There is nothing in the rules that says ham radio audio has to sound tinny, scratchy and irritating like what you hear coming out of the space shuttle. Anyone who takes pride in his station would value good sounding audio as much as he would a strong signal report.

The hash is coming from Ethiopia.  They are jamming The Voice of the Broad Masses of Eritrea, which broadcasts in the supposedly broadcast-free portion of 40m, starting at 0300 GMT. Their strongest and most consistently-used frequency is 7175, but additional frequencies include 7165, 7130, 7120, 7185, 7195 and probably others. They usually simulcast on 2 or 3 of the above frequencies, and sometimes hop around to dodge the Ethiopian jamming.  I have heard them play a cat-and-mouse  game by hopping amongst the above frequencies, only to have the jammers follow them within minutes of QSYing. At times I have heard another Ethiopian sounding BC station zero beat the carrier, and then the hash come on top of that, so you have two broadcast stations zero beat with each other plus the noise. The Eritrea  station also  transmits a different program on 7205, but I have never heard the jamming stations bother them on that frequency, although the jamming has been heard centred on 7220.

The broadcast from Eritrea can be positively identified by listening just a few minutes before sign-on at 0300Z to the interval signal, which is the sound of strumming on a guitar, broken up with announcements in the local language.  The sound of the interval signal can be verified at http://www.intervalsignals.net/ (the site is down right now, but they promise to be back up in a few days). Find Eritrea on the list, and click on the link to hear an audio clip of the interval signal.

The jamming usually starts up at about 0400 GMT and continues for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. I suspect it  disappears when propagation to  that part of the world goes out as they move into daylight (Ethiopia is 3 hours ahead of GMT, so at 0600 - midnight CST - it is 9 AM in Ethiopia.)

I read a report somewhere recently that China had furnished 4 jamming transmitters to Ethiopia.  Although the targeted broadcaster occupies only about 10 kHz of spectrum, each white-noise jamming signal is usually more than 20 kHz wide. When all 4 jammers are running simultaneously, they pretty well render the entire supposedly broadcast-free segment of 40m useless in N America.

I first noticed this noise right after the broadcast stations first vacated 7.1-7.2, but it had probably already been there for a long time, masked by stronger broadcast signals coming in from Europe.http://www.iaru-r1.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=308:radio-ethiopia-which-is-jamming-voice-of-broad-masses-from-eritrea&catid=39:iarums&Itemid=87

Since satellite dishes are permitted by federal law by default, why not mount a small dish on top of a vertical mast, and use the mast as vertical antenna, with the dish serving as a top-hat for loading?  I wouldn't think the ground radials would even be relevant to the case, or did they go so far as to write rules about what you can bury under the sod (would they go round prodding people's lawns in search for buried wires)?

You can pick up second-hand parabolic dishes for use with satellite reception at flea markets for a few bucks.  I have even seen them lying in dumpsters free for the taking at the local landfill's "convenience" station. It wouldn't be anyone's business whether the dish actually was in active service for internet or TV reception.

If you live on a HOA-controlled property, you are not really a home owner; you are a tenant!

The signal on 7110 is Radio Ethiopia.  They transmit from 0300Z until 2100Z.  At least they stay within that wasteland between 7100 and 7125, where US phone stations are not allowed by FCC rules but very CW/data stations are ever heard operating.

More troublesome is the Voice of the Broad Masses of Eritrea.  They fire up at 0400Z on 7175, and at that same time, another Ethiopian or Eritrean broadcaster starts up on 7165.  Almost immediately, white noise jamming starts up on top of the station on 7175, so they QSY to 7165, zero beat with the other BC station.  The white noise then follows them to 65. There may be two broadcasters on the same frequency with the white noise jamming on top of them.  Sometimes they play this cat and mouse game all evening, until fade-out sometime after 0600Z.  This can be very disruptive all the way from 7155 to 7185. A few times I have heard a white noise jammer on both frequencies simultaneously.  When that happens, much of the supposedly broadcast-free spectrum between 7125 and 7200 becomes useless.

This noise is jamming.  It is not DRM or digital SSTV as many believe.

If they would only QSY all this garbage to 7100-7125, at least they wouldn't bother anyone much, at least in N. America.  After a full year, it is obvious they don't plan to abide by the new allocations and vacate 7100-7200.

Don k4kyv

"by W6MAZ on November 22, 2009     
A guy in my club cannot use 20m because of his neighbor's new AT&T digital entertainment package. He wipes it out on transmit with anything over a few watts."

That should have read that "the neighbour cannot use his new AT&T digital entertainment package because the ham next door wipes it out on  transmit with anything over a few watts, and AT&T refuses to fix it". The ham was there first, and the AT&T system is acting like a radio receiver when it is not supposed to, so the neighbour should take it up with AT&T to fix the problem. That's whose  responsibility it is. The ham should politely "co-operate, but OPERATE". If the ham community keeps on caving in to these jerks, soon we won't be able to operate ANYWHERE.

Our greatest threat is not that commercial interests will take our bands away (at least on HF) at the next WARC, although we must always keep our eyes open for any such indications; our greatest concern at the moment has to be the proliferation of cheap, poorly designed consumer products and other technology that unnecessarily pollutes the HF spectrum with buzzies and hash, and which also malfunction in the presence of LEGAL rf fields emanating from LICENSED stations.  Just a few examples include BPL, the new digital/LED traffic signals, plasma TV's, touch lamps, HomePlug/U-verse and other gadgets, and whatever new product came on the market this morning to spew additional trash in our bands.

The latest one I have heard about causes RFI all over the CW portion of 40m. It sounds like a buzz saw, with many sidebands +/- 10 KHz. The signal was reportedly 20 dB over S9, and the problem was found to be about a block away: An Ooma phone hub VOIP phone. People buy these for $250 and get free phone calls over the net. It's just the hub - you plug a phone into it. You also plug it into your residential telephone wiring (after disconnecting from the local carrier), so you can use other jacks.
 
The unit is always oscillating. Most of the energy radiates from the unit via the wall jack, which is what you use to access your house wiring system, and also makes a nice antenna. The oscillation frequency  is stable. If you unplug the wall jack, it will only radiate 2-3 feet.
 
It is high time that hams, swl's and other users of the HF spectrum began to raise holy hell over these companies' lack of cooperation and the FCC's refusal to to their job enforcing rules already on the books.

I have noticed that a lot of stuff like power tools and computer peripherals now have what looks like a little cylindrical shaped toroidal noise suppressor on the power cord or computer cable, so it appears that some manufacturers are at least making a stab at dealing with the problem. How difficult or how expensive would it be for the makers of the Ooma garbage to insert a simple rf filter in the cord or plug that goes into the telephone wall jack, or for AT&T's U-Verse provider to run fibre optic cable all the way to the customer's house right up to the phone, internet and TV jack?

There are over 600,000 licensed hams in the US.  If 600K people would start bitching and complaining, and loudly, congress, the FCC and the manufacturers might take notice.  There were probably fewer than 600,000 people nationwide raising hell, rightly or wrongly, at this summer's town hall meetings, and look what that produced.

If you think the MaxCom Automatic Antenna Matcher story was a riot, check out "The Seafarer’s Church of the Creator":

http://www.religionnewsblog.com/13286/estate-owner-wants-to-avoid-33000-tax-bill-by-making-home-a-church

The original MaxCom was developed by a company in Florida, run by a dude named Sonny Irons. Check out some of the 1980's era ads in 73 and CQ magazine.  The photos of Irons in the ads will speak for themselves.

It seems that Irons had a run-in with the law back in the mid 90's.  The following stories tell enough about Sonny to make it easy to understand why he feels compelled to pack heat.

http://www.browardpalmbeach.com/1998-04-23/news/sonny-s-last-stand/1

http://www.waterfront-news.us/98/06/html/speakeasy.htm

We have a few weeks to submit well-thought-out comments to the FCC on how to best accomodate everyone's interests.  It will most likely take a couple of weeks for the ARRL petition to appear in the Federal Register.  Then, after that date, there will be an additional 15 days to comment.

I am thinking along the lines that no-one should lose any pre-15 Dec privileges, but that the 3600-4000 phone privileges should remain.  There is no carved-in-stone reason that Generals and Advanced class operators have to lose access to 3600-3750 for cw, digital and other "narrowband" modes in order to allow Advanced and Extra class to have the new phone privileges just given them.  The 3750-3775 segment is already sparcely populated, so expanding the Extra phone segment by a factor of four is going to most likely leave 3600-3700 very sparcely populated compared to the rest of the phone spectrum.  There should be plenty of room to share this space on the band.  After all, Extra class operators should be capable of good amateur practice, eh?  And in at least 3600-3750, there is no compelling reason to automatically prohibit RTTY, PSK, Packet and other digital modes anywhere that AM and SSB phone are allowed.

Narrow and wide band modes already share our 1800-2000 kHz band, with minimal conflict, except perhaps during contests.  Otherwise operators in this band pretty much adhere to the established band plan.  The Canadians no longer have any subband restrictions at all, and I rarely, if ever, hear Canadian SSB stations QRM'ing the digital stuff on 3620-3635.

This would be a good compromise between complete elimination of subbands, as has been proposed by some members of the US amateur community, and the complex matrix of subbands and sub-subbands that exists in the US regulations, based on a combination of licence class and emission mode.

The links to the three filings worked for me last night, but have gone dead... and URL's are incomplete as displayed, so here is how to access the list of documents filed, as updated:


1.  Visit the FCC website at http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/ecfs/

2.   Just to the upper right of the page, under "ECFS Main Links" click on "Search for filed comments."

3.   At the top of the new page, copy and paste, or type into the "1. Proceeding" box the following:  04-140

4.   At the bottom of the page, click on the button "Retrieve Document List", and the updated filings should appear in order, beginning with the most recently filed.

Section 1.429(e) of the FCC rules provides that when a petition for reconsideration is timely filed in proper form, public notice of its filing is published in the FEDERAL REGISTER. Section 1.429(f) provides that oppositions to a petition for reconsideration may be filed within 15 days after public notice of the petition’s filing in the FEDERAL REGISTER.

All persons filing oppositions to the ARRL's Petiton for Reconsideration regarding the phone band expansion should be aware that Section 1.429 requires a printed copy of the opposition to be served on the petitioner. In the case of the League, this would be Christopher D. Imlay, General Counsel for the ARRL, at Booth, Freret, Imlay & Tepper, P.C. in Silver Spring, MD.

As of 14 December 2006,05:59 GMT, these petitions are posted on the FCC website:

http://gullfoss2.fcc.gov/prod....8711102

http://gullfoss2.fcc.gov/prod....8710734

http://gullfoss2.fcc.gov/prod....8710722


Here is the complete text of Section 1.429:  

§1.429 Petition for reconsideration.

(a) Any interested person may petition for reconsideration of a final action in a proceeding conducted under this subpart (see §§1.407 and 1.425). Where the action was taken by the Commission, the petition will be acted on by the Commission. Where action was taken by a staff official under delegated authority, the petition may be acted on by the staff official or referred to the Commission for action.

Note:

The staff has been authorized to act on rulemaking proceedings described in §1.420 and is authorized to make editorial changes in the rules (see §0.231(d)).

(b) A petition for reconsideration which relies on facts which have not previously been presented to the Commission will be granted only under the following circumstances:

(1) The facts relied on relate to events which have occurred or circumstances which have changed since the last opportunity to present them to the Commission;

(2) The facts relied on were unknown to petitioner until after his last opportunity to present them to the Commission, and he could not through the exercise of ordinary diligence have learned of the facts in question prior to such opportunity; or

(3) The Commission determines that consideration of the facts relied on is required in the public interest.

(c) The petition for reconsideration shall state with particularity the respects in which petitioner believes the action taken should be changed.

(d) The petition for reconsideration and any supplement thereto shall be filed within 30 days from the date of public notice of such action, as that date is defined in §1.4(b). No supplement to a petition for reconsideration filed after expiration of the 30 day period will be considered, except upon leave granted pursuant to a separate pleading stating the grounds for acceptance of the supplement. The petition for reconsideration shall not exceed 25 double-spaced typewritten pages. See also §1.49(f).

(e) Except as provided in §1.420(f), petitions for reconsideration need not be served on parties to the proceeding. (However, where the number of parties is relatively small, the Commission encourages the service of petitions for reconsideration and other pleadings, and agreements among parties to exchange copies of pleadings. See also §1.47(d) regarding electronic service of documents.) When a petition for reconsideration is timely filed in proper form, public notice of its filing is published in the Federal Register. The time for filing oppositions to the petition runs from the date of public notice. See §1.4(b).

(f) Oppositions to a petition for reconsideration shall be filed within 15 days after the date of public notice of the petition's filing and need be served only on the person who filed the petition.   See also §1.49(d). Oppositions shall not exceed 25 double-spaced typewritten pages. See §1.49(f).

(g) Replies to an opposition shall be filed within 10 days after the time for filing oppositions has expired and need be served only on the person who filed the opposition. Replies shall not exceed 10 double-spaced typewritten pages. See also §§1.49(d) and 1.49(f).

(h) Petitions for reconsideration, oppositions and replies shall conform to the requirements of §§1.49 and 1.52, except that they need not be verified. Except as provided in §1.420(e), an original and 11 copies shall be submitted to the Secretary, Federal Communications Commission, Washington, D.C. 20554. Parties filing in electronic form need only submit one copy.

(i) The Commission may grant the petition for reconsideration in whole or in part or may deny the petition. Its order will contain a concise statement of the reasons for the action taken. Any order disposing of a petition for reconsideration which modifies rules adopted by the original order is, to the extent of such modification, subject to reconsideration in the same manner as the original order. Except in such circumstance, a second petition for reconsideration may be dismissed by the staff as repetitious.

(j) The filing of a petition for reconsideration is not a condition precedent to judicial review of any action taken by the Commission, except where the person seeking such review was not a party to the proceeding resulting in the action or relies on questions of fact or law upon which the Commission has been afforded no opportunity to pass. Subject to the provisions of paragraph (b) of this section, such a person may qualify to seek judicial review by filing a petition for reconsideration.

(k) Without special order of the Commission, the filing of a petition for reconsideration shall not excuse any person from complying with any rule or operate in any manner to stay or postpone its enforcement. However, upon good cause shown, the Commission will stay the effective date of a rule pending a decision on a petition for reconsideration. See, however, §1.420(f).

(Secs. 4, 303, 307, 48 Stat., as amended, 1066, 1082, 1083; 47 U.S.C. 154, 303, 307)

[41 FR 1287, Jan. 7, 1976, as amended at 44 FR 5436, Jan. 26, 1979; 46 FR 18556, Mar. 25, 1981; 52 FR 49161, Dec. 30, 1987; 63 FR 24126, May 1, 1998]

www.washingtonwatchdog.org/documents/cfr/title47/part1.html#1.429


Use the link below to view the entire text of all FCC regulations.

http://www.washingtonwatchdog.org/documents/cfr/title47/index.html

View (copy the URL below and paste into your browser)

http://www.rwonline.com/reference-room/special-report/06_rw_oninionjuly1.shtml