On march 23 our club is going to be participating as a special event station. My question is about operating on 60 meters SSB as a special event station. Is it legal? Would it be bad form? Our club is not serious about any of the special event station operation. We just want to operate at the Horseshoe Bend National Military Park to help commemorate the battle of Horseshoe Bend. We are hoping that our operation will expose many visitors to ham radio. Do you think that there is even enough activity on 60 meters to consider it a band for operating in this event? We are probably going to set up 3 stations and operate 80, 40, and 20 meters, so if 60 meters should not be considered it will not impact the operation at all.
I would not do it. 60m being channelized, I'd consider it pretty rude to monopolize the tiny space we have on the band. It's not illegal I'm pretty sure - but just not a very good idea and you'd likely get a lot of flack. There are a lot of folks who frown on Special Events even running on WARC bands - I wouldn't run there either. I've done a few SES event myself, and always stay on the "traditional bands where contests are allowed" Dave W7UUU
Over and above the channelized nature of 60-meters, I think it's a good idea to keep special events and contests and similar things not just off it, but off all the WARC bands. Hey, even in my old age I like to contest in a relaxed way and chase special event stations, but the WARC bands provide a haven for those that eschew those things.
60 is complicated. I don't think we should be afraid to use it, just be very sensitive to the primary users. At the first peep of anything that doesn't sound like hams, pull the plug. 60 has some really unique characteristics, making it useful when 75 and 40 are not. If you are looking for lots of contacts, 60 is probably not the place.
Thanks you guys have confirmed my suspicions. We will just stick to the traditional bands. On a side note. I operated on a net frequency on 75 meters during winter field day. Again our club is a bunch of older hams and we don't take things serious. I made a few contacts of guys just telling me that the frequency would be needed at a certain time. Some of the fellows started out like they were looking for a fight but when I started rag chewing with them and let them know that I had no intentions of tying up their frequency then they were my friends. Our winter field day which was small and only lasted 4 hours picked up 2 new hams. One just passed his extra and one just passed his technician. You never know what will be productive in expanding your club.
Don't be afraid to operate on 60-meters. Just stay in the channels, don't interfere during interoperability exercises, and keep the ERP at 100-watts.
The WARC Bands IARU agreement which has been codified in the official records states: "Contest activity and point collections shall not take place on these bands". Many USA stations are violating the spirit of these rules, with all the Special Event Stations, or QSO parties, which are just forms of "Point Collections". I would never use those bands now including 60 meters for Point collection or contest when I'm operating my U.S.station. It just makes it harder for DX stations and others to use these smaller bands (So think about it, and tell the ARRL, that all of these QSO parties and Special Events on the WARC Bands are sending a bad massage to the rest of the world, about USA Hams). K0UO/V31KW
