On Mon, 11 Jun 2007 23:02:21 -0400 "Stephen W. Kercel" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> As for legality, for FCC licensed stations, signing "/QRP" is > perfectly legal. FCC Regs 97.119(c) allows for "self-assigned > indicators." There is an interesting gotcha to the rule. The last > sentence of the regulation says "No self-assigned may conflict with > any other indicator specified by the FCC rules, or with any prefix > assigned to another country." Q signals, including QRP, pose no such > conflict. However, as W3BE points out, other popular "self-assigned > indicators" are illegal, particularly "/M," commonly used by mobile > stations, a prefix assigned to the UK, That's an odd one! The prefix "M" is indeed assigned to the UK and used in the amateur service. But in the UK "/M" it is also the legally assigned suffix to be used when operating "from a vehicle or as a pedestrian" (leaving aside the recent regulation change in the UK which seems to have made the use of the suffixes for mobile/portable etc. optional). As far as I can read in our regs there's nothing to prevent adding /QRP to one's callsign. As long as your "basic" call is given correctly then anything else is allowed in a QSO - tagging /QRP to the end seems to me to be just part of the rest of the QSO. It's splitting hairs to worry about the difference between "GM4SLV/QRP" and "GM4SLV<space>QRP" and (when I'm sending!!) "GM4SLV<might be a space, might not be who can tell>/QRP" As to actually signing /QRP I tend to agree that in general it's pointless and even counterproductive, as it seems to put some people off - a real 559 turns into 339 in the mind of the op at the other end when the seed of "oh - it's a QRP station" doubt is sown too early in the QSO! I do find it useful as a QRP operator to know in advance that the weak station I can hear is actually QRP because then (through the theory of reciprosity) I can assume that he'll hear me just as well as I can hear him. Without this clue (/QRP) I tend assume other signals are from "normal" 100w stations and therefore I'll be receiving 13dB more signal from them than they will from me. I'll switch in my attenuator and see how it still sounds. If he's still workable I'll give him a call (not signing /QRP). I never sign /QRP but accasionally I'll add "QRP" into a CQ call if I'm on one of the QRP calling frequencies and want to inform other QRPers that I'll be able to hear them, if they can hear me. Cheers John GM4SLV Shetland Isles UK _______________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Post to: Elecraft@mailman.qth.net You must be a subscriber to post to the list. Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.): http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com
