HI SEan,   
      
   On Sun 2011-Aug-07 10:24, Sean Dennis (1:18/200) wrote to Richard Webb:   
      
    RW> Bristol going north up the interstate you can hit it.  I've still got   
    RW> it programmed in my mobile rig in case we get up through there again.   
      
   SD> I'll have to ask a friend of mine who is moving from here back to   
   SD> Richmond since his wife just got a good job there.  As for the   
   SD> "commercials", yeah, some of those guys have some seriously funny   
   SD> stuff programmed in there.  On the 146.800 machine out of Marietta,   
   SD> Georgia, run by the Kennahoochie ARC, on timing out the repeater, it   
   SD> will say "GOTCHA!" and then you'll hear Vincent Price laughing like   
   SD> an evil madman.  Up here, the local club is too cheap to replace the   
   SD> nearly 40 year old repeater that's having problems.  That and   
   SD> they're hemorrhaging members but that's a story for another place.   
      
   YEp, our big club here in MEmphis just bought a new machine   
   for its big footprint repeater, my only gripe is they won't   
   leave the pl on it!  IT gets a little desense action, it   
   shares tower space with a tv station and a bunch of other   
   stuff afaik.  IT's a pain to monitor when they shut the   
   damned tone off, as it has one of those three tone "doodle   
   oot" courtesy beeps, so it sits there and goes sshhht   
   doodle-oot kerchunk, over and over again sometimes.   
      
   I used to do mp3 stuff for the SLidell, La. club's machine   
   once in awhile when I lived there.  Also used to like the id commercials on   
   the 47.21 in Burnsville, Mn.  TOpical,   
   they're the skywarn connection for twin cities, or were back then iirc.  THey   
   had a guy who could imitate JOhn WAyne and   
   other famous personalities rather well, and he did some real funny stuff.    
   FIrst time I head one of them on that machine   
   we were driving up interstate 35 in a snowstorm heading for   
   Kathy's sister's house in Bloomington so we could attend a   
   funeral as it turned out.  Trip was originally flying trip   
   for Kathy to see auntie one last time before she did the big crump.  We didn't   
   make it.   
      
    RW> memory channel department. SOmething like that rig would be way cool   
    RW> though for portable stuff.   
      
   SD> I'm betting that there is probably a speech synth add-on for the   
   SD> 897.  It seems to have everything else available for it!  By the   
   SD> way, when typing to you, I always try to keep in mind that you're   
   SD> using a reader for messages and I try to make sure that my messages   
   SD> will be easier for the reader to read it back to you properly.   
      
   DOesn't hurt with most text, you probably noticed I had to   
   ask somebody to explain their ascii drawing the other day.   
   sOmetimes if I put my nose to the screen I can decipher   
   them, but ...   
      
   As for the Yaesu 8xx series, don't know if they have speech   
   or not.  Main reason I'm so resistant to buying Yaesu is   
   that most of their products that even offer speech it's very limited, and   
   doesn't talk to you nice in the menus so   
   necessary to configure a complex piece of equipment to make   
   the features benefit you.  i have a Yaesu ft-2800m vhf   
   mobile in the van, and it's been more rock solid than many   
   Kenwood mobiles except their older ones that live in the   
   vehicle, but it's a pita to set up ctcss tones, etc. without sighted   
   assistance, which means we pull over to the side of   
   the road and tinker with the radio.  But, it's 60 watts on   
   high power, and adequately heat sinked so that it can run   
   high power when mounted in the usual places without   
   overheating, which most of my later model KEnwoods couldn't   
   in those conditions.   
      
   I bought that Yaesu sort of under duress, local radio store   
   never seemed to have one of those little dual band brick   
   amplifiers you could drive with a handheld and get 50 watts   
   on vhf in stock, he said he had too high a rate of return on them, and I   
   needed at least 50 watts for mobile on 2 as we   
   were going to be doing a lot of traveling, I had cash money   
   in my pocket earmarked to make that happen right now.  tHe   
   only thing he had in stock that fit was that 2800m.  STill,   
   on the up side, it's darned reliable, and has 200 memory   
   channels.  I've got repeaters from one end of the   
   MIssissippi river to the other programmed in it, and still   
   have about a hundred memory channels left .   
   Again topical, that means the main sky warn for every locale that runs such a   
   program along my usual routes.  IT does the automatic 162 mhz noaa weather   
   radio seek too, and I could   
   program it for the same codes in my area if I wished iirc.   
      
      
      
   SD> I hear a lot of the 8x7 rigs on the air as they all seem to be   
   SD> popular. However, you won't hear me on the air for a while: I sold   
   SD> off my IC-718, tuner and desk mic yesterday.   
      
   Bummer!  I like the 718.  That's a good radio.  THere are a   
   lot of them out there, and they're priced reasonable.   
      
    RW> Back on topic, you folks in northern latitudes might have   
    RW> seen some aurora last night I see thanks to all the funky   
    RW> magnetic activity and a coronal mass ejection which impacted earth   
    RW> about 1800 utc yesterday. Spaceweather.com said it might impact gps   
    RW> satellite and the like last night on an email I saw forwarded to me.   
      
   SD> I was noticing problems with GPS last night; my TomTom was having   
   SD> problems keeping a signal acquired even though it had nine   
   SD> satellites in its acquisition signal.   
      
   Wow, you're the first I've heard of then, but that explains   
   'em I'll betcha .   
      
   SD> This morning, it is a steamy, slightly cool, and drizzly morning.  A   
   SD> good morning for me to spend cleaning up the house on my day off. :)   
      
   Kathy and I have to do week's supply of dog water as even   
   though we medicate her with preventative for fleas and   
   parasites we do the Bob Ackley treatment of her drinking   
   water.  THen it's clean air conditioner filters time, and   
   take Kathy's computer out of the cabinet and see what's what with a cd drive   
   she can't access, time to wiggle the cable   
   or replace I guess.   
      
   Regards,   
              Richard   
   ---   
    * Origin:  (1:116/901)