How much are our bands worth?

So just how much are our bands worth?

Well 40MHz of what was our 2.3GHz / 13cms band has just been sold in the UK for £5.125million / MHz.

And 40MHz of what was our 3.4GHz / 9cms band went for £7.925million / MHz.

Our allocated spectrum is priceless Andy, but those bands are not worth this sort of money to amateurs - use or lose?

73 Phil

I believe some of the proposed new satellites intend to use 13cm for communications - what happens when they are over a country that has sold off the complete 13cm amateur band for commercial use?

73 Ed.

The power density /Hz will probably be very low plus the satellites will seldom be in the boresite of your antenna. Thus for terrestrial narrowband amateur use the problem might not be great.

In another forum, great indignation is being expressed by members of the Microwave Community because the RSGB VHF Manager has given his approval for the use of 144.175 MHz for terrestrial FT8 activity, even though this frequency has traditionally been used in the UK and Western Europe for talkback during microwave experiments.

Walt (G3NYY)

If true that is inexcusable!

Did OFCOM not auction part of the spectrum in the 2.3GHz and 3.4GHz bands formerly used by the Ministry of Defence last year for the 5G network.

73
Graeme

5G Frequency Bands and Spectrum Allocation in the UK

No, the spectrum was given up by the MoD and taken from amateurs. The auctions were last week, the prices paid (£1.1billion) were released today.

When it comes to 13cms I think the GM SOTA community (and others) are doing a sterling job of making it clear it is in use.

If you ask the same question of the DC bands, the answer would be zilch due to electronic smog!

Just you wait till all the cordless car chargers appear if you think the LF bands are bad.

I have direct emails from the RSGB VHF Manager - in response to one I sent to RSGB on the matter of 144.174 - his response was that the use of 144.174 for FT8 is in line with the IARU R1 bandplan and that as 144.175 is not used for microwave talk-back that will be removed from the RSGB band-plan.

If I had not raised the matter he probably would not have even known that 144.175 is still used for microwave. He simply said we should find another frequency.

Tell him to visit a taxidermist!:laughing: