At the recent ARRL board meeting, the HF Band Plan Committee submitted its final recommendation. A couple of days ago, a friend of mine emailed me about it:
Seen the new proposal? I’m not seeing much chatter about it which seems weird. Of course, in typical ARRL fashion when they want to slide it by with little protest they keep it on the down low. The news item has been up for a week – no chatter. Seeing anything online?
I haven’t seen much aside from this Reddit post. Thinking that this was mostly about new Tech privileges, I replied:
This has been in the works for more than two years now:
- ARRL requests expanded HF privileges for Technician licensees
- Please comment on new Tech HF privileges by April 13
- Tweeting about the new Tech privileges proposal
As I recall, I didn’t really think much about this one way or the other. I’m not sure that these privileges are enough to get many Techs on HF, but I could be wrong. What do you think?
To which, he replied:
I think it will probably squelch upgrades from Tech. It may be a longer term goal of the ARRL to get amateur radio licensing down to just two classes – maybe even a single class someday?
I generally support the league but hate whenever they mess with licensing and band planning. It’s like New Coke – things are working well and they still feel the need to fix it. And I especially don’t like when they go into sneaky mode. This proposal was buried in BoD notes and has had no front ARRL page news attention (or did I miss it?). Even more, I’m surprised there isn’t already a long hate thread on reddit or QRZ.com.
This perpetual notion that there must be something wrong with ham radio therefore we must fix it has gotten terribly old to me after 44 years of it…
I sympathize with his views on what seems like a lack of transparency, but the Band Plan Committee did ask for input on this back in February. It seems like they’re being a little secretive about this now, but only because the minutes of the July board meeting haven’t been released yet. I think that’s because there’s still some unfinished business.
As far as the ARRL continually messing around with ham radio, I think it’s inevitable. As Heraclitus is purported to have said around 500 BCE, “change is the only constant in life.” Likewise, amateur radio is going to change whether we like it or not. The question really comes down to whether these changes are going to be beneficial or not.
Something similar is happening here in Ann Arbor, actually. Beginning in about 2000, a group of people took control of city government and began pushing the city in ways that have irrevocably changed the nature of the town. Instead of being a sleepy college town, this group has pushed for denser development, more mass transit, and “affordable housing” (whatever that is). The latest is that they’re pushing for yet another millage to allow the city to implement a “carbon zero” environmental policy. Many long-term residents, like myself, are not really on board with some of these initiatives.
We think that while some of these things sound good in meetings and on paper (screens?), we don’t think the mayor and his faction on city council have really thought through all the consequences of their actions. I think the net result is going to be even more inequality as raising taxes is going to speed the exodus of people like me who can probably afford the added taxes, but would rather not pay them. 35 years ago—when I moved to Ann Arbor—the taxes were high, but it was worth it because we had pretty good city services, and it was a fun place to live. Now, the taxes are even higher, there are fewer city services (for example, the city no longer has a special leaf pickup in the fall), and a more dense population means more aggravating traffic (despite the thought that a denser population will mean more people will take public transportation and use cars less).
A more cynical person might say that they’re doing this on purpose to force people like me out of Ann Arbor. I think they’re just misguided.
Getting back to amateur radio, though, what the ARRL is trying to do with this band plan is two things:
- Make space for more WinLink (ACDS stations).
- Get more Techs on HF, with the thought that they will engage more with “mainstream” amateur radio and thereby have an incentive to upgrade to General and then Extra.
I’m not sure that attempting to do both of these things in one fell swoop is the greatest idea, but doing it in two steps would be a lot more work. As for objective #1, I think that blocking off a portion of the band for ACDS operation is probably the right thing to do. I’m no expert on that, though. I do think it’s inevitable that this type of operation is going to be more commonplace, be it WinLink or some other system.
As for objective #2, I agree with my friend that I think it’s a disincentive for Techs to upgrade to General. Why bother upgrading if all they’re doing to do is work FT8? Like our city government, I don’t think the band plan committee and entry-level license committee have completely thought through the consequences of their actions. In blog post two years ago this proposal is called, ironically, “disincentive licensing.”
Seriously, I’d like to know exactly how the Entry Level License Committee came up with this recommendation. I believe I asked this question a couple years ago when they submitted their recommendations, but never did get a good answer. Did they call up some Techs and ask them what it would take for them to get more engaged in amateur radio and upgrade, or did they simply pull this idea out of thin air?
In an online discussion of the changes occurring in Ann Arbor, I noted that change is inevitable, but some changes are for the good, while others are not so good. The same thing is true in amateur radio. I’m not sure that reducing the incentives to upgrade is the right thing to do, and unfortunately, once you’ve increased privileges, it’s nearly impossible to take them away. If it doesn’t work out, then we’re pretty much stuck with it.
About expanding the Tek privileges, I’m OK with it. Upgrading to General isn’t really that hard, and so I’m not really *for* this change, but I’m OK with it.
Of course, this things could go horribly wrong; changes always carry that risk. But the expansions are only into the top half of the General voice allocations on 80, 40 (slightly more here), and 15m, and into some of the same bands’ data allocations. There’s plenty of room to go down-band if the worst happens. But I expect that the worst won’t happen. I think what will happen is that many Techs will try out HF and then want all the rest of it. That’s a good incentive to upgrade to General.
For more incentive to upgrade, there won’t be any Tech privileges on 20m. That’s huge. In a lot of ways, it’s at 20m that things get really interesting, especially if someone’s into contesting. I think that’ll pull a lot of HF Techs along into General.
The existing CW HF allocations for Techs were a good idea, in that they gave just a little taste of HF. I don’t think they went far enough though. For most people, it’s easer to just study up for General than to learn CW, so they weren’t the draw we need. Adding a few slices of voice and data though, I think that may be enough to encourage things along.
Not being a winlink user yet, I’ll pass on commenting on that part of the change.
But yeah, I’m OK with it. Upgrading to General really isn’t that hard, so this change isn’t needed, but it’s not a terrible idea either.
So this is the ARRL response, years later, to their incentive licensing fiasco! I’m opposed. Frankly, the general just ain’t that hard To pass any more. . You want more privileges, put some skin in the game and study!
Present Technician class is a waste of efforts and most of them never upgrade. I support the idea to increase privileges for the initial level.
Imagine as a non-ham you buy the books and study and pass the test, realizing you are not allowed much on the airwaves. You have to buy another set of books and study and test again. What a waste of time and money for the beginner!
My proposal is to follow the rest of the world with max two license classes. So eliminate the Technician class and make General a little easier maybe with some adjustment of privileges.
With the present system the increase in privileges between General and Extra are relatively small, but the efforts are much larger.
I think it’s great. I’m studying for my General now simple because the 10m and 6m bands are dead and I’m tried of just listening in other other bands. Opening up some more bands for Techs may be an incentive to some Techs to upgrade by allowing them to get more involved. It certainly wont stop me from going for General because it will open up even more bands for me to use.
When will these changes take effect?
If I understand the new band plan correctly, it confines any “wideband” data (defined as larger than 500 Hz) into specific sub-bands. This was meant for Winlink, but I believe it captures the 1000 Hz Olivia and Contestia sub-modes and who knows what else.
The existing HF privileges for techs give them no incentive to invest in HF equipment to speak of. Except for a tiny snippet of 10M, current HF privileges for techs require learning that most obsolete of communications formats: Morse Code, and is therefore closed to people who can’t get the hang of it – I’ve been trying on and off for over 50 years, and I can’t get it. I passed the general written a year or so after I got my tech, but have never managed Morse at over 2-3WPM, so I didn’t get around to upgrading ’til 2016, and went to Extra Class. At the very least Techs need to have narrow band digital privileges on some HF bands.
I agree that the current HF Tech privileges give them no incentive to invest in HF gear, but the whole point of incentive licensing was to get Techs to upgrade to General, not to get them to buy HF gear. From that point of view, this proposal is a disincentive. Why upgrade if they already have privileges?
>> Why upgrade if they already have privileges?
Dan, I think that the draw of getting on 160, 60, 30, 30, 20, 17, and 12m is going to be a strong incentive to upgrade for a lot of Techs. 80, 40, and 15m are a nice first taste, but these limited privileges aren’t going to be enough for a many new operators who are wondering about those other “forbidden” bands on that new HF radio. Already having the gear is going to be a strong pull too.
The more I think about this plan, the more I like it. Maybe the old plan’s jump from Tech to General was too big a rung spacing on the ladder. There are certainly a lot of people who get to Tech and stall out there. This new band plan may get a sizable number of them moving again. I sure hope so.
Time will tell, but you’re more optimistic than I am.
God help us all!
Sirs,
I know this blog post is a few years old, but I wonder if anyone can tell me if there is there a good, or recommended place for Winlink stations on 6m where a 2300 Hz bandwidth is acceptable?
I would contact the ARRL or Winlink Global about this, Paul.