[carver]

Originally Posted by soundguy

sorry.. but that's mostly incorrect!

I'm a ham operator..

DE Ke4rrd

My mobile rig is a 50w icom 12v unit mounted in my truck. I can work all over this country and beyond. ( with larger antenna ) I have a 'linear' amp as well. with skip.. no problem working stuff 'on the other side'

for cb.. if you have a clear line.. figure a rule of thumb of about 1w per mile depending on what gear the other guy has.

ps.. gear on 12v, and a charged car battery can 'work' quite a bit. 200w drain on a 12v bat is a 16ah deal. cheap walmart car battery will do that for qite a while. PLENTY of talk time. you are acting like you are gonna get 5 words out after you key up the mic... just ain't so.. BTDT got the qsl to prove it..

73's

And I've used CB radios since the '70's. Don't know that much about HAM, but there isn't a lot you can tell me about operating CB's that I don't know. I do know that the HAM radios operate on different frequencies than CB. Much cleaner frequencies! Allowing a HAM radio to talk much further than a CB using the same power. What I said was that I would need a linear on a CB to talk further than 15 - 20 miles, with the 3 watt final output. You just stated that you are running a 50 watt output on your HAM radio, and you have the advantage of using much cleaner frequencies than a CB operator would have. You also stated that you have a linear for those times you need to talk a little further! Your "rule of thumb of about 1w per mile" is correct for FIRS radios, but that isn't CB frequencies! I've shot skip, bare foot, with a CB, and 1/4 wave ground plane! So how is it that what I posted was "mostly incorrect"?