a generous bunch of bands from way down below the current AM radio commercial band—below 550 kilohertz—all the way up into the microwave region.

And let me tell you, we make good use of those allocations!

Whether it is assisting with communications in a natural disaster, helping with civic events like charity runs and bicycle races, experimenting with new and exciting communications modes, antennas and circuits, competing with each other in what we colorfully call radiosport, providing a fascinating pastime for the very young, elderly or physically challenged, or just fostering local and international goodwill with casual conversation day and night, the hobby continues to give back, to justify those bands.

And to blaze new and exhilarating trails.

Amateur radio is one of the few hobbies that requires a licensing examination and is under the watch of a big, old bureaucratic federal agency. The hobby as we know it today is overseen by the Federal Communications Commission.

That exam should not scare anyone away, though. And neither should having to exist under the purview of some huge government entity. Kids as young as six years old have passed the licensing examinations. And so long as operators follow basic rules and regulations, there will be no interaction with the FCC beyond obtaining and—every ten years—renewing that license. But even the examination is administered by a bunch of friendly, local amateur radio operators who are excited for you when you pass and helpful and encouraging if you are not successful that first try.

Since the very beginning and until only a few years ago, those wishing to obtain an amateur radio license were required to demonstrate ability to send and receive messages in Morse code. Not anymore. Though many hams still use and enjoy the dots and dashes, it is no longer required that you know a single character in order to get your license.

Let’s be clear here. Obtaining the license, putting together a station, getting up some kind of workable antenna, knowing what to do on the air, and figuring out which of the various aspects of the hobby might be of interest to you are all beyond the scope of this book. What you are holding in your hands or scanning on your e-book reader right now is a set of short stories—fiction created by this story-teller—that, I hope, illustrate some of the magic of the hobby of amateur radio and just how interesting the folks in it are. Some of the stories are serious, some are silly, but if I hit my mark, all are entertaining and will help convince you that it is worth your time to take a fling at this fascinating pastime. Or dig deeper into it if you are already licensed.

Or, if you are an old hand, give you a different but enjoyable look at a diversion you will love. It also offer you an inexpensive book you can pass along to someone else who might take the bait.

If you are still among the great mass not yet washed in the righteous waters of ham radio, or if you have so far only dipped your toe in those enchanted waves, I highly encourage you to visit the web site of the American Radio Relay League, our national organization, at www.arrl.org. It offers a wealth of information on what it takes, what you can do, and why it is worth your effort. You will be amazed and intrigued by the width and depth of it all and the wide array of people who are involved regularly.

You can always visit our good friend Mr. Google and do a quick search for amateur radio or ham radio (why we are called hams is an interesting enough bit of reading itself!) to find myriad sources, articles, videos, and more on the subject. Most are interesting, many are helpful, some are terrible, a few are even negative, but that, my friend, is the nature of the Internet.

To be completely self-serving, you may even want to try my books I have written about the hobby.

Riding the Shortwaves: Exploring the Magic of Amateur Radio is one guy’s (me) love sonnet to the hobby. Not only has it given me years of satisfaction, accomplishment and fun, but it also led to a long career in broadcasting and advertising.

I keep hearing people, including many hams, claiming that amateur radio is old-fashioned, that smart phones, Twitter and other social media make it obsolete. Young folks have their Instagram and their video games and will never be interested in ancient technology like radio.

Absolutely not true! Apples and oranges, I decry!

Ham radio is more vibrant and relevant than ever. And more popular, too. And this book tells you why. I do my best to show you the magic that infected all of us who are active in radio and hope that you catch the bug, too. And if you are already infected, I try to give you some ideas for explaining the magnetic attraction of our wonderful hobby to those not yet pulled into the circuit. Yes, pun intended.

And yes, I am evangelistic in the book. Guilty as charged. But I do not want anyone who might enjoy this hobby as much as I have to miss out because of false impressions promulgated by those who have no idea what they are talking about.

The second book has a little different slant. Through the years, I have encountered many people who became interested in obtainng a license and getting on the air but never followed through. And many others who went to the trouble to get a license but never dove deeper into the hobby, and possibly became inactive or allowed their hard-earned ticket to lapse. Why?

Truth is, amateur radio is not necessarily for everybody. I am perfectly aware that some folks simply will not take to it, or that it is not exactly what they thought it was and drop to the wayside. But I suspected that many who remained on the periphery did so not because they did not want to get deeper into it but because of real or perceived obstacles that prevented them from ever getting the most from ham radio.

Being a data guy, I eventually narrowed the answer down to about five typical reasons that kept popping up in conversation. They are:

-Not knowing how to put a station together, or at least one that might offer them a satisfying on-the-air experience.

-The fear and hassle of putting up some kind of outdoor antenna, and especially in these days of restrictive deed covenants and home-owner association rules.

-Not knowing what to say or how to act on the airwaves once they were putting out a signal that could be heard around the planet, across borders, through walls.

-Not sure about exactly what types of activities they might be able to pursue. This one is especially true of those who got into the hobby primarily for weather-spotting or other types of disaster communications. Those are both admirable reasons for getting a ham ticket, but only a couple of the tremendous number of things you can do with your radio(s) and a valid license to use it (them).

-The jargon. Any pastime as old as amateur radio will have developed its