Stories about harassment by the man etc?

[CopperCone]

Does anyone have any good stories or links togood stories related to the authorities investigating radio law violations? I thought it might be interesting.

Or problems that led you to investigate interference

A good one I recall was an old refrigerator causing microwave cell tower interference lol.

[cncjerry]

Early on with DSL ATT was putting in these boxes that caused all kinds of noise on 80M.  I worked with Ed Hare at ARRL to figure it out.  Called ATT and they removed them, at least the ones in my neighborhood.  I don't know what they used to replace them but I'm sure it was painful.

These days post Riley Hollingsworth, I really think Amateur enforcement has tailed off.  Look a the mess on 80M around 3.840, 3.89 or 3.908 on the west coast.  There have been complaint after complaint against W6WBJ, "Worlds Best Jammer", including a NAL, etc, etc. without a court date set for what, 9yrs?  He personally ran Art Bell and his gang off the radio and I always thought that gang was interesting to listen to as Art had a large budget for radios and a killer antenna. Ran about 5KW.  I just put up a new antenna and I'm not even tuning it into the upper part of the phone band on 80M.  I've never seen such a foul, drunken, cross section of humanity, clearly embarrassing, and I know I'm painting with a broad brush.  Some of the guys that participate in the reverse name calling are professionals (Drs, Attnys, etc) and it's almost like some internet forums have closed down and dumped them on 80M.  I'm sure there are a lot of very nice people but let me tell you, the idiots have taken over in that slot of the band from about 3.84 to 3.91 (with the exception of the AMers on 3.87). 

I wrote two lengthy letters to the FCC asking them to either 1) prosecute the case or 2) say they give up.  They replied that they are looking into it.  I sent the second letter asking for clarification on the first.  No reply.  I had breakfast with a prior FCC chairman when I was funding a company. I know they are battling with free speech issues to some extent and I expect to see a rule change in the future on prohibited behaviors.  Even the jamming is on weak ground because of the comparison to a DX pile-up or when a net calls for check-ins and everyone hits their mic at once.

Enough said.  I think you opened a door here...  

Jerry

[dmills]

I (really my parents) got a visit back in the day from the man from the post office (They used to be responsible for radio communications over here!), seems my experiments with a QQV0640 self oscillating "radio mic" were unwelcome and that they should ban me from playing with active devices....

Bloke was back two weeks later,  seems that an improvised Paulsen arc into a long wire down the garden was NOT what he had in mind by no active devices. I had the tank coil would around the legs of a chair, the tank cap was two cardboard boxes covered in foil that would slide inside each other and the current limiter was a two bar electric fire in series with the mains. Hydrogen was by thermal dissociation of alcohol from a bottle of gin, the rectifier was a synchronous design made from a cake tin lid and small synchronous motor and I was trying to modulate the thing with a carbon mic in series with the aerial, I was maybe 13 years old. 

I got marched up to the local BBC site and into the presence of their chief engineer (How long ago this was, such folk existed), quoth the man from the PO "He is going to do it anyway, you may as well teach him to do it right!". I spent the next couple of years bunking off school whenever I knew maintenance on a 'sender' or other interesting plant was scheduled. That guy was awesome.

Regards, Dan.

[usagi]

the FCC doesn't really have any enforcement authority. they are a regulatory organization, not enforcement. they can only levy civil fines, which jammers regularly ignore.

usually the way to get criminal LEO involved is if the jamming involves public safety or copyright.

[DaJMasta]

My dad's told me a story about working at a site that developed active jamming hardware that actually involves some FCC enforcement, though it's sort of 'the man' enforcing their rules on a different 'the man.'

So they were working along in their lab with relatively functional sensory equipment but needing to develop software/sliced hardware to actually pick out the important parts of the data and prioritize them, and in their testing they found some local interference that wasn't present the past week.  Between the frequency band it was at and a couple of speeding tickets, they identified that a cop with an out of calibration speed radar gun had setup camp on a road going past the site, and thanks to the fairly high end for the time equipment they were testing with, they knew definitively that it was spewing out interference where it shouldn't have been and was not meeting the FCC requirements for such a device.

So they called up the local police and told them that there was this faulty radar gun being used at these times at this location, since their equipment was basically designed to pinpoint it, and recommended that it get fixed/serviced/whatever so it would work normally and not interfere with their work... but the same gun showed up around the same place the following week, so they reported it to the FCC.  As I understand, federal agents showed up at the local police HQ and the faulty radar gun never appeared in their data again. 

I can't imagine they have much bite as an organization, but I think they can get support from other agencies for at least some enforcement.



It's sort of a shame I've heard relatively few stories about that work, since it was defense related electronic warfare work it's basically under indefinite NDA even though it's been decades now, but the few I do hear have been pretty interesting!

[CJay]

I've not got any 'direct' stories but in the good/bad old days before CB was legal here in the UK the mythology and folklore that grew up around 'the man' created some spectacularly bad interpretations of how the technology worked, including one who told me in all seriousness that the RIS could detect illegal crystals in the air for hours after you'd stopped transmitting and the only way to stop it was to run the radio inside a lead lined box.

There is a debate on the RSGB tech forums about an article in the Times where someone is complaining that their WiFi is being degraded because a neighbour who's a ham has erected a new antenna tower and hasn't got planning permission, it's quite disheartening and, if the story isn't something made up to puff a legal firm that specialises in planning law, isn't going to go well for the ham.

[bd139]

That's hilarious.

Slightly to the side of the real issues, but I've had some threats already and I only got my foundation a couple of months back. My neighbour accused me of spying on her and would call the police because she though the balun box on my antenna pole was a camera  . Not totally sure this has been resolved either because the woman didn't understand why I would be doing this because she wouldn't and had no perspective other than her own. I expect some harassment from the man soon. Fortunately it's just a squid pole so it's 100% temporary so planning can fuck off.

I am seriously considering moving to somewhere where there are no neighbours if I'm honest. Especially as my neighbour is a "loud Italian" which is all you can hear on HF anyway as well...

[CopperCone]

'do i look like a fbi agent to you lady?'

[usagi]

My neighbour accused me of spying on her and would call the police because she though the balun box on my antenna pole was a camera  . Not totally sure this has been resolved either because the woman didn't understand why I would be doing this because she wouldn't and had no perspective other than her own.

typical pearl clutching crazy cat lady who peers at everyone all day through her blinds and keeps a notebook on all the perceived "offenses" everyone "commits".

sounds like my friend's crazy neighbor who was annoyed we were having a picnic at his house, so she opened her windows and called the police on the speakerphone just so we could hear. was quite satisfying to hear the police tell her to basically jump off a cliff. her reaction was priceless.

[bd139]

Yep that's the class of crazy.

Got to watch out for dog walkers as well. They cause a lot of self-righteous trouble.

[VK5RC]

A funny tale of one government department fighting another, ending well for Hams. Some years ago when the paranoia of mobile phone towers was at its highest, a lot of local councils brought in laws to prohibit them. Radio communications are under Federal laws and the constitution says federal laws win! The results were that Hams (and mobile companies) can build a tower up to 10m with the local council only getting involved from the footings design.
Good neighbourhood relationships still apply in practice.

[GerryBags]

I wonder how much trouble I'd get into if I started mucking about with RF where I live? It's something I'm interested in learning more about.... but I live right under a section of the Mach Loop in N Wales. I really don't fancy causing some sort of issue aboard a fast jet trying to get the hang of low-level flying, but I do fancy being able to earwig on their comms (if that's even possible) to find out when they're going to be overhead. You have to be lucky to catch them otherwise, as the surrounding mountains stop much of the engine noise until they're right on top of you and then 20- 30 seconds later they've banked and disappeared behind another mountain. Have had some great catches, having said that, but never when I've got a camera to hand.

The background is quite pretty, too.... just not many neighbours to shift the blame onto if an official visit did eventuate. 
(not my pic)

[bd139]

To quote ofcom “it is illegal to listen to anything other than general reception transmissions unless you are either a licensed user of the frequencies in question or have been specifically authorised to do so by a designated person.”.

So yes that would be illegal. Also difficult as they have likely rolled out bowman now so only ATC ops will be on VHF and unencrypted.

I doubt you’d ever get caught. Worst case you’d get the ofcom “Tactical Spectrum Enforcement Unit” descend from helicopters onto you to serve the deadliest weapon in their arsenal, the “enforcement notice of doom”.

I’ve been building transmitters for about 5 years without a license  .  Got one now though

[kj7e]

At a former home I had a nice tower and antenna array for HF.  On weekend mornings I would join some local 40m AM nets, so I had a 40m rotatable dipole mounted off the side of my tower at 50' ele for high angle of incidence radiation (worked fantastic).  Being a broadcast engineer I have always loved power and would run full legal limit AM through a Henry 4K Ultra.  I had one neighbor in particular who felt it was not his job to protect his new surround sound system from RFI and complained persistently to both the county and FCC.  This lead to multiple visits from the county building inspector who found all of my paper work in order and to code.  Later, I had a surprise visit from a FCC coordinator, a local HAM who was to do a preliminary station inspection and report back to the FCC.  I more than welcomed the inspection and rather enjoyed being able to demonstrate my gear.  ultimately, the FCC handed the complaining neighbor a RFI handbook and told me my station was well in compliance.


74' freestanding tower;




The AM station at the time;


I had better test equipment than the inspector;




I had a few run-ins with this particular neighbor,  It started when I erected the tower and would sometimes just climb it to hang out up top to get a view of the city.  He didn't like me looking in his backyard I recall.  One day late in the evening after I had got back from a shooting competition, I was in the living room cleaning my guns when someone knocked on the door.  I opened the door partway to find the complaining neighbor and his opening words where in a very forceful tone "I want to know what you are going to do to fix your interference?!"   I opened the door the rest of the way, I was still holding my 1911 which I was still cleaning, once he noticed it, his tone changed and he rephrased himself to know what he could do, HAHahaha.  I was polite and asked if he would like to come in and talk, but he nervously made up a reason why he had to get home and apologized for bothering late in the evening.  He never came back around.

Me working on one of my previous towers;


Yep, thats me at the top of this 150' tower, I had to climb out to the driven element on the upper 20m 6ele monobander and fix a burnt N connector from a lightning hit.  That was fun;





Also did some climbing on our stations 360' tower on South Mountain near Phoenix AZ;

[ahbushnell]

Wow!

[GerryBags]

Wow indeed! The view from up the tower in the last pic must have been incredible. Erm..... what's the big... broadcasty looking.... box to the left of the desk in an earlier pic, please?

[kj7e]

Henry Radio 4K Ultra amplifier, used a single 8877 but the power supply in the 4K ran the snot out of it.  I've had a dozen big Henrys over the years, built like tanks.

[janoc]

Wow indeed! The view from up the tower in the last pic must have been incredible. Erm..... what's the big... broadcasty looking.... box to the left of the desk in an earlier pic, please?

Looks like a power amp. Impressive setup, though!

[GerryBags]

Henry Radio 4K Ultra amplifier, used a single 8877 but the power supply in the 4K ran the snot out of it.  I've had a dozen big Henrys over the years, built like tanks.

Now that is a tube and a half! Well, it's a valve really, but we'll let you off. That 4K ran the snot out of one of these?!? Blimey. I just had a look at some pics of the inside of a 4K and it all makes sense. The earth strap from some vast coil to the chassis looks about the same guage as one I saw on a 600bhp Ruston Blackstone tug engine that stood taller than me.

Your poor neighbour must have been picking up your transmissions in the fillings in his teeth! 

[kj7e]

At one point I had a Henry 5K Premier, had a pair fo 8877's 

Better view of the 4K;


4K power supply;


4K RF Deck tuning;


4K RF Deck input;


Here are some of the 5K;


I don't recall what slug I had in the Coaxial Dynamics meter 


5K power supply;


5K RF deck;


I had a supply of 8877's


Also had a few other Henrys that ran 8877's and an Alpha 77SX (2x 8877) at one point.

[bd139]

Think the transformer in that beast weighs more than all my kit 

[mikerj]

Yep that's the class of crazy.

Got to watch out for dog walkers as well. They cause a lot of self-righteous trouble.

Dog walkers and joggers; they always find the dead bodies 

[janoc]

Holy cow, that's one heck of an amplifier!