What do you think? Is it time for a change?? …Dan
SB QST @ ARL $ARLB015
ARLB015 FCC Invites Comments on Petition to Eliminate 15 dB Gain Limit on Amateur Amplifiers
ZCZC AG15
QST de W1AW
ARRL Bulletin 15 ARLB015
From ARRL Headquarters
Newington CT April 28, 2016
To all radio amateurs
SB QST ARL ARLB015
ARLB015 FCC Invites Comments on Petition to Eliminate 15 dB Gain Limit on Amateur Amplifiers
The FCC has put on public notice and invited comments on a Petition for Rule Making (RM-11767), filed on behalf of an amateur amplifier distributor, which seeks to revise the Amateur Service rules regarding maximum permissible amplifier gain. Expert Linears America LLC of Magnolia, Texas, which distributes linears manufactured by SPE in Italy, wants the FCC to eliminate the 15 dB gain limitation on amateur amplifiers, spelled out in Part 97.317(a)(2). Expert asserts that there should be no gain limitation at all on amplifiers sold or used in the Amateur Service.
RM-11767 can be found on the web at, http://apps.fcc.gov/ecfs/comment/view?id=60001536394 .
“There is no technical or regulatory reason [that] an amplifier capable of being driven to full legal output by even a fraction of a watt should not be available to Amateur Radio operators in the United States,” Expert said in its Petition.
Expert maintains that the 15 dB gain limitation is an unneeded holdover from the days when amplifiers were less efficient and the FCC was attempting to rein in the use of Amateur Service amplifiers by Citizens Band operators. While the FCC proposed in its 2004 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Order in WT Docket 04-140 to delete the requirement that amplifiers be designed to use a minimum of 50 W of drive power and subsequently did so, it did not further discuss the 15 dB amplification limit in the subsequent Report and Order in the docket.
The R&O is in PDF format at, https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-06-149A1.pdf.
“Although no party advocated retention of the 15 dB limit, it remains in place today,” Expert pointed out in its filing. “In the intervening years, advancements in Amateur Radio transmitter technology have led to the availability of highly compact, sophisticated low-power transmitters that require more than 15 dB of amplification to achieve maximum legal power output. Therefore, Expert seeks to remove the 15 dB limit from Part 97.317 so that Amateur Radio manufacturers and distributors will not be forced to needlessly cripple their amplifiers for sale in the United States.”
Expert pointed to its Model 1.3K FA amplifier as an example of a linear “inherently capable of considerably more than 15 dB of amplification,” which would make it a suitable match for low-power transceivers now on the market having output power on the order of 10 W.
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/EX
WR2E says
The so-called “15db Rule” was originally intended to make it difficult for unlicensed persons to use ‘LINYEER’ amps on 27Mhz and ‘freeband’ frequencies. It FAILED in it’s purpose. Someone wants to run illegal power, they will find a way in spite of FCC rules. They’re rulebreakers, that’s what they do!
As it stands now, the rule is stifling state of the art tech.
I agree with the petition, get rid of the rule.
Jerry says
From a technical standpoint it makes a lot more sense to just let it be then to change the rule. 90% of all hams today are not technically inclined. Most of them, in an attempt to be louder, resorts to using amplifiers over a resonant antenna. Then to try to make themselves even louder, they crank up the microphone gain. You can’t explain to them that anything out of the pass band is just splatter and serves no purpose. I see no reason for people to use an amplifier at all, other than to overcome the noise on 75 or 160 meters. If you want to operate 75 or 160 meters, you need to have a resonant antenna, not just a G5RV and a antenna tuner + 1000 watt amplifier. Te people that does this, only succeeds in talking to other people with 1000 watt linears because they can’t hear the guys running just 100 watts and a resonant antenna.
David Ryeburn VE7EZM and AF7BZ says
That non-resonant antennas do not work well is a myth. A center-fed 1.25 wavelength antenna (sometimes called a double extended Zepp) has in its best direction about 3 dB gain over a half-wave dipole, and can be used well (but with somewhat different patterns and impedances) on many bands in addition to the one for which it was designed. Of course if you just connect a length of RG58 to it and put an antenna tuner at the bottom of the feedline to make your transmitter happy, you’ll draw the (incorrect) conclusion that non-resonant antennas work poorly.
If you build one for the 30 m band it will work not quite as well as a half-wave dipole on 80 m (but the difference will be hard to measure), and in its favored directions it will work better than a half-wave dipole on 40 m, 30 m and up. It won’t be lobey on 80, 40, or 30. On the higher bands it will get lobey but in its favored directions will have even more gain. Feed it with good open wire; if you don’t want to build that, and you don’t live in the rainy part of the world where I do, purchased ladder line will work nearly as well. You do need a good tuner and a good 1:1 current balun.