2 mtrs 146.560 in Texas - what's the story?

[KF5GDY]

I look at the the Texas band plan and the proposed Texas Band plan but see no action and then just mainly see what is the opinion of folks who will do whatever they want to do I suppose. Take the case of 146.560. 146.380 to 146.605 are listed as open simplex frequencies, yet I have seen discussion (dated) on TX ham boards arguing about whether it is permissable to use this specific frequency but no one ever says WHY or WHY NOT. On the other hand, I have seen it mentioned by Texas operators as a "very popular frequency" .

My curiosity comes from having discovered it by mistake, assuming I had correctly set my VFO for a local Galveston County repeater. I begin to hear six or seven operators all talking like they knew each other very well and I even got the feeling that they could have been within line of sight with one another by references in their conversation. As they begin to ID, I noted that all the signs were K6. They were all 5/9 like local and they are there every day from all parts north and south of San Jose CA. I have tried to call one or two severla times without success but they are very strong and consistent. I see no reference to this frequency being a satelitte channel but could it be?

[KF5FEI]

Could be a linked repeater. We have one here in DFW that goes out to the CA system.

[ND5Y]

You are most likely hearing a simplex IRLP, Echolink or similar RoIP node. Probably the reason they didn't hear you was bacause the node requires a CTCSS tone.

Probably this one: http://status.irlp.net/index.php?&nodeid=3269

[KA1MDA]

Up here, there are repeaters scattered all over the simplex portion of the band- mostly Dstar crap, and the rest appear to be mostly Spanish language voice repeaters. When I complained about the repeaters infiltrating the simplex portion of 2 meters to the local coordinator, I was told that following the ARRL suggested bandplan was up to the discretion of the local coordinators. I guess the local coordinator for the adjoining state where all this junk is coming from has a lot of discretion!

Tom

[W3WN]

Up here, there are repeaters scattered all over the simplex portion of the band- mostly Dstar crap, and the rest appear to be mostly Spanish language voice repeaters. When I complained about the repeaters infiltrating the simplex portion of 2 meters to the local coordinator, I was told that following the ARRL suggested bandplan was up to the discretion of the local coordinators. I guess the local coordinator for the adjoining state where all this junk is coming from has a lot of discretion!

Tom

We've seen this the last few years in WPa. When the available "standard" repeater pairs were all assigned, the WPRC started using the "optional" simplex frequencies for repeaters. No publicity of this change outside of the circle of WPRC members ever occurred.

My club drew the wrath of the (up until very recently) frequency coordinator for daring to schedule a 4 hour 2 meter simplex contest for a Saturday evening in January, because we didn't ask his permission before announcing the simplex frequencies to use. I guess we were supposed to know about the "new" assignments by osmosis? (We operated the contest anyway, and have for several years now. No complaints from repeater owners about interference on the inputs. Gee, what a surprise.)

[K1MAL]

You are most likely hearing a simplex IRLP, Echolink or similar RoIP node. Probably the reason they didn't hear you was bacause the node requires a CTCSS tone.

Probably this one: http://status.irlp.net/index.php?&nodeid=3269

Or they could be using tone squelch on their radio's. There is symplex net near hear that does that.

KF5GDY, Try doing a ctcss scan on their audio if your radio allows it.

[WA9SVD]

We've seen this the last few years in WPa. When the available "standard" repeater pairs were all assigned, the WPRC started using the "optional" simplex frequencies for repeaters. No publicity of this change outside of the circle of WPRC members ever occurred.

My club drew the wrath of the (up until very recently) frequency coordinator for daring to schedule a 4 hour 2 meter simplex contest for a Saturday evening in January, because we didn't ask his permission before announcing the simplex frequencies to use. I guess we were supposed to know about the "new" assignments by osmosis? (We operated the contest anyway, and have for several years now. No complaints from repeater owners about interference on the inputs. Gee, what a surprise.)

This seems to be a common activity amoungst Coordination groups in many areas. They have deemed the Emporor status, and feel they have toe power and authority to dictate how simplex frequencies are to be used and organized. here in Southern California , the 2 Meter Coordination group has decided that they will take over coordination of 70 cm as well, and have designated that 2 M simplex only use 15 kHz "channels" of their decision. This goes against the frequencies that our local Amateurs have used for personal communications, as well as the established frequencies ARES has used for over 20 years; they claim WE are interfering with operations on their dictated channels. (When did simplex get designated for specific channels???)
It's up to the general Amateur community to protest the usurping of our rights to simplex operation by the power hungry "Coordination" mongers.

[KE5KTU]

I've been there and know exactly what you are talking about. I contacted the coordinating body over there and he assured me the 2 meter simplex frequencies listed in the arrl band plan have not been given to any one group ( coordinated repeater) which means first come, first serve on the simplex frequencies. DO NOT let anyone tell you diffrent. A friend and I were several minutes into a QSO in that area and a station informed us we could not use the simplex frequeny we were on because he had a repeater there. Long story short, there was a backyard IRLP node on that frequency and if the node had local traffic on it the IRLP people would severe his connection to the Alaska node..... I don't understand why the have the backyard links, there are plenty of COORDINATED repeaters they could add IRLP and Echolink to.
Jake

[K1MAL]

I do not know what the story is in other area's but around here the 2m coordinators are doing a disservice to amateur radio. The state is full of zombie repeaters or ones that arnt even turned on. I think we have more repeaters now then users.

The coordinators need to grow a set and start DE-coordinating these pairs and free spectrum for guys who want to actually make use of the band.

[KE5KTU]

I agree, If the repeater is not on the air I do not think it should be given coordinated status. I think that if the coordinating body got a phone call every day about the same repeaters not being on the air, eventually they may actually do something about it ! Lol