I'd be careful on that one.  Did you measure your supply UNDER LOAD, or did you just meter the end connector?  Uh huh, thats right.  Your supply probably would meter less than 12 volts under load.  Now, car alternators feed between 13 and 14 volts to the car electrical system, but if that power should spike, it may well overload your computer power system.  Remember, you can't put the electronic fog back into the electronic components!

A seventy dollar power supply is better than another $800 computer, isn't it?

 

"The ARRL can take the word of a trusted volunteer organization (trust and verfity). If the Red Cross doesn't keep its word then there may be an issue. Does the ARRL presume that the RC is not trust worthy? Or is the ARRL is trying to badger the RC just the way it does the FCC and every other group that it doesn't agree with?"

The point you are missing is that even though the Red Cross may not get anything more than a criminal background check from this MBC, MBC itself WILL get the entire check done, and it is stated right on the permnissiom form that -----MBC WILL RETAIN THE RIGHT TO DO WHATEVER IT SEES FIT WITH YOUR INFORMATION-----!

That means that whoever wants to pay MBC for a readout of information WILL GET ALL OF YOUR INFORMATION MBC HAS OBTAINED.

Now, I don't know about you, but the way identity theft has been rising around the country, I certainly do not want my personal information available to anyone who just has to pay a fee to get it.

Nobody has mentioned the other side of the coin--if there is something like that available, how many nutcases would apply to try to get one whether or not they needed it?

Say that the applications for those credentials that came in were so that from every 30 people there was only one who actually required credentials.  All of those application would have to be reviewed, checked and researched.  The time and money used on the other applications would be wasted--it most certainly could have been used better elsewhere.  

I think the Maine legislature did the right thing.

"It's not as hard as you think...

Let the local group build a web page with a "roster" that has name, call sign, rank, with that data....."

Oh, really?

In this area, there are numerous 'databases', that list inaccurate information--and the 'official' ones aren't right either.

I've been listed on one for the last five years, but I've stepped down from the position I am indicated to hold now for almost three.  My name is still there despite numerous requests to have it striken.

A directory without a mandated staff of people to keep it up to date is worthless.  This idea, however good it may seem to be, without that mandated staff is pretty much the same.

I wonder if anyone realizes that even though the line to your house is a twisted copper pair, a lot of the phones in moderate to heavily populated areas are on fibre from a neighborhood junction point to the central offices already.

In the northeast, those neighborhood junction points are the green cabinets (about 4 ft by 3 ft) you may see in areas, or a raised concrete pad with aluminum doors on top (an underground concrete box/room) in less heavily travelled areas.

The central office may have power lines to that box as well as fibre, but there may be backup batteries there if the power lines come from a local feed instead.

In this area, the cable company puts a modem in when you have phone by cable, that modem is powered from the cable itself--there is no outage when the power fails.

I agree that deregulation fowled a lot of things up, but the picture is not as bad as some of you make it out to be.

You can also make your own packs with one or two 12 volt gel cells available from used battery back up systems that are common as mud in some offices, or from commercial radio dealers that service cell phone sites when they replace the back up batteries at those sites.  Those dealers usually have to pay to get rid of the old batteries, and you sometimes can have them for the asking.

Get a battery carrier bin used to hold wet cell batteries, wire it up and put on the connectors you want, and you have your power supply.

I think you're all missing the reasoning behind the WILDERNESS protocol--a means of communications where there are no stations around, a situation less common as times go by and the population grows.  It is really not meant to be used around populated areas with the exception of the LiTZ tone section of the protocol.

If there are enough hams on the frequency, the person who would use the protocol would have no trouble getting someone to answer if they did a LiTZ call, now would they--and at any time, not necessarily on the hour.

As someone else said, this is making a mountain out of a molehill--you're missing the meaning and purpose of the wilderness protocol.

An earlier post--

Drill Sgt: "Son, you can't get up in the morning and walk across that parking lot without breaking some sort of regulation. Don't worry about it, just don't do anything stupid."

Common sense at last.  I too am a gun owner and licensed for self protection.  Since I am no longer a private cop (security guard) I feel I no longer need to carry--the only time I do lately is when I go to the range to practice.  If I'm called up, I DO NOT take a weapon--the professional LEOs have to, but I do not.

If you are in a situation where you may be threatened, get a LEO to go along--or DON'T GO.  Simple enough--and smarter too.

K2GW is absolutely right (on the bottom of the second responce page)--the purpose of this law is to prevent confiscation of firearms in an area where there is a state of emergency--not to provide first responders carte blanche to carry firearms in that area.

It is interesting to see how laws meant for one thing can be twisted to by some to try to cover something different--and how some armchair lawyers will insist that the law WILL cover that difference.

Going from 12 volts DC to 120 volts AC and back down to around 18 volts (??) for the laptop will eat up battery time fast considering conversion inefficiency and loss.  

I would second the airline/auto laptop power supply--decent universal supplies such as those are available at some office supply stores for under a hundred bucks--less than the cost of a second AGM battery--if you were considering that.

Newer vehicles are chock full of computers and sensors that feed them.  Computers generate RF while in use.  A properly installed radio will not interfere with the functioning of the electronics in todays cars--usually.  However there are always exceptions.

For example, I've just run across a bullitin warning the drivers of a couple of Nissans top of the line model not to put their "electronic" key--used to open and start the car--on or near their cell phones because of potential damage to those "keys".

K0BG has a lot of info on his website, I believe its K0BG.com, that may help you.  Hope this helps.

Even though some people swear by the ASTRON line, when you buy one of them you're paying extra for six letters -- A-S-T-R-O-N.

The Astron line is good, the housings are made to look very well--if you plan on showing them off.  The Pyramid line is more spartan, Pyramid doesn't charge for the nice looking cabinet--except for the flashy paint job on some of their units, and that's why Pyramid supplies cost less.

Astron supplies are marketed more to the general users while Pyramid supplies are marketed more toward the professional--audio shops, merchandising jobbers, and so on.  Both are good supplies.  Neither one is better--or worse--than the other.

You should be fine--even with both rigs on.  The total draw for both rigs--one transmitting and one receiving--should be about twenty five amps at most, and that is well within the rule of thumb useage level for power supplies.  This rule of thumb is not to draw more than about 75 to 80 per cent of a supplys rated power output--that way it isn't overworked and prone to failure.

Go to it and have fun!  73!

Pyramid supplies are good supplies, but are manufactered by a company who specializes in car audio equipment.  These supplies (in a simplified form) power the audio displays found in a lot large department store auto sections.

However, just because they aren't made especially for ham equipment does not mean they aren't a good supply--I have a Pyramid supply that I use to power my shack radios, and that supply has been going strong now for about ten years.

Like any supply, don't run it continuously at its rated output level, try to keep it at about 75 per cent level and it will last many years.

"1A thru the first 10 ohm resistor is 10W. 1A thru the second 10 ohm resistance is another 10W. 10W + 10W = 20W or 1A thru 20 ohms is 20W."

That would be true if the resistors were in parallel, but in series it is not.  In a series circuit, in effect you have a 20 ohm 1 watt resistor, not a 20 ohm 2 watt resistor.  In a parallel circuit you would have a 5 ohm 2 watt resistor.  

Sorry Bob, but you're not right.  In a series circuit the wattage rating is always limited to the lowest rated device because ALL the power passes through that device.  In a parallel circuit it is a total of the rated wattage of each device because the power is split among the devices.