I have just had a promotional email from a radio supplier. It seems that legal CB in the UK is now 40. It going legal on 2nd November 1981.
Anyone here do CB in the day? I played with it prior to it being legal & before it really took off in the UK. It was too quiet & short range for me. SSB not being available on any of the sets back them. So I headed back to Echo Charlie.
We also used legal CB’s following it’s 1981 legalisation & with a licence. I was involved with landbased broadcasting & the offence was setting up & operating. So unless they caught you on site, you were safe. So we would set up & then monitor the transmitter site from a distance & keep in touch via CB.
I had a CB radio, a home base, a legal one with a license. It was my Son’s originally, but I took it over when he got tired of it. I made a lot of local friends through it & chatted to the truckers who came passed on the main road, it was fun. I even chatted to some celebs in taxi’s who’s driver let them use it.
I also bought a portable CB & used that a lot as well.
My handle was Equus, but as most of the CBers couldn’t pronounce that it got manged as Eggwhisk.
I met on the CB, a CBer called Horseman, he turned out to be my ex riding instructor, in the days when I had gone to the local stables & had refresher lessons, a few years before. we had some laughs about those lessons, he was a very strict instructor. I was surprised he’d remembered me.
Yes, my CB days were fun, but then the Italian skip happened & you couldn’t hear anyone properly, it was awful, I tried for another few months but it was impossible to chat properly & that’s when I gave up.
I had one when I was a teenager…it was alright for chatting to school folk and the occasional passing lorry driver, but I wanted abroad people from all over the world! I didn’t realise that you needed a huge antenna in your garden for that!
You don’t & especially not during 81/2 when the solar cycle was at it’s maximum. Even at Solar Minimum, during a summer lift, I have worked the US on the amateur Radio 10 meter band using just 5 watts & a small mobile antenna.
We have talked about this before but I have a CB radio in my car and one small, cheap hand held unit. They opened up CB UHF and increased the number of channels to 80. There is a class licence but you don’t have to apply for it (how silly is that?)
I don’t use it everyday, only when I am traveling in remote areas, it is handy to know the traffic ahead (road trains etc) or if I am traveling with other people. I have used it to order tucker at a roadhouse - they usually stick a sign up on the road 10 to 15km away giving the channel they monitor.
There is still 27Mhz HF but I don’t think that many people use it except the diehard outback travellers because of its longer range. (not really sure about this, I just see the aerials on chunky 4WDs)
Channel Name:
Frequency:
Purpose:
Frequency Spacing:
Channel 1
476.4250
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 2
476.4500
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 3
476.4750
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 4
476.5000
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 5
476.5250
Emergency Repeater Output (not an emergency channel in New Zealand)
12.5 kHz
Channel 6
476.5500
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 7
476.5750
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 8
476.6000
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 9
476.6250
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 10
476.6500
4WD Clubs or Convoys and National Parks.
12.5 kHz
Channel 11
476.6750
Call Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 12
476.7000
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 13
476.7250
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 14
476.7500
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 15
476.7750
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 16
476.8000
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 17
476.8250
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 18
476.8500
Caravanners and Campers Convoy Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 19
476.8750
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 20
476.9000
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 21
476.9250
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 22
476.9500
Telemetry and Telecommand Only (No Voice or Data)
25 kHz
Channel 23
476.9750
Telemetry and Telecommand Only (No Voice or Data)
25 kHz
Channel 24
477.0000
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 25
477.0250
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 26
477.0500
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 27
477.0750
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 28
477.1000
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 29
477.1250
Road Safety Channel - Pacific Hwy/Mwy between Brisbane (QLD) and Sydney (NSW)
12.5 kHz
Channel 30
477.1500
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 31
477.1750
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 32
477.2000
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 33
477.2250
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 34
477.2500
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 35
477.2750
Emergency Repeater Input (not an emergency channel in New Zealand)
12.5 kHz
Channel 36
477.3000
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 37
477.3250
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 38
477.3500
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 39
477.3750
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 40
477.4000
Road Safety Channel Australia Wide
12.5 kHz
Channel 41
476.4375
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 42
476.4625
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 43
476.4875
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 44
476.5125
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 45
476.5375
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 46
476.5625
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 47
476.5875
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 48
476.6125
Repeater Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 49
476.6375
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 50
476.6625
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 51
476.6875
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 52
476.7125
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 53
476.7375
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 54
476.7625
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 55
476.7875
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 56
476.8125
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 57
476.8375
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 58
476.8625
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 59
476.8875
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 60
476.9125
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 61
476.9375
Reserved due to bandwidth of data channels 22 & 23
-
Channel 62
476.9625
Reserved due to bandwidth of data channels 22 & 23
-
Channel 63
476.9875
Reserved due to bandwidth of data channels 22 & 23
-
Channel 64
477.0125
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 65
477.0375
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 66
477.0625
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 67
477.0875
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 68
477.1125
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 69
477.1375
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 70
477.1625
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 71
477.1875
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 72
477.2125
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 73
477.2375
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 74
477.2625
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 75
477.2875
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 76
477.3125
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 77
477.3375
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 78
477.3625
Repeater Input
12.5 kHz
Channel 79
477.3875
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
Channel 80
477.4125
General Chat Channel
12.5 kHz
My kids and I tend to use channel 70 because there is very little traffic up there
That sounds like the Australian system, not the UK system. In the UK we have legal access to uhf licence free frequencies on 446 & within the amateur 433 mhz bend. But legally these are for handheld radio use only, with no external antennas & milliwatts of power only, so realistically & legally distances of yards not kilometres, unless between very high points. Such as their use on high altitude balloons.
Currently within Europe, the UK included. We have 80 legal channels, with SSB being legal & no licence being required & I believe up to 10 watts of power. But the original UK system was for 40 channels, 4 watts, limited size antenna & a licence was required.
I do not use CB as I am a radio amateur & I use 28 to 30 mhz, not 27 mhz.
The propagation you mention was a result of the 11 year solar cycle & we have been through a few of those since. Currently, we are just leaving solar cycle minimum. But other forms of perpetration exist on 27- 30 mhz. So some days are totally dead & occasionally propagation is good.
CB is not dead, with users still there & I would imagine that the Italians are still a problem when the propagation is running north-south as the Italians are renowned for using a lot of power. But from what I know. Things are a lot quieter now than they were during the Solar Cycle maximum during the early 80’s as that cycle was a good one. And thus, I do remember it well.
Currently looking at the NASA site we are getting some very good days, with 50 sunspots recorded last month. And although we are at the start of Solar Cycle 25, 24 has not yet finished, or only just finished. I am not sure which. So average sunspot numbers should start to climb from around now as Solar Cycle 25 started in 2019, so will benefit from the end of 24.
