Hello, Richard.   
      
   Friday August 05 2011 at 21:00, you wrote to me:   
      
    RW> little anemic in the power department.  I won't have   
    RW> anything under 50 watts for my primary 2 meter rig mobile   
    RW> these days.  tOo many repeaters are alligators, even many on big sky   
    RW> hooks.  Comes from not being split site, loss and whatnot thanks to   
      
   I'm really not using it for its VHF capabilities but for its HF capabilities.   
   Concerning 2 meters (there's but one 440 repeater around here and rarely   
   used), a majority of the repeaters here are linked and on mountain tops so   
   it's pretty easy to hit a repeater.  I can work Bristol, TN/VA, about 30 miles   
   NNE of here, on 1 watt simplex and on 5 watts via a repeater, I can work   
   stations within a 75 mile range rather easily.   
      
   What I want the 897 for is my love of "mountaintopping" (for those that don't   
   know, that term means I like to take a portable ham radio up to a mountain top   
   and work stations from all over the world from that location; many hams jump   
   on the opportunity to work "rare DX" meaning talking to me in a rarely-used   
   location by a ham radio operator) and mobile HF operations.  I've my eye on a   
   motorized Little Tarheel screwdriver antenna for mobile HF stuff.   
      
   I'd mainly do that for ARES support if need be since the 897 can do packet   
   natively and digital modes very easily.  Then again, deciding to call CQ from   
   an unusual spot sounds like fun too.  I can go park over at the college and do   
   a little DXing from there.    
      
   I've talked with my wife about putting a FT-857 in each of my vehicles too but   
   uh, well, that motion was overruled at this time. :P   
      
   Later,   
   Sean   
      
   ... The chief cause of problems is solutions.   
   --- GoldED/2 3.0.1   
    * Origin: Paragon BBS - paragon.darktech.org (1:18/200)